Ep. 193 - Make fasting easier by controlling blood sugar volatility & cravings | Common signs of metabolic dysfunction & how to improve them | How important are blood sugar & HbA1c for health & fat loss? | CGM & ways to understand your metabolic health
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In today’s episode, Dr. Scott and Tommy discuss the relevance of blood sugar for individuals without diabetes. How blood sugar levels affect energy, weight, hormones, mood, and long-term health, and emphasize the importance of addressing blood sugar issues early. They share insights about the impacts of intentional blood sugar spikes on cravings and overall well-being.
Show Transcript:
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Fasting For Life Ep. 193 Transcript
Hello. I'm Dr. Scott Watier.
And I'm Tommy Welling.
And you're
listening to the Fasting for Life podcast.
This podcast is about using fasting
as a tool to regain
your health, achieve ultimate wellness,
and live the life you truly deserve.
Each episode is a short conversation
on a single topic
with immediate, actionable steps.
We cover everything from fat loss
and health and wellness
to the science of lifestyle design.
We started fasting for life because of how
fasting has transformed our lives
and we hope to share the tools
that we have learned along the way.
Hey, run one.
Hop on real quick
before we head to today's episode
and let you all know that the next master,
your fasting challenge, is upon us.
Yes, that is right.
It is coming up on September 13th
through the 19th and the last master
fasting challenge we did in July.
Man, what an absolutely incredible time.
The results were amazing.
Tons of testimonials, positive feedback.
So we decided that we're going
to run this back a couple more times
before, dare
I say the end of 2023 is upon us.
So we know that summer is over,
that we are back to school.
And I don't know about you,
but I've started to see some holiday
decorations and fall in.
The holidays are soon to be upon us.
So let's start the last quarter
of this year and end summer with a bang.
If you're new to fasting
or want to get back on track,
if you're struggling to break through
a plateau, if you're ready to finally stop
obsessing about your diet and your weight
loss and get off that roller coaster once
and for all, let's end
the summer with some intention,
some habit building, and fast
track your fasting results
as we head into the fall
and the upcoming holiday season.
So we want you to do
to get more information about the Master,
your fasting challenge
that's coming up on September 13th.
Head to the show notes.
Click the link for dates.
More information
frequently asked questions.
It's all there for you.
And we really, really,
really want to end this summer
with some intention
around our fasting lifestyle.
So we'll see on the inside.
Click the link for more information.
And now today's episode.
Everyone.
Welcome to the Fasting Life podcast.
My name is Dr.
Scott Water and I'm here as always,
and with good friend and colleague
Tommy Welling.
Good afternoon to you, sir.
Hey, Scott, how are you doing?
Fantastic, My friend.
Excited for today's episode.
We're going to hop into the conversation
of Does
blood Sugar Matter
if you don't have diabetes?
We're going to unpack that.
We're going to have some fun
along the way.
And as we promised, give you one or two
actionable things that you can take away
from today's episode
and put into your day to day life.
Starting now to start
adopting a fasting for life lifestyle.
Tommy I want to give a shout out
to the new listeners.
If you are new, we want to welcome you in.
Thanks for giving us a shot.
Thanks for listening in
and thanks for adding us to hopefully
a long term partnership
in your fasting journey.
I mean, I've been doing this
for a while now
up over 190 episodes, so thank you again
to all of the long term listeners as well.
Those downloads, those subscribers,
those rates, those reviews that continues
to tell the podcast world
and the podcast gods and goddesses
that we are bringing value
each and every week going on three year
strong without missing a single week.
So just grateful for each
and every one of you, grateful
for those five star reviews
as they are our favorite kind.
I love them, right?
They're our favorite.
We love to see us the best.
I want to also say, if you are new, go
ahead and head back to the first episode.
If you want to get a little bit
more perspective on Tommy and I and why we
believe fasting is such a powerful tool,
not just for weight loss or for true
health and longevity and transformation
and just just so many different things.
So if you want to go back and listen,
give it a listen.
We appreciate that.
And we are so happy
that you're here with us today.
