Kristina K. Carlton wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> I have been trying to get my blood glucose down and have finally made the
> decision to cut my protein intake. I know that things won't change overnight
> but I am a little confused.
>
> Sunday I had 45g carbs, 82g protein, and 93g of fat with a total of 1336
> calories. My carbs came from lettuce, black olives, water chestnuts, and 1/2
> carrot. The next morning my FBG was 88 which is a lot lower than it normally
> is and I was pretty happy about it.
>
> Yesterday I had 50g carbs, 91g protein, and 110g of fat with a total of 1512
> calories. My carbs came from collard greens and kale both cooked. This
> morning my FBG was 100. 
>
> How can that be? Why would it be that high? I do have a lot of stress in my
> life otherwise I can't think of what would cause this.
>
> I drink green tea, white tea, or decaf in the morning and then herbal teas
> or decaf green tea during the day. No sweeteners...I as using stevia for a
> while but stopped. Does stevia affect blood glucose?
>
> Any suggestions?
>
> Thanks,
> Kristina
>   
First of all, strss *can* cause FBG to rise.  The stress hormone 
cortisol does exactly that.  It prepares your body for "fight or flight" 
by making glucose, the explosive exertion fuel, more available.

Second, home glucometers are not perfectly reliable.  I don't know if 
the instructions for yours mention not washing your hands with soaps 
that contain glycerin (many do contain it), because glycerin residue on 
your fingertips can raise the BG reading.  In any case, it's the general 
trend you want to watch, and don't be too concerned about occasional 
readings that don't fit the curve.

Third, since you're carefully monitoring your intakes, you might 
experiment to see how tight the correlation between protein and FBG is.  
A 9g difference doesn't seem like much, but in conjunction with a 5g 
increase in carbs it might have been sufficient to cause a rise.  I'm 
inclined to doubt it, but you never know.

Thanks for sharing your results.  I think monitoring BG is one of the 
simplest and most direct things we can do to get feedback about the 
metabolic effects of our diet.  I know that I was surprised to learn 
that Owsley "Bear" Stanley's FBG is 99 after 40+ years of a meat-only diet.

Todd Moody
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