How do you explain this?

science
(THERESA PITTS) #1

I’ve been keto for 6 months and doing great. My husband is more paleo than keto, he eats cereal and fruit. I haven’t gone over my carb limit since I started Keto. So, last night I decided I wanted sushi. I had one roll with rice being the only non keto component. Hubby had two rolls. About an hour after eating, my BG was 134 (normally 85ish) and his was 94. What would explain his BG being much lower than mine?

(Christopher Bingel) #2

We are all unique special snowflakes.

I’m mostly kidding, but every body’s metabolism is different. I had a cheat day when I was on vacation a few weeks ago that included a pint of Ben and Jerry’s (totally worth it, btw) and my blood glucose didn’t budge. I had a mixed drink that had a splash of OJ in it, and I was up around 200.

We wouldn’t be on Keto if our metabolism wasn’t all out of whack!

(bulkbiker) #3

Probably because your body isn’t used to processing carbs so it had a shock when you reintroduced something really carby like rice…
Your hubs body gets them frequently so is used to them and reacts less.
It’s why people on keto should carb up for a couple of days if they want to get representative results on an OGTT otherwise they will get the body saying oh shit carbs! results…

(Tim W) #4

Don’t forget, most sushi is made with rice wine, and guess what rice wine has in it…

Sugar…

So, you ate carbs and sugar, glucose went up, no surprise.

(Sonia A.) #5

Since I’ve been keto, my bs seems to rise up much more than before, when I ate carbs (or too much protein). It’s probably because of less exposure to carbs. But, when compared to the other members of my family, my bs goes back to normal more rapidly. So I’m not worried.

(Christopher Bingel) #6

If your family is related to you (not marriage or “chosen” family) then they may be insulin resistant, too.

(Sonia A.) #7

Oh yes, I should’ve mentioned that some are. But, not all. So my theory is that the ketogenic diet and its metabolic benefits are the reason for the rapid return to normal for my bs.

(Christopher Bingel) #8

I don’t disagree. My thought was more that your family should be on the lookout for T2D.

(THERESA PITTS) #9

I knew my BG would go up, but I expected my husbands to go up as well.

#10

Theresa, it really is incredibly individual (not just different responses to carbs in general but also different responses to different carbs). In Robb Wolf’s latest book he suggests doing carb tests on specific foods to check your own glucose reaction. He tends toward recommending keto and most of the recipes in the book are geared that way, but he also wants folks to find out which carbs they do tolerate better in case they want to include some in their diet.

The tests are specifically done on a pretty big dose so that you can easily see what’s going on, and they’re first thing in the morning with no fat to blunt the response. Personally, I have more of a spike to 50g of carbs in blueberries than to 50g of carbs in carrots, but with carrots it takes a longer time to drop (so overall a bigger area under the curve).

It also depends so much on what that day was like for you both! In my few months of taking frequent bg readings, I also found pretty dramatic differences after meals depending on sleep the night before, stress levels, activity that day…

(Tim W) #11

Great responses from Madeleine and others. We are all so unique, we HAVE to do our own N=1 and evaluate. If anything, your experience is yet another data point in support of individualized programs/diets/nutrition plans etc. the idea of “everyone in this country should eat xxxxx or yyyy” is obviously flawed.