So, Tommy, as we unpack today's
conversation about does blood sugar matter
if you don't have diabetes,
I feel like this is a great conversation
that should be had
because what you're seeing,
if you're on social media
and if you are working on your health
and if you are dabbling in fasting
or you've been fasting for a while,
or you want to be more consistent
anywhere in the fasting keto
weight loss world,
you're going to see a lot.
Nutrition, health, fitness, yeah,
you're going to see a lot of convert, even
sleep, hydration, exercise,
all of these things.
You're going to see a lot of conversation
about blood sugar and blood
sugar monitors and ketones.
And we've done different episodes,
but we've never really talked about
Does it really matter for me to know
what's going on at a physiological level
with my blood sugar?
And what does that translate or
what does that look like
on a day to day basis in my life
and in my fasting journey?
Because blood sugar levels affect
your energy, focus, weight, hormones,
they can affect your moods, your mental
health, brain fog, and long term,
we know that elevated blood sugar
and more importantly, elevated insulin
will result in things like diabetes,
but also metabolic syndromes.
And eight out of the top ten reasons
why people lose their life
all cause mortality here in the States.
So if this is a slow and go process,
which we know that blood sugar issues
start long
before they show up on your blood work,
then we want to be addressing this
at the root cause.
So we want to simplify it for you today,
but also talk through a couple
of main overviews, main takeaways of like,
why does this matter?
Should it matter for me?
And really the statistics don't lie.
So 30 million Americans with diabetes,
another
with pre-diabetes,
majority of them undiagnosed, which I was
and I'm assuming which you were.
Oh, yeah, as well.
Early on and before
we were able to adapt fasting in a way
that got us to get the weight off,
get our labs back to normal and transform
not just our lab numbers, but
also our lives through the art of fasting.
We want to be looking at, you know,
kind of the basics of blood sugar.
And then I want to talk through
a couple of points on how we can change it
and what we can do
and why it matters, but also a situation
that we've come across of someone who is
deliberately spiking their blood sugar,
which I love, the construct of the study
of the case study, right.
Of being the Guinea patient.
But I want to
I want to frame the potential outcomes
in a different way
and the potential intentions and things
that can come from that as well.
So starting with blood sugar
and why it matters
and what is it and what does it do?
Well, we always say that more importantly,
we should be looking
at routine insulin levels
rather than blood sugar levels.
Yeah, And just to go back a couple
of steps, you know, for the blood sugar,
I love that question.
Like if I'm healthy
or if I don't have weight to lose
or much weight to lose, does
blood sugar really matter?
And I feel like that's a question
that's starting to get asked
more as we kind of make more
and more inroads further into the insulin
resistance, understanding how insulin kind
of starts, the cascade of these things.
Because, you know,
insulin is our our bodies normal track
for chasing after blood sugar.
Like,
you know, we have blood sugar sensors
throughout the body, essentially
every every cell can sense blood sugar
that's around.
But, you know, the main sensor is being
in the pancreas, you know, understanding
like what is actually happening,
what's the trajectory of the blood sugar,
how much insulin needs to come out
and when there's also glucagon
that comes out to counteract
the insulin as well.
So you have a hormonal cascade.
But importantly,
those things are happening
and it's a normal part of the process.
Okay, so that's fine.
But if we don't have a weight to lose,
we have relatively normal bloodwork.
Blood sugar is still
you know, it's going up, it's coming
down, it's changing throughout the day.
And that's a normal thing to happen.
We have the dawn phenomenon
where we're waking up
and we have a normal blood sugar rise
that should be, you know,
within certain limits
at the beginning of the day.
And there's a cyclical nature
to these things as well,
and that's great for understanding.
But then after that,
we also have a different, you know,
actual response depending on, you know,
if maybe there are a few positives
or if maybe you've been holding on
to a few pounds for a long time,
or if there are certain food choices
that you're making over and over
and over again,
those can lead
to certain responses within blood sugar
that may or may not show up on a lab
or might take a while
to kind of build up or,
you know, kind of it could be like
a little bit of an iceberg coming up.
And so sometimes can be,
you know, under the surface they are
or go undetected for a long time as well.
Yeah.
So a couple of basic points here
and just understanding so often fasting,
blood sugar is under 85
and you'll see the ranges,
the normal ranges that are out there,
you know, normal is 70 to 100.
