Curious, I've read that...
1) Many normal people's fasting BG is higher when very low carb, is that true?
2) If they cheat and eat carbs, their blood sugar will really go up at like an hour after eating, anyone tried it?

Wondering how sensitive normal non diabetics really do get from eating really low carb. I've read it's a normal thing, but curious about the numbers. Like if you eat a couple pieces of toast, how high would your BG get an hour after?

No one ?
Anyone home ?

I'm not sure, because I never tested my blood glucose before going low carb. But

1)I've seen this happen to some people, but it's not universal, and doesn't seem to be the case for me. Switching to ketogenic low carb did decrease my fasting blood glucose by about ten points, but I already had normal fasting blood glucose eating a higher protein low carb, so all that did is bring me from the 80s to the 70s.

2)I fooled around with occasional carb refeeds for a while--maybe every other week I'd eat six or seven bananas the day I went grocery shopping. Then I checked my blood glucose once, it went up to 165 or so, so I stopped doing that.

Topic: Yes.

1) Many normal people's fasting BG is higher when very low carb, is that true?

I figure there would be "some" in any population so it is probable that it is true. It is not the case for myself.

2) If they cheat and eat carbs, their blood sugar will really go up at like an hour after eating, anyone tried it?

You'd think it would be the opposite or a small rise. That's kind of the end game I think. I have not tried but how are you defining "cheat"?

2 is actually pretty normal physiology, take carbohydrate out of the diet and then suddenly reintroduce it and glucose tolerance goes way down. This doesn't take very long, just a day or two of a very low carbohydrate diet or fasting will have this effect. But it should only take a couple of days of reintroducing carbohydrate in the diet to return to a state of insulin sensitivity. This is why I didn't automatically self-diagnose myself with diabetes when my blood glucose went to 165 with those bananas--that would be a diabetic reading for somebody on a habitual high carb diet, but it's a normal reading after an extended fast or a very low carb diet.

But it's definitely something that makes me nervous about carb-cycling programs, people say they do this to retain metabolic flexibility. If anything, this pattern of eating would ensure that a person would be very glucose intolerant on those occasions when they did eat carbohydrate. I'm not saying that wouldn't work as a strategy for weight loss for some people--I've discovered, partly by accident, that a high carb day will actually make it easier for me to do a prolonged fast, so it's not beyond the pale that it might reduce somebody's appetite, or lead in to a hormonal state more conducive to weight loss (even if initially of course causing weight gain), it's just hard to guess at the health effects of the carb up.

Great insight and post. I didn't know that stuff. Thank you teaser!

PS OP, I think there is a newish thread on this board were folks are carb cycling. You might want to check in with them and see if they use meters. I think they do VLC on the days the do not carb load. Thread is called "Carb Night" or something similar. There's a book they are using for the protocol.

Might be interesting to follow.

I don't think toast is a good test. Bread has one of the highest glycemic loads out there. I would be curious to see if it went higher with normal kinds of carby sides like mashed potatoes or beans.

Thanks Teaser, very interesting.
I read that our pancreas stores insulin based on previous needs, so if we give it very little need for a while, it stores much less, then if you suddenly introduce sugar/carbs, it just doesn't have the 'juice' to wipe it out right away. That old post on here from that person on the Korean diabetes forum talked about it, where they took 4 days of carbs to 'get carb sensitive' again, but wondered if it was also true for normal people. Thanks, very interesting!

I said 'toast' for it's fast glycemic index, something that would really 'shock' the system. Bananas are a good indicator too.

Thanks for the replies!

I'll find that other thread too, thanks for the tip on that!
Edit, do you know what subforum that thread is in? I can't find it, man there are TONS of subforums...?



Ron

http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthre...763#post9099763

The thread's here, support for people following Kiefer's Carbnite plan.

There it is, thanks!!

Bummer, no non D's checking bg's. I googled and found other people on other forums where just like you guys said, some get higher fasting BG's some don't, some get lower.

I guess the post meal spike of glucose is the real common denominator if a person is very low carb, then cheats and eats carbs.

If anyone else sees this and has a meter, check your BG at 1 hour after a cheat meal just for fun?

BTW, (Teaser) what time point after the start time of eating the bananas was your BG up like that?
(30min, 1 hour, 1.5, 2 hours?)

My latest n=1:
I track body temp, weight, measurements and FBG. I am non-T2D. Even when doing IF (18 hours per day) my FBG is rarely low. My body temp never gets past 97. I eat LCHF within a 6-hour window, refeeding once a week, also within that 6-hour window. Objective is to spike insulin.

I think this is the reason why cheating or doing that stupid 12 days on / 2 days off version of a low carb diet was always a huge mistake for me. Through testing my BG and doing post prandial readings after a meal I learned that I was reactive hypoglycemic. As I was a chubby kid from the very start, I have probably been reactive hypoglycemic all of my life. After eating high GI foods - like white bread, corn flakes, candy, etc. I will get an abnormally high BG spike followed by a BG crash that would leave me craving carbs for hours (if I could stay out of the pantry, that is). Throw in the insulin resistance that crept in over the years and that just exacerbated the problem. Cheating after having been consistent with a low carb diet for more than a week or two always gave me cravings on steroids. When I did that 12 days on / 2 days off so called "Mayo Clinic Diet" (which was a low carb fad diet that had nothing to do with the Mayo Clinic) those 2 days off were always carb binge city for me. I couldn't help it. The reaction I had to the same food was never nearly as bad when I was not dieting.

I was diagnosed as a type 2 diabetic 2 years ago and resolved it through LCHF WOE. I didn't start testing my BG until I'd been eating this way for 8 or 9 months. I learned so much. Even some low carb meals would cause me to have BG spikes and crashes and still caused me mild carb craving. When I learned to eat in such a way as to have a normal arc in BG after a meal, I didn't have those cravings. It may sound a little OCD, but when I look at my dinner plate, I say to myself "there are the carbs" and I eat that food last. I get a higher BG spike if I eat a higher carb food that has little fiber, fat, or protein first. An example of that is my 10 carbs per cup pureed mushroom & onion soup. I don't have that stand alone and I don't make it an appetizer.

Yes - there is value in testing your BG even when you are not diabetic. If you eat one donut and 30 minutes later you can hardly resist eating another and another, then testing your BG just might show you why.

Curious actual range?