Higher glucose over previous years

(Ethan) #42

I think there is a big difference between a fasting glucose of 120 and one of 140…and the article doesn’t mention a1c, but I can guarantee that it wouldn’t consider an a1c of 6 good or normal for keto

(Joey) #43

You’ve offered an intriguing combination of observations…

Since your glucose rises when you exercise - not when you eat - doesn’t this suggest the increase is not about your diet? Instead, couldn’t it simply be a healthy response by your liver to the demand being placed by your muscles for energy?

Do you mind sharing more details on the specific carbs you’re eating? I’d be keenly interested in understanding what kind of carbs seem to be successfully addressing your concerns over elevated glucose.

What is leading you to conclude that you’re on the path to becoming a diabetic? Countless diabetics have reversed/resolved their elevated glucose levels by restricting their carbs. How might increasing carbs help you avoid becoming a diabetic?

As a highly energetic, carb-restricted athlete, your concerns over serum glucose (created by the demands of your body - i.e., not your diet) present a very interesting case. It could be of help to others to walk us through the basis for the conclusions reached thus far. Many thanks!

(Bob M) #44

For me, my blood sugar goes up when I exercise. I personally don’t find that to be a big deal.

There are certain people who do get “higher” blood sugar on low carb/carnivore. Shawn Baker at one time had a very high HbA1c and high glucose, though I think he’s lowered it now. But Shawn Baker is on a different planet concerning exercise and physical ability.

I’ve seen that some/many LMHRs also have higher blood sugar, again most likely due to exercise.

I think it’s the body’s way of creating enough glucose to replenish glycogen and for whatever other reason your body needs this. (And this is why eating more carbs lowers the blood sugar – you’re feeding the need for glycogen using exogenous glucose.)

Are you becoming “diabetic” because of this? No, because I bet if you measured your insulin level, it would be low. What causes diabetes? The pancreas, in large part. It pushes out too much insulin or gets exhausted and can no longer push out insulin.

So, we’re only looking at one side of the equation, which is blood sugar. We’re not looking at what matters as much, if not more, which is your pancreas and insulin.

Get a fasting insulin test done, or better yet, a 2 hour Kraft test (OGTT, with insulin measured at least before, 1 hour and 2 hours after 75g glucose drink).

(Bob M) #46

Do the benefits of ACV supplementation outweigh the detriments (including possible damage to teeth or other side effects)?

What would you actually be achieving, other than changing a number?

By the way, Dr. Georgia Ede has a good email this month about ACV. Includes this study, which looked at RCTs:

I recommend her email (Diagnosis Diet), and it’s infrequent.

#47

A remember a couple years ago Shawn Baker’s FBG was 127, his A1C was commensurately high and his total and free testosterone were very low. This was after being carnivore for quite a while.

I think he says his blood sugar is lower now but I’m unclear on what he did. Doe anyone know? I don’t really follow him closely. I don’t think he has yet joined some of the other carnivores in eating fruit and honey.

#49

Thank you for trying to help, @amwassil. You had already posted it somewhere and I had already read it.

However, I don’t get any answer to my questions in this article. Somewhere the author says something like ‘should you worry’… ‘maybe’.

The references the author uses are youtube videos, the opinion of people. Opinions.

In the meantime, there’s a science paper out there saying people with BG in prediabetic range may already have lost 40% of their beta cells.

Glycated ldl may be the cause of stuff like atherosclerosis. Being in ketosis means glycation your LDL suddenly is ok? No one has the answer yet. I’m afraid of just hoping for the best. Sorry about the misspellings, English is a very foreign language to me.

Does the level of ketosis affect how well one may do with high BG? Who knows?

As for vinegar, I’ve tried and it didn’t work for me. And as @ctviggen says, there’s the potential of hurting my teeth. I consume it with food and also have drank it in water with a straw to avoid my teeth. No luck on glucose numbers. If it acts on ingested carbs, anyway, since the food I eat doesn’t affect my glucose, it won’t solve my problem.

@SomeGuy, I don’t have answers. I can tell you what is my reasoning, but I’m so ignorant in these matters, take it with 10 spoons of sea salt.

I thought of the following hypothesis: for decades, I’ve exercised on an empty stomach.

In the meantime: I could never increase my speed. There’s a wall I could never break.

So, my thoughts now: could it be that my body just got so used to dumping glucose from any place it could find, including destroying my muscles (therefore I was never fast, never strong)? Could my insulin resistance come from there? Not from insulin doing to my pancreas dealing with food, but dealing with all the internally dumps from my liver?

Then, when I moved to keto, it became worse, because I had even less carbs.

I’m not saying this would apply to other people, but aren’t we all different? Could it perhaps explain my situation? Who knows?

So, I was thinking that, perhaps having more carbs, I could eventually get a message sent to my liver that it can decrease the dumping of glucose.

At the moment, I’m at about 50g net carbs per day. Some days, as high as 60. Some days, as low as 30. And my average glucose is at 103 mg/dL. I’ve started to have 24h averages below 100. My fasting BG is below 100, just below.