Well, I was in the nineties
high eighties to mid nineties for a while
and I was already at a point
where I had some metabolic dysfunction.
Right.
I was carrying the excess weight,
I was doing the calorie
counting macros, working out, etc.
and I wasn't seeing the results.
And then at one point
it ticked up into the nineties,
into the one hundreds, which then
by standard medical metrics, prediabetes
is that 100 to 125 and then type
two diabetes 125 plus the stuff,
those numbers
have been around for a long time
and I feel are doing a disservice
in that optimal should be even lower.
recent research is showing.
And I know for me, when I really started
to see some sustainable change
in my fasting insulin, in my blood sugar,
in my blood pressure, in my cholesterol
and my triglycerides,
because blood sugar is just one metric
in terms of looking at metabolic health.
Right? So we're just looking at one
tiny little piece of it.
And then the upstream is
obviously the insulin, which either takes
the blood sugar out of your bloodstream,
the puts it into muscle
and deliver in the form of glycogen
or storing it as fat.
Right.
So when we're looking
at those normal levels,
a lot of even some of the you know,
we'll have people
that have diabetes or pre-diabetes
that are on that have monitors
and they're checking their blood sugar
and they'll say, Oh, my machine
yelled at me when I got too low.
And I'm like,
What's too low? And they're like 70.
And I'm like, okay, well,
how did you feel?
Or sometimes, you know,
because yeah, and I'm like,
depending on the machine,
depending on the Met.
Yeah.
So optimal, we want 85 and lower
just like insulin, right?
So if you look at the insulin scale,
it's from five or six depending on what
lab you use all the way up to 24 or 25.
Right.
And we talked about this
on a recent episode
where there isn't a consensus
on what a normal insulin level should be.
But I'll tell you that there are
is indication that seven and above
you have a higher incidence of becoming
insulin resistant and diabetic.
If that number stays elevated.
So mine was in the twenties.
Once I got that down under seven,
I started to see some really long
term change.
And then now that I'm in the fives,
my cravings, my day to day
life has changed dramatically
with my relationship with food, fasting
and when and how I eat right.
So you had mentioned something
and we'll go into this
a little bit more in a minute.
But the way this presents itself
or way the way blood
sugar might you might feel on a day to day
basis, Right.
Because not
everybody has a blood sugar monitor.
Not everybody has a CGM or continuous
glucose monitor.
And not everyone, to the point of today's
conversation,
thinks that we really should be
periodically checking our blood sugar.
If you're not diagnosed with this
metabolic syndrome, pre-diabetes,
your diabetes condition. Right.
So how this can present in a day to day
basis, right.
We go from blood sugar, then
impacting insulin, elevated blood sugar
or bigger spikes over time
cause elevated insulin over time,
which will cause insulin resistance,
which will then cause metabolic disorders,
metabolic syndrome,
which will then be to diabetes
and cardiometabolic issues, etc..
So we get that cascade.
But on a day to day basis,
I mean, there's a few things
that you're going to feel
when blood sugar goes high
and then when blood sugar comes
crashing down, Right?
Yeah.
And I think that as a general consensus,
most people would agree that
if I haven't heard the term
like pre-diabetic or at risk
or I don't have other people
maybe in my family
who are kind of at risk for those things
or have a history of those things,
then I don't really need to be concerned
with my blood sugar.
And I feel like that's there's
nothing wrong
necessarily
with why that's such a common belief.
But at the same time, there are
differences in like in what we're doing
and then what
our blood sugar is actually doing,
and then those things
lead to changes over time.
So whenever we're actually going to ingest
food, we're having things like
I used to just crash in the later
it would get into the day,
the more I would crash after a meal
and then but it was like,
especially if I was eating
relatively healthy foods
or I was tracking my calories
and tracking my macros.
It was so like
I didn't even understand that it was
it was because of insulin resistance
or because of blood sugar issues
that happened on a smaller scale
because, I mean, that happened
since my teenage years.
It just got worse and worse and worse
over the years.
But it still wasn't really hitting
my radar as like, Hey,
there could be a blood sugar issue here
because my fasting blood sugar,
like you had mentioned,
was usually somewhere
like in the mid-nineties.
