It has become an epidemic now in India, diabetes is troubling us as never before. With the rise of affluence also comes the cost of overindulgence. And getting enough daily exercise becomes a necessity, which is often put off to a tomorrow that never comes. With the competitiveness in schools, students spend more time in front of the computer, grabbing a quick high-sugar-high-carb meal. Relaxing often takes place in front of the TV, often quite mindlessly snacking on something less than nutritionally ideal, often full of sugars and trans-fats. We are finding that even our children are becoming overweight and developing diabetes as well.

It is important to understand
what is happening.

For thousands of years, until quite recently, we were subject to times of plenty and times of famine. In order for us to survive, and to survive as a race, we needed to be able to store energy so that in times of famine we would not die off. Our resourceful bodies are designed in such a way that when we have an excess amount of sugar, our bodies store the excess energy as fat. How does the body do this? When an excess amount of sugar shows up in the blood, the pancreas produces insulin.

Insulin is a hormone whose
main purpose is to store the excess sugar as fat.
The result of that is a lowering of blood sugar.

Often it is thought that insulin's role is strictly to lower blood sugar, but that is only part of insulin's activity, and not the main objective.

The main purpose of insulin
is not to lower blood sugar.

It may surprise you that insulin's main role is not to control blood sugar, (glucose), but to direct that extra energy into storage as fat.

When blood sugar becomes elevated
it is a signal for insulin to be released
to direct the extra energy into storage.

A small amount is stored as a starch called glycogen in our body, but the majority is stored as our main energy supply - fat. Insulin's major role is not to lower sugar, but to take the extra energy when available and store it for future times of need. Insulin lowers glucose as a side effect of directing the extra into storage.

Who has heard of the
term "insulin resistance"?

What happens in diabetes mellitus type 2, often called adult-onset diabetes, is that the function of insulin to take care of the excess sugar, becomes impaired. Our cells become resistant to insulin, and then ignore it.

When our cells loose their sensitivity
and become insulin resistant,
the insulin levels go up.

With a constant over abundance of sugar constantly in the blood, the pancreas keeps putting out insulin in response. Therefore large amounts of insulin are constantly being secreted. The cells get 'overwhelmed' by the constant demand of insulin and in effect, stop listening, they get desensitized. In other words, they become insulin resistant.

Treatments that concentrate
merely on lowering blood sugar for diabetes
while raising insulin levels can actually worsen
rather than remedy the actual problem.
It just trades one evil for another.

Elevated insulin levels are highly associated and even causative of:

• heart disease
• peripheral vascular disease
• stroke
• high blood pressure
• cancer
• obesity
• pre-mature aging
• retinopathy
• many other diseases.

Since most treatments for (type 2, insulin resistant) diabetes utilize drugs that raise insulin levels, or actual insulin injections, the tragic result is that the typical, conventional (allopathic) medical treatment for diabetes contributes to the multiple side effects and the shortened lifespan that diabetics experience.

Allopathic medical treatment
primarily concentrates on fixing symptoms,
which in this case is elevated blood sugar,
rather than curing the underlying disease.

Symptoms are generally the way our bodies reveal and communicate that something is amiss, and is also the body's way of healing. For instance, a runny nose is a symptom designed to cleanse the nose and sinuses of viruses and bacteria when one has a "cold". Taking a decongestant just inhibits our own body's mechanism for dealing with that infection and will therefore prolong it.

By some estimates,
diabetes has increased over 700%
in the last 50 years.
This reveals two very important facts.

1. Diabetes cannot be primarily a genetic disease, since the prior to 50 years ago it was a rare disease, and the current generation has essentially the same genetics.

2. The things we are doing to try to reverse this epidemic are not working.

What can we do about it?
First of all we need to change
our eating habits.

Our diets are way too high in sugars and foods that immediately turn into sugar in the body. All carbohydrates, such as potatoes, rice, cereals, pasta, and breads rapidly turn to sugar and the excess sugar (glucose) rapidly turns into long-chain saturated fatty acids.

Any meal or snack high in grains
and sugars, which are all carbohydrates,
typically generates a rapid rise in blood glucose.

To compensate for this your pancreas secretes the hormone insulin into your bloodstream. Insulin is essentially a storage hormone that helps you store the excess calories from carbohydrates in the form of fat in case of famine.