Is this a coincidence? Is this real? Just the normal error of the CGM sensor? Only time will tell.

If it is real, was it the carbs? Or the changes in exercise?

My exercise at the moment: walking 2h, about 30 min of walk/sprints in the middle of this 2h walk.

On somewhat alternate days, I’m jogging 6k at 9.5 km/h and walking after the jogging.

I’m not doing other forms of exercise at the moment, because of the weather and the place of the world I’m working these months. Too miserable. I do a bit of body weight/resistance exercise, but not much.

I suspect the exercise change is way more likely to be the reason than the carb up, but I don’t know. I’ve also moved to less sat fats. My fats are coming also from fatty fish, nuts and olives. I still eat cheese, but only a few times a week.

I don’t know if you have seen this:

Screenshot_20220127-161635
Screenshot_20220127-161635.jpg1480×720 180 KB

Never mind the other curves, the interesting one is the blue. Look where the A1c of Virta patients was at the beginning and where it is headed. The last point is 3.5 years. The source of this image is a talk of Dr Phinney on youtube.

It kind of made me think that the diet alone isn’t the answer. If this Virta patients, with all the resources and specialists they have at their disposal, can’t keep their A1c down, what about the common mortal? I’m sure many can, but it can’t be generalized. I may be one of the people for whom it doesn’t work.

Why I think I’m going to become diabetic? Because my numbers aren’t becoming better. If I don’t do something extra, like I’m doing now, my guess is that they’ll continue to go in the wrong direction.

Before I started keto, my doctor thought I was fine. I had one BG of 102. Only the one. Now, before I started this effort to change something, they were consistently above 100. My doctor gave me a prescription for Metformin!

Wasn’t the aim of my keto journey to be medication free? I’m not taking the Metformin yet. I hope I don’t have to.

@ctviggen, my Homa-ir is 1.8. I’m not going to ask for another OGTT test at the moment. I’ll do another A1c in 3 months and see what. If by then my FBG is below 100 and my A1c is below 5.7, I’ll just consider I’ve found the right thing to do for myself and rest the case unless next year it goes bad again.

The reason is stress. I’ve set my goal and I’ll stick to it, then try to live a life without worrying about this, until it gets bad again.

If what I’m seeing now is real, not just a temporary thing, then I’ve found what works for me.

You talk about looking at only one side of the equation. But isn’t glycation a real problem? Insulin resistance is making my BG stay up and that means all that glucose doing damage. I imagine it as big rocks going through pipes. I can’t see why the big rocks wouldn’t cause a damage just because the level of something else in the pipe goes up, or down. So, if my insulin is low, then I’m happy, I won’t have problems linked to high insulin. But it doesn’t mean I won’t have problems linked to high BG.

Do you have a reference (not a YouTube video, not a non peer-reviewed article) that says high BG doesn’t cause damage if insulin is low? If you do, I beg you to share it! It’d make me so happy!

#50

To be honest, the ketosis part doesn’t interest me at all. I’m yet to see one benefit of being in ketosis.

I only eat keto to keep my BG low and insulin low.

Things like brain fog, inflammation, better hair, nails, the cure for all problems… not my issues.

The vinegar didn’t do the blood cleaning for me.

I hope it works for other people and I’m happy if it works for you.

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #51

@Corals What I love about you: you’re registering BG ‘slightly’ above what you think it should be. And instead of thinking ‘I wonder what wrong’s with me that’s resulting in elevated glucose’ you think instead ‘Keto is nonsense’. Hundreds, if not thousands of folks on this very forum, can attest that keto is not nonsense. But your conclusion is 'Keto is nonsense. Please excuse me if I ignore you.

(Joey) #52

@Corals It’s clear you’ve given this topic much consideration and are working to find the relevant science that best explains what you’re experiencing, and how you can best proceed. Kudos.

Reviewing the ground covered throughout this thread I see little of value I can add. Best wishes and please keep us posted on developments. :vulcan_salute:

[BTW, your English is impeccable - like a native speaker!]

(Mark Rhodes) #53

There’s not much more in this [earlier link](https://www.ketogenicforums.com/t/elevated-blood-glucose/97323?u=marklifestyle) in the forums but you are not the first.

I started carnivore in September 2021. 2020 through 2021 my keto diet became less and less carbohydrates. Much more meat. 65%Fat- 30% Protein. During that time I noticed my sugars also going up but my insulin remains about 4.0 uiU/ml. Ill post mine over the last few years. Taken daily 2 hours after awakening but averaged monthly. It is interesting. I think I am somehow being affected by coffee and my HWC. I am going to experiment with this

(Robin) #54

Hey, Michael. That was’t a personal attack. Play nice.

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #55

Maybe I missed it amongst all her posts complaining about how keto doesn’t work, but I don’t recall @Corals saying ‘…for me’. I recall multiple instances of general negation of keto as a thing in itself as if the positive experiences of thousands if not millions of folks from every corner o earth count for nothing.