Now, in my early thirties,
it had ticked up to where sometimes
it would be like 104109
I'm getting my my fasting blood sugar,
but usually that was at like 110 or 120
that it didn't hit anybody's radar.
So it wasn't like, Hey,
you're pre-diabetic at this point.
But essentially I'd been living
in that zone for a long time
because of bleeding issues.
Yeah, this was the missing piece for me.
I'd spent being in the house
space, running, putting, creating,
you know, weight loss in a box
type products and doing all this stuff
in a clinical setting and having,
you know, metabolic type pathway testing
and doing before and afters and hormone
balancing with women
and all these different programs
that we were doing and getting people
results, none of that was fitting me.
And I'm like, what the heck? Like,
why isn't this working?
So when we look at blood sugar,
glucose is the fuel for your cells or
and then there's
the ketone conversation too.
But dysregulated glucose can impair
how your cells work throughout your body,
driving dysfunction in your veins, brain,
organs, muscles and more.
So it's subtle in how we feel,
but it's important long term
to our overall disease and mortality risk.
So the daily blood sugar
impacts are things that we can
and I'll describe a few here
in just a second,
but this was the missing piece for me.
As I was looking everywhere else.
I had just done a bunch
of functional medicine testing and
I thought it might have been my adrenals.
I thought it might have been my gut,
I thought it might have been
and what didn't up coming
back was my insulin resistance.
But even though my blood sugar numbers
are still falling in that normal range,
but I had the elevated triglycerides,
I had the elevated cholesterol,
I had the blood pressure creeping up,
I had the increased waist circumference.
Right.
All of those types of things
by tracking despite and.
Right, right, right, right, right. So,
all right.
So we started today's conversation on
does it matter if you don't have
any of those things, right. Yeah.
And I still truly believe that. Yes, it
does.
You don't need to be monitoring this
like a hawk, Right.
Like, you know, you get a new child
that just learned to walk.
You're hawking them, right?
You're like, wow, I don't follow. Okay.
You know what I mean? Like, especially
as a first time parent with your first.
Yes. Yeah, right. Like, right.
So you don't need to be doing that.
But if you do have weight loss
resistance, 2010, 20, 30, 40,
£50 to lose or labs that are already off.
Yeah, I think it is
something that needs to become part
of your routine for the next three
to 6 to 12 months and the blood
sugar impacts that you'll feel
without the tracking is,
you know, you can lead to fatigue,
brain fog, cravings, skin changes.
If you ever had a sugar high or sugar
crash, a slump post meal.
Tommy, like you mentioned or feel bad
when you've gone a long time
without eating, that can be a hypo
or reactionary caloric blood
sugar dip that's going to really increase
that desire to eat.
And then when blood sugar is more stable.
So we're not saying blood sugar
spikes are bad,
but the consistent blood sugar spike over
time is bad or elevated level is bad.
So when you stabilize high, right, then
it has to then it has to come back down.
Insulin.
More insulin gets released than necessary,
and that's going to come way down.
And then all of a sudden
I feel that, right.
So when it's more stable, your energy
levels are higher, your skin's clear.
We have more mental clarity, better
memory, we're less susceptible to cravings
and crashes
that throw off our eating habits, right?
Yeah. So we joke in this family.
My wife just completed her
first 19 and a half hour fast.
All right, So if you're like,
wait a minute, you're the fasting guys.
And like, your wife doesn't fast.
No, not typically pregnant
and or breastfeeding.
We've got three kids under six and a half
for quite a bit.
Over the last six and a half, seven years.
I've been fasting now
for just over four years.
So timelines don't match. Right.
And she's always been really good
at tracking and macros
and she's been able to get results
with that type of approach.
And she's one of the few people I know
that's kept the results and gotten better
as she's gone along and not fallen off
and then got back.
And she's very passionate about it
and it works for her.
Well, it wasn't working for me
and so many other people, right.
Especially some y'all
that might be listening
who have come to fasting for that next.
You know,
maybe fasting is the next answer, right?
But that throw off our eating habits
and behaviors, right?
Those cravings in those crashes
is so incredibly important.
So the reason I want to bring this up
is because we know insulin,
you know, blood sugar goes up
and insulin goes up if they're constantly
high, your body's going to begin
to convert the excess glucose into fat.