Even worse, high insulin levels that develop
as a result of eating grains and sugars
suppress two other important hormones-
-glucagon and growth hormone-
that are responsible for burning fat
and sugar and promoting muscle development.

One way you can protect your body from storing fat and rising insulin levels is through eliminating grains and sugars from your diet.
An eating plan:
Emphasizing: (organic as much as possible)
good healthy unheated fats (such as olive oil, coconut oil, fresh raw coconut (unprocessed), avocados, olives and nuts (raw or lightly roasted, not fried),
increasing the amount of all fibrous vegetables and
increasing the amount of raw leafy greens.
And reducing or eliminating:
non-fiber carbohydrates and starches (including grains, sugars, potatoes)
any hydrogenated fats (always check labels on packaged foods)
fried foods (heating oils to this point make them unhealthy. The only oil safe to heat at high temperatures is coconut oil)
also diet foods, processed foods
sugar replacements (all of them are made from chemicals and some were even initially created as pesticides).

Doing this will greatly improve and can even reverse type 2 "insulin resistant" diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, many other chronic diseases of aging, and even slow the aging process itself.

Secondly we need to exercise more.
You may ask,
"What exercise has to do with it?"

Even the smallest amount of exercise for sedentary, overweight people proves to make a difference, according to studies. And good exercise is vital to good health.

Most people
tend to not appreciate
how powerful exercise is.

For exercise to be most beneficial, it should be viewed as a 'medicine'. If the dose is not high enough, it will not work. Too little will not be effective, too much can be an overdose. One of the keys in using exercise to normalize insulin levels with secondary benefits of weight loss and normalization of blood sugars, is to make certain minimum thresholds are met. Generally it seems that most people are not exercising enough.

There are three important variables with exercise:

* Length of time
* Frequency
* Intensity

Assuming people can exercise, it is recommended to gradually increase the amount of time they are exercising to one hour per day.

Start slowly with 10 or 20 minutes once or twice a day and gradually build up your endurance. Remember to watch your breathing. If your breathing gets too heavy, just stop or slow down long enough for your breath to feel normal again. Then start again. Exercising like this is called interval exercise. Exert for about 15 seconds and then do a light resting exercise for 45 seconds, (Like jogging and then walking slowly) and continue like this, a short period (like 15 seconds) of a more intense exercise, and then 3 times as long with a resting exercise (45 seconds) and keep up this on and off way of moving. Start with 10 minutes at a time, once or twice a day and gradually, over a couple of weeks, build up to 1 hour per day.

You will be amazed at how much
you will grow to love to exercise like this
once you start this easy and effective way.

Start with this ratio of 15 seconds exertion and 45 seconds resting (or just walking), and build up to 30 seconds exertion and 60 seconds resting exercise and eventually up to 60 - 60. This has been shown to be the safest and most effective way to exercise, to build endurance and get results. Remember to watch your breath as the marker, breathing through your nose, and make sure that during the resting exercise your breath becomes quiet again. If not, just rest longer until the breath quiets. This also may mean that you need to adjust your ratio and make shorter exertion times and longer resting times. Find a ratio that works for you so that you can go for the entire 10 or 20 minutes feeling strong and energized. Slow and steady wins the day!

And lastly, remedies that improve
cell sensitivity to insulin,
and reduce insulin resistance
would be recommended.

Organic herbal remedies do not cause other complications as seen with insulin and anti-diabetic drugs. ORGANIC INDIA Sugar Balance has shown good results, especially when combined with proper diet and exercise. Sugar Balance can be taken along with your current conventional medicines, which can then slowly be reduced. Omega 3 oil is also said to be very helpful in promoting cell sensitivity, especially when taken with vitamin E. Always make sure you buy your health care products from a source you can trust.

   So please remember, a diet high in fibrous vegetables and low in any kind of carbohydrates and sugars is required. And make exercising a priority everyday!

ORGANIC INDIA is committed to bring you the latest information and research that truly supports your health and wellness. This article is not meant to be an in-depth comprehensive report about diabetes and insulin. It is meant to offer a general outline giving some very basic information and facts. If you are interested in more detailed information or personal advice please feel free to communicate with us and write to us at customercare@organicindia.com. Your comments and questions are welcome.

Resources:
Dr. Ron Rosedale
Dr. Joseph Mercola
mercola.com archives
Dr. Narendra Singh