I don’t apologize for not letting it pass. It’s not an attack on me personally - I couldn’t care less about her opinion of keto. I do care when she portrays keto as something unhealthy generally and a useless exercise on the face of overwhelming evidence that it’s quite the opposite.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #56

I can think of two:

  1. Being in ketosis means that insulin and glucose are low enough to no longer be causing systemic damage.

  2. In addition to serving many organs as fuel, the three ketone bodies, acetoacetate, acetone, and β-hydroxybutyrate, are all potent signaling hormones with beneficial effects on the body.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #57

Ironically, I had an English teacher in high school who kept trying to wean us from saying, “I think that,” and “In my opinion,” on the grounds that every reader knew it was our opinion. But alas, this was pre-Internet, so different logic applied back then.

You youngsters don’t know how well you have it, with dirt all over the place and bread that comes pre-sliced. :grin:

(Mark Rhodes) #60

Nothing happens “suddenly” was my teacher’s favorite. Nor are there accidents. There are a series of events that had unfavorable consequences. Damn I studied under determinism.

(Robin) #61

Good quote.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #62

You Calvinist, you! :smile:

#63

@SunnyNC: I’m tagging you here, because I couldn’t add a reply in the other thread. I had already replied there and there’s a limit. Since I use my phone, I find it complicated to do all of my replies in one go.

I’ll be avoiding the other thread, because I don’t log in often and it is difficult for me to control all the threads I’m interested in. Things accumulate and I get lost.

I’m getting to the point where I’m accepting my changes put me into a good place.

Following my CGM (and I’m testing its results with a normal glucometer sometimes, mainly upon waking up), my 7 day glucose average is below 100 and I no longer have visible dawn phenomenon!

My spikes aren’t as high as before, much much less pronounced. Most of my day I’m below 100. I’m only above when I do high intensity, but I don’t get past 145 anymore. Most importantly: after it goes up, it then comes down as it is supposed to do, getting below 100 before I finish my workout.

I’m not claiming anyone should do the same as myself, nor that it will work for somebody else, but here is what I’m doing:

I’m keeping as low carb as possible but:

  1. eating vegetables in one of my meals
  2. less sat fat and more EVOO, olives
  3. my animal protein comes exclusively from salmon, mackerel, sardines, eggs and cheese
  4. added a second meal that I’ve transformed into a dessert thing: a keto mug cake or two, because I was losing too much weight since these changes started and I don’t want to lose weight. I’m using such things as stevia and erythritol
  5. I’m decreasing salt to protect my kidneys. My sodium and potassium were high last time I had a blood panel

Exercise:

  1. 2h most days
  2. most of it is walking
  3. jogging instead of running and a lot less (5 to 6k, 8.5 to 9.5 km/h). I’ve stopped running 10-15k, 10km/h for the moment, but I may bring it back slowly
  4. when I walk, I do sprints for 30 min (HIIT, kind of). For instance, I walk 1h, do 30 min of sprints/walk, then walk an extra 30 min

I’m super happy my dawn phenomenon is like with normal people: I can’t even see any increase in blood glucose! During the night, it just goes down! When it gets to, say, 50s or 60s, it goes up, but not to 100! It stays below it.

When I exercise, it goes up, but then it comes nicely down while I’m still exercising and continues to go down until I eat.

Before: it would jump up a lot, then it would come down, but stick pretty high, seldom getting below, say, 110 while I was still exercising. Even when I would just walk, or do a flight of stairs.

By the way, when I do a flight of stairs, it barely moves up, or just doesn’t. Before, it’d jump up as if I had gone for a run!

For the record, I have not taken the metformin, nor any other medication.

(SunnyNC) #65

Yeap, I agree. I have read a lot of her blogs on tuit nutrition. She goes on and on about everything …FBG, PhIR, HOMA you name it, everything except increased A1C while on keto. I had posted a comment and don’t think she replied. Increasing A1C is no good, not sure why these so called experts can’t seem to explain this but go great length time to reference 100s of studies defending higher FBG while on long term keto. Oh I know why, there is no way they can justify it increasing A1C is ok, so they focus on other things to support their bias and distract readers

(Joey) #66

@Corals and @SunnyNC Sorry if this thought has already been shared/discussed (it’s gotten hard to keep up entirely with the inter-related threads), but I did want to mention…

Berberine is something to explore, research and consider for lowering blood glucose. Reportedly, it has a similar effect to metformin, although its pathway differs.

I have no personal experience with berberine whatsoever - and there’s a lot of serious research that has been done that’s worth reading before deciding whether it’s a possible supplement to address the concerns you’ve expressed.

If you’re unaware of the research on this supplement, you might simply “Google Scholar” the term: berberine.

Here’s one paper that might be of interest:

Berberine-Type2Diabetes.pdf (357.6 KB)

Final sentence of paper’s conclusion: . “In conclusion, this pilot study indicates that berberine is a potent oral hypoglycemic agent with beneficial effects on lipid metabolism.”