And we're going to get fat storage, right.
Which can lead to weight gain.
And then insulin prevents fat burning.
So high insulin levels are going
to make it harder to lose that weight.
And then we might see other blood sugar
related issues, not in the day to day
symptomatology that I just described, but
you might see some hormonal dysfunction.
So that's why I thought it might have been
my testosterone or my adrenals. Right.
So but other things like PCOS
Pre and perimenopause, menopause,
infertility issues,
depression, anxiety, thyroid.
Yeah.
So we know that now, long term blood sugar
dysfunction can also lead
to what now is being called type three
diabetes or Alzheimer's and dementia.
Right.
So when we're looking at the long
term issue, we know it's there.
So short term, when we're talking about
this, this daily experience
and this habit
or this desire to lose weight,
and then you start doing something
and you're not getting the result.
We saw someone on social media that was
deliberately spiking their blood sugar
with the intention
to still be in a calorie deficit
and show that they're able to lose weight.
Sure. Sounds good.
Sounds great.
Great.
You know, yeah,
there's a couple of caveats to it,
but yeah, it's kind of like it's
definitely not optimal.
I'll start there,
but I'm going to also say it's kind of
it can contradict your desire
for a good compartmentalization
of your fasting
and of your eating as well,
because it's tough to deliberately induce
more blood sugar spikes
or have them be more dramatic
than they need to be,
and then quickly or easily or intuitively
get back on to my next fast,
like it's a little tougher
or a lot tougher to set your next timer
when you just had major blood
sugar swings.
It's like motivations down, energy
is down, just mental clarity is down.
But then cravings are up, hunger's
up, volatility is up.
And in those in those moments,
like those moments of lethargy
and just feeling that blood pressure,
our blood blood sugar crash,
it can feel like a little bit more food
or the next meal
or maybe a snack can be like a little bit
of an answer in that moment.
And that that tips the scales away from
my fasting lifestyle, long term success.
So my big question is like, why?
Like, why would I want to, you know,
why would I want to do that?
Even if even if I could still lose weight
like that?
So I love being the guinea pig, right?
So I'll share my carnivore experience.
I've shared mosquito experience,
my tracking, my nutrition experience.
Right.
And it's been interesting
because the intention was
and I follow this person huge following
love the research love is approach.
Love is no B.S.
like tactics,
like got a lot of good stuff.
But day one of spiking my blood sugar
while losing weight for 30 days.
Right. Okay.
So can you spike your blood sugar
and to lose weight?
Yes, of course.
He also says this is only
for healthy individuals
without preexisting medical issues
to help them understand. Right.
So if you you know, you can lose weight.
He doesn't have a lot of weight to lose.
Probably a handful of pounds. Right.
If that's the point
that you were trying to get across, was
you can lose weight
without sacrificing your favorite foods.
I completely agree.
Mm hmm.
And blood sugar spikes are normal
and healthy responses from your body.
It's not weird or bad.
Completely agree, right.
But interestingly enough, by day eight,
he mentioned.
Yeah, I'm having, you know, one day
he had four pieces of white
bread for breakfast.
He had a donut after dinner one night,
and he said, Yeah, I'm still I'm down
a few pounds, I'm eight days in,
I'm going to do this for 30 days straight.
He's probably going to lose the weight
he wanted to lose.
He's he's tracking and weighing
and doing all that stuff
as a healthy individual, right?
No visceral fat, no insulin resistance,
no weight loss
resistance,
no significant amount of weight to lose.
And by the he's like I have noticed
to your point, Tommy, what you were
just talking about, that my cravings
for sugary foods have gone up right.
What was the other thing you mentioned?
I can't remember stuff and I just forgot
It was just hunger.
It was just, Oh, yeah, literal cravings
for sugary, more indulgent stuff
and overall hunger has gone up. Yes.
Thank you.
That's not a good combination.
Whether you have £4 to lose or £40
lose is not helping, that's for sure.
And even if you can lose the weight
as your blood sugar changes,
everyone's blood sugar is going to have
some level of volatility in there.
But. Right.
I don't want to pour gasoline
on that fire.
