Kristina Carlton wrote:

>My fasting glucose is 100 - 102. I suppose I should not be eating fruit? I
>wasn't eating any but incorporated some apples into my diet. So what exactly
>does an elevated fasting glucose indicate?
>
>

In my opinion, it indicates some degree of insulin resistance.  There is
another consideration, however.  If your fasting blood glucose (FBG) is
measured in the morning, it may be higher than at other times.  This
phenomenon, experienced by many, is called the "morning spike" (Well,
men sometimes use this expression to refer to something else), and it
appears to be a result of the body releasing stored glucose at around
dawn.  Arguably (although I haven't seen it argued), this is a natural
phenomenon whereby your body prepares for the activities of the day.  I
have learned that my later afternoon FBG is always lower than my morning
FBG, and in fact my lowest readings, in the low 80s, have been in the
afternoon.  I've found that doing some short duration high-intensity
exercise, such as a set of pushups to failure (about 35 reps these
days), will push the morning FBG up to 120.  This makes sense, I think,
since I guess my metabolism reads this exercise as a sign that I'm about
to do something violent, and tries to give me the needed fuel.

This article from Life Extension Foundation,
http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2004/jan2004_awsi_01.htm, gives you some
idea why I think FBG is an important thing to track.  I quote: "But
insulin continues to be secreted when blood glucose levels are over 83
mg/dL, which indicates that the pancreas is striving to drive glucose
levels down to a range safer than what aging people typically are able
to achieve."  This, I believe, is the heart of the matter.  In my view,
what we want is for the insulin machine to be turned OFF, except in the
3 or 4 hours after a meal.  During those hours, of course, insulin is
essential for the proper assimilation of nutrients.  It is considered a
"normal part of aging" for FBG to creep up, but I believe this is one of
those "norms" that is just an indicator of accumulated metabolic
damage.  I don't really believe it is normal for human beings to drift
toward type 2 diabetes as they get older.  But the evidence indicates
that it is common.

So, I'm making it my personal priority to try to restore my FBG to the
low 80s, but I haven't found it easy to do.  A zero carb diet doesn't do
it; that much is clear.  Barry Sears has said in his books that the Zone
diet *does* lower FBG dramatically.  The Zone diet, as we know, is only
moderately carb restricted, but the other notable thing about it is that
it tends to be quite low in total calories, and no meal is more than
about 400-500 calories.  I've seen it stated (by Sears and others) that
if you eat more than about 40g of protein at a meal (that's about 6
ounces of lean meat), the insulin response is comparable to that of just
eating carbs.  Of course, the protein, unlike carbs, will also stimulate
the release of glucagon, but that's not entirely positive either, since
glucagon tends to stimulate the release of stored glucose as well.  It's
an open question whether consuming a lot of saturated fats decreases
insulin sensitivity, but some pretty knowledgeable people, such as Ron
Rosedale, believe that it does.  This is one reason why Sears urges
caution in the intake of saturates.  It's also a reason why it may not
be smart to generalize the Inuit diet to any zero-carb (or nearly so)
diet, since the Inuit would normally also be getting a lot of their fats
in the form of marine polyunsaturates.  We also often mention the Masai
as an example of healthy people who eat almost no carbs, but their
overall caloric intake is also quite low.

There is evidence that the reason why fairly severe caloric restriction
slows or reverses the aging process is because it reduces fasting
insulin.  We've discussed this on here before.  In my view, the
reduction of carbs, and elimination of refined carbs, is a very large
first step toward reducing fasting insulin, but it's not the whole
story.  Total caloric intake may not be the whole story either, so I
find myself thinking more and more about size and timing of meals, and
duration of fasting intervals between them.

Todd Moody
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