Blood Sugar Basics: What you don’t know about blood sugar can hurt you!
You know the basics about blood sugar…
At least you think you know the basics, right? Your blood sugar spikes in response to eating foods laced with sugar—including things that we traditionally think of as healthy like fruits, some vegetables, and grains. When your blood sugar is too high for too long (medical people call it hyperglycemia), the sugar can lead to diseases like Prediabetes and Type 2 Diabetes, eventually causing permanent damage to your body.
Did you know that you must make a change before most people know there is a problem?
The problem is, you can’t feel consistently high blood sugar. You can’t even feel the potentially permanent damage that high blood sugar causes until it’s too late to reverse the damage.
Blood sugar that’s too high for too long eventually causes metabolic disease (Type 2 Diabetes and Prediabetes) and permanent body damage. Though it is possible to reverse a diagnosis of Type 2 Diabetes with better lifestyle changes, you cannot reverse permanent body damage such as blindness, nerve damage, heart damage, and kidney failure.
The problem is that the damage is sneaky.
The dangers of long term, out-of-control blood sugar
- Blindness
- Heart Damage
- Kidney Failure
- Nerve Disorders
- Dementia
The problem is that all of this damage is sneaky. Changes in vision are slow; you don’t feel heart damage until it is too late; kidney and nerve damage is slow and at first only causes occasional problems. When you finally know there is a problem and you arrange to visit your doctor, it might be too late to reverse damage to your body.
If you want to protect yourself from developing metabolic diseases or permanent damage like blindness and amnesia, then you must monitor your blood sugar.
If you want to protect yourself from developing metabolic diseases or permanent damage like blindness and amnesia, then you must monitor your blood sugar and keep it in optimal range. Luckily, it’s easy to do.
Do you know your A1C?
If you don’t know your hemoglobin A1C score, and if you aren’t regularly monitoring it, then you don’t know if your blood sugar is in optimal control.
You cannot feel your blood sugar level, so if you are not testing it, you don’t know if it’s too high. Also, testing your blood sugar once or occasionally tells you nothing about your blood sugar control. A simple blood sugar (glucose) test is not the right test for determining whether your blood sugar is in good control. The blood sugar (glucose) test is a point-in-time blood test, and you need more information. The A1C test (hemoglobin A1C) is the right test to determine your blood sugar control.
The A1C test tells you your average blood sugar level over the last 90 days. Because the A1C score is an average of blood sugar levels over the previous few months, you can’t cheat the A1C test or confuse one point-in-time reading with the reality of longer term control. Consistently monitoring your A1C will tell you whether you are in control. You can also track your A1C as a trend over time will help you determine which lifestyle changes or drug treatments are benefiting you the most.
You can’t cheat the A1C test
If you want to lead a long and healthy life, it’s important to monitor your A1C and control your blood sugar with healthy lifestyle changes. If you are diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes or Prediabetes, you may also need prescription drugs to manage your blood sugar.
Knowing the nitty gritty about high blood sugar will help you control it
You might know that there’s more to the blood sugar story than what you eat. Your body burns sugar as fuel, right? It also packages sugar as fat to store for later use. The foods you eat, the exercise you do, and the drugs and supplements you take also make an impact on how much sugar stays in your bloodstream…and how much gets burned as fuel or packaged as fat. That’s key!
The foods you eat, the exercise you do, and the drugs and supplements you take also make an impact.
The body’s ability to use sugar as a fuel depends upon the hormone insulin, which comes from your pancreas. If your pancreas is not working correctly (Type 1 Diabetes) or if your body is not responding to insulin correctly (Type 2 Diabetes and Prediabetes), then too much sugar gets stuck in your bloodstream and you have high blood sugar (hyperglycemia).
Let’s talk about Prediabetes and Type 2 Diabetes—the metabolic diseases you can prevent with better lifestyle changes. To put it simply, if you eat too much sugar for too long and also don’t burn up enough sugar as fuel for exercise, then your body breaks down. Your body’s cellular insulin receptors don’t work correctly (medical people call it insulin resistance), and even though your pancreas may be releasing insulin (for a while, anyway), your broken-down body’s cells won’t let the blood sugar in. The sugar just gets stuck in the bloodstream with nowhere to go. It keeps knocking on the cell’s door, but it can’t come in. So, the amount of sugar in the bloodstream keeps rising and causes big problems (e.g., heart disease, blindness, kidney failure).
The amount of sugar in the bloodstream keeps rising and causes big problems.
You can control your blood sugar with small changes!
With simple daily changes, you can better control your blood sugar. Take some time to learn the basics about blood sugar so that you can make small changes reducing your risk of developing Prediabetes, Type 2 Diabetes or organ damage resulting in blindness, heart disease, amnesia, kidney failure, or nerve disorders.
Sources:
https://labtestsonline.org/understanding/analytes/a1c/tab/test
http://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/a1c-test/home/ovc-20167930