I'm trying to put the fire out here.
I don't need more.
But it's also like I can do things
just to stack like we have.
We have so many levers that we can pull.
It's food choices.
It's the order,
you know, that we're eating.
It's, you know, timing of exercise.
And what type of exercise am I doing?
It's how am I fasting
and how consistently am I doing it,
all of these kind of things.
And it's also protecting my inputs
and insulating my mindset.
You know why while I'm doing this too?
And each one of those blood sugar spikes
might not be your your Achilles heel
in any given moment.
But I love the idea of just stacking
as many of those things
in my favor as possible.
So I've lost, you know, nearly £80.
I'll give much of the credit
to fasting in general,
but there was a lot of steps,
you know, within that.
And every time as I leveled up
and figured out how to, you know, like
decrease the volatility in my blood sugar,
that made the next step that much easier.
Right,
Right.
So I want to push her boulders
dudes highly successful.
He's lost weight a bunch of times he's
done cuts and bolts and super successful.
And I totally appreciate him
dispelling this myth
about blood sugar spikes,
but he clearly obsessed with it.
Especially. Especially. Exactly. It's.
Yeah, blood sugar you can access
spiking your blood sugar every now
and then with a food you love is fine.
Eating the dessert,
having the indulgent food,
eating the thing you love, you don't.
And I love his perspective
because he also says, you know, I don't
I don't like labeling things,
cheat meals, right.
Or good or bad.
And we completely agree with that, right?
Yes, right. 100% agree.
But if we're looking at,
you know, normal ranges.
Right.
So standard ranges are less than 100.
Fasting for us would be 72 to 85 as normal
pre meal, 72 to 90.
And then post meal, we want to see less
than a 30 milligram per deciliter spike.
So increase from pre meals to post meals.
And we want to see that number come down
under 140 within the next 2 to 3 hours.
Right. Yeah.
So the standard is much higher than what
the optimal is.
Yes. Right.
So the standard approach to weight loss
versus the optimal approach with fasting,
let's blunt your blood sugar spikes
to decrease those cravings
and more desire
for those insatiable foods that
maybe you have a unhealthy relationship
with the binge worthy stuff.
Sure. Right.
That's where I want to come.
Makes my fasting harder to right.
Because yeah, if you have a really highly
calorically dense,
processed carbohydrate sugar laden evening
and you set your timer for 72 hour fast,
the next day is going
to be really difficult.
So I'm, I'm on day three of a 72 hour fast
now and I'm hitting that
Yeah, it's not my favorite.
I don't like this time between 60 and 72.
Once I get past 72, it's fine.
I'm doing this with a group of guys,
so if I would have broken some, might.
We started this group.
A couple of people are working on
some health related issues and work
and we're really leveling up, you know,
decreasing our visceral fat and optimizing
our health
as all dads in our early to mid forties.
Right.
And I said the night before
we had a new president of the group
and he was like, any recommendations are
and remember how it came up.
I was like, Yeah,
just make sure when you the night
before you eat like high quality protein,
high fat, higher
fat, less refined processed coverage,
don't go and eat all you can eat, say,
of all the indulgent stuff
before you're about to go for fast, right?
Yeah.
So the same thing with blood sugar
spikes on a day to day basis.
We want to limit those rate limiting steps
or those hurdles
that we need to get through. Right.
So couple of things.
And how do you check your blood
sugar levels?
And I want to go over Tommy,
as we wrap up today's conversation.
I want to go over the four
or five things that you can do to help
maintain healthy blood sugar
if that's you or things you can do to help
regain healthy blood sugar levels.
Right.
And so the ways you can check it is
you can get a a finger prick right?
So you can do the blood sugar monitors.
And then recently, you and I,
since we've partnered with nutrients
and nutrition is an incredible company,
they combine human expertise
with technology with the biosensor,
which is the continuous glucose monitor,
which is the thing
that you stick on the back of your arm,
which is what you're probably seeing
if you're again,
if we start the conversation,
if you operate in this space,
then you've probably heard
of a continuous glucose monitor
or seen those little patches that people
wear in the back of their arms.
And it's not just for diabetics
and I've been using one.
I'm in the middle of a six month plan
right now, and I will tell you that I've
been able to dial in some of the foods,
not just what I eat, but when I eat them.
But recently I've noticed
that my stress levels have gone up.
So I'm doing a different position.
I'm doing more coaching
and I've taken on another level of stress
in my day to day life,
and I've noticed that my blood sugar
has gotten a lot more volatile.
So I've noticed that my hunger cues
have gone up, my cravings have gone up,
all of the stuff
that we talked about, right?
So what I love about time
when you want to get more of it, right?
Right. Yes.
Now is the time.
I want more of it, right? Absolutely.
Because this is where I would normally.
Oh, life.
Life's a mess.
Life's life got me, stress got me.
You got to take care of my mom.
Got a kids sick,
you know, all that stuff, right?
So I've noticed that with nutrition,
it's been incredibly powerful
to have this on and commit to it,
because I'm able to see those changes
because my season of life has changed.
So one of the amazing things
about nutrition is it gives you real time
data on things like, by the way,
we're going to talk about these in
just a second in terms of things,
you can help to balance your blood sugar.
But in regards to my sleep,
my hydration, my stress, when I'm eating
certain types of foods, right?
So I've done testing
where I've had the same meal at night
versus the same meal in the afternoon.
The order that I eat, the foods
you're able to not only get real time
data, but also optimize the efforts
that you're making.
And that's the key.
So if we just use the scale as a weight
loss technique, as our weight loss guide,
then we're we're in for a cheat meals
and off days
and on days we're in for a really,
really tough uphill battle.
So that's why I love about nutrition,
That's why we've partnered with them.
So if you had two nutrition start
i o forward slash fasting for life,
you'll get a $30 off code coupon
and then you also get one month
free of dietician support.
And the dietician support
was so incredibly powerful.
They're uplifting.
It's not it's real life coaches
that are worth you
so nutrition study I o fasting for life
versus fasting for life.
I highly recommend that you commit to it
for at least the six month program
because it's going to really
give you some insights.
You might go through a transition
or a season of life change like I did,
and it's been really, really powerful.
So tell me,
the last thing I want to talk about today
is the things that we can do to help
optimize our blood sugar
and remove those barriers
and those stumbling blocks
in making lifestyle and habit change.
Right?
Because we want to break those habits.
We don't want to spike our blood sugar
deliberately to then
have to have more willpower to fight
those cravings and those hunger cues.
Right.
So what can I do to maintain
healthy blood sugar, eat foods
that help budget, stabilize, change
how you eat, exercise regularly?
And then the two for me is prioritize
healthy sleep and stress.
Yeah, you don't want I mean,
if you're prioritizing healthy sleep
and you are looking for ways to minimize
your stress, I mean, you're able
to kind of both of those things lead
to better mornings and better evenings.
And when we're talking about
like bookending the day,
which would sometimes
it's easy to gloss those over.
I mean, you know,
we live in a very busy time.
Everyone's got a lot going on more
than they probably should.
Right.
And there's usually no like,
you know, just adjusting that day to day.
And that's fine. I totally get that.
And the same thing is true for me.
But at the same time, if we can if we can
protect those even just a little bit,
it makes it that much easier
to kind of get through that tougher time.
You know, if you're if you're used to home
at dinner, let's say, or,
you know,
you typically do dinner with the family
or like like a later evening meal,
it can be tough.
It can be a slippery slope
to kind of close your window right then
and set your timer for a good solid fast
going into the next day.
Or, hey, maybe this is
you're going to do a burn date tomorrow.
That can be really tough.
And if you aren't setting that timer
with really good intention,
with a strong deliberation
and you get to the next day
and you go back on your own word,
that's tough.
That's a little chink in the armor.
I got to get past that.
I just lost a little bit of trust
in myself
that makes the next task that much harder.
So instead of those which can be momentum
going the opposite way,
if we can make small little things,
you know, if it's if it's a CGM,
if it's making one better food
choice tomorrow so I can make a little bit
stronger decision on my next fast,
that's really going to add up.
It's going to add up to decrease
the volatility in my blood sugar,
which is going to
then lead to a little bit more consistency
on the scale of I'm
trying to lose there and I'm going to see
better outcomes over time like that.
Consistency builds
excitement and motivation that then leads
to discipline and then, you know, it's
a good positive feedback loop right there.
Yep, yep.
So I want you to pick one of these
if you're listening.
So there are four key levers, right?
There are the foods you eat, right?
So try to eat foods
that don't cause those sharp rises.
So nutrient dense whole foods, right?
Avoid the foods that spike your blood
sugar, such as the process refined stuff.
Okay. Now,
I'm not saying don't ever eat that.
That is not what I said. Sure.
What I'm saying is know what it's doing to
be able to prepare for the after effect,
which is the increased reliance
on willpower and increased cravings.
Right.
So a lot of no are not yet
goes a long way.
Yes. Right, Right. A little delayed
gratification goes a long way. Right.
So it's essential to consider the choice
of carbs, veggies with lots of fiber.
And then the second thing is change
how you eat your food,
which is then
you would want to eat your proteins
and fats first veggies and fiber,
first proteins and fats.
And then after your proteins
that you would eat your carbohydrates
directly after you have that.
So you're not just eating
what's called a naked carbohydrate, right.
That can increase that can decrease
your blood sugar response by up to 30%.
Also the time of day you eat eating later
in the day has a higher insulin response.
Start moving your meals.
Earlier in the day, remember I said
there's a laundry list of stuff here.
I want you to pick one or two
if you're listening.
Yeah, exercise has a huge impact on blood
sugar walking after a meal.
We say this often in these conversations
and in our challenges,
which we've got one coming up
in a couple of weeks here where we walk
through all of these different points
in detail, and it's called master fasting.
And so we do these challenges
every 6 to 8 weeks.
We've got another one coming up
in a couple of weeks in head to the show
notes, click the link for fake
use dates, times and to get registered.
But we definitely talk
about all of this stuff,
not just, Hey, what's your blood
sugar number?
Hey, what's your fasting time?
Right?
That stuff's important,
but this is the stuff that makes it
habitual, makes it a habit
or a lifestyle adaptation.
So change the order that you eat
or the time of day
you eat, exercise, walking,
or specifically zone to cardio.
Right?
And then you really want to focus on
that sleep and stress.
And we also have a sleep guide.
You can grab that in the show notes
as well.
So lots of moving parts here.
But big picture, we started today's
conversation, Tommy, with does knowing
or does looking at blood sugar matter
if you don't have diabetes?
My answer is yes.
It matters
because so does fasting insulin does.
You know, this is one data point
in the picture of metabolic health in life
and in weight loss. Right.
But you don't have to obsess over it.
But it needs to be a piece of the puzzle.
Whether or not you're a healthy individual
or you've got some substantial weight
to lose, disease to reverse or medications
you'd like to come off of.
So I'm excited
for the upcoming challenge to you,
But give the people one
final thought from you,
Tommy, as we wrap up today's episode.
Yeah, just out of all those things, I
would say number one step would be choose.
One of the things that we just talked
about as like, you know, that
if you made a little bit of improvement
there, it would go a long way because it's
either been the big one
to derail you in the past
or it's
the one that comes up the most often.
So whenever I'm thinking about, you know,
this this guy doing the guinea pig stuff
and I'm thinking about emotional
relationship with food a little bit
because if I'm chasing those sugar rushes
and getting those big blood sugar
swings, I'm also getting some big dopamine
swings as well.
So I'm kind of wiring
some of the wrong habits.
So that would be like
my number one was just to cut down
on some of those things just a little bit.
And that started to move me
in the right direction.
So pick one that really resonates with you
and make one
or two better choices today
and tomorrow for the next couple of days.
See how you feel.
You probably get a little less blood
sugar volatility
and that's probably going to
make your next fast that much easier too.
Yup. Yup.
Head to the show notes
for all the links that we mentioned.
The challenge registration,
the Sleep guide, the CGM as well.
Tommy, another great conversation, sir.
Shedding some light on the blood sugar
and the insulin epidemic that we see
that we've experienced.
And I just hope that you guys
are able to take one or two things from
today's episode,
put it into your fasting lifestyle
and continue to walk us,
walk this out with us.
As always, sir,
thank you for the conversation
and we'll talk to
you next week. Thank you. Bye.
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