You have power over diabetes
13% of Americans have diabetes and 34.5% have prediabetes.1 If you don’t have diabetes now you may end up with it because 26.8% of people over 64 have it.1 We used to think Type 2 diabetes (acquired after early childhood) was caused by eating starches but research shows the original cause is eating fat that damages your cells so they cannot properly handle food like starches.2 We live on starches and the glucose (blood sugar) fuel they provide. Fat in animal products is the primary problem. If you think you may be condemned to a lifetime of taking medicine it is time to treat the cause with diet rather than treating symptoms with drugs.
How does diabetes work?
Glucose is the sugar in your blood that is the fuel your body runs on. It powers all your cells in your muscles, brain, and organs. Your pancreas, a small organ next to your stomach, creates insulin that flows in your blood to open your cells to take in glucose. It is fats in your cells that block insulin from letting glucose into your cells which is called insulin resistance.3 Insulin is like the key that causes cells to admit glucose. Fat gums up the cell lock so blood sugar glucose is blocked from entering cells causing it to build up in the blood. Excess blood sugar damages arteries and organs like the liver and kidneys resulting in diabetes.
Where do you get fat that clogs your plumbing?
The primary source of fat is what you eat.5 If you grind up plant food like potatoes or broccoli and daily wash it down the kitchen sink drain there will be no clog but do this with bacon grease fat and your sink will clog quickly. The same happens in your blood plumbing system resulting in atherosclerosis causing heart attacks and strokes, and fat in cells causing insulin resistance and diabetes.
How do you avoid the fat cause of diabetes?
The simple solution is to avoid eating fat but this is not easy if you eat the Standard American Diet (SAD) because restaurant cooks saute in oil and meat is marbled with fat. Hamburgers drip with fat and chicken fat floats to the top of chicken soup. Even olive oil is highly processed removing most nutrients and fiber while retaining mostly fat. Alternatively, unprocessed plants like vegetables, legumes, fruit, and grain have a small amount of the fat you need so a plant-based diet is optimum. For a practical in-depth analysis of diabetes and how to treat it see Neal Barnard, M.D.’s book on how to reverse diabetes.5
A Whole Food Plant-Based lifestyle may look difficult but is easier than it seems.
There is an endless variety of delicious Whole Food Plant-Based (WFPB) dishes. Substitute a veggie burger for a ground cow burger. Substitute scrambled tofu for scrambled eggs. Order your pizza covered with vegetables like tomatoes, mushrooms, and onions and skip the cheese. Order spaghetti with tomato sauce and no meat. There is a great collection of delicious meals in WFPB cookbooks such as Michael Greger’s6 and Kathy Fisher’s7 collections. One caveat is that if you are taking drugs for diabetes you should consult with your healthcare provider on titration as you change your diet because your need for drugs will lessen and may be eliminated.
The time to create optimum health is now. It is better to prevent ill health in the first place than having to try to undo the damage with drugs and surgery later.
1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. National Diabetes Statistics Report, 2020. Atlanta, GA: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services; 2020
2. M Krssak, K Falk Petersen, A Dresner, L Dipetro, S M Vogel, D L Rothman, M Roden, G I Shulman. Intramyocellular lipid concentrations are correlated with insulin sensitivity in humans: a 1H NMR spectroscopy study. Diabetologia. 1999 Jan;42(1):113-6.
3. A T Santomauro, G Boden, M E Silva, D M Rocha, FR F Santos, M J Ursich, P G Strassmann, B L Wajchenberg. Overnight lowering of free fatty acids with Acipimox improves insulin resistance and glucose tolerance in obese diabetic and nondiabetic subjects. Diabetes. 1999 Sep;48(9):1836-41.
4. Rinaldi S, Campbell EE, Fournier J, O’connor C, Madill J. A Comprehensive Review of the Literature Supporting Recommendations From the Canadian Diabetes Association for the Use of a Plant-Based Diet for Management of Type 2 Diabetes. Can J Diabetes. 2016;40(5):471-477.
5. Barnard N. Dr. Neal Barnard’s Program for Reversing Diabetes. New York, NY: Rodale; 2017.
6. Greger M. The How Not To Die Cookbook. New York, NY: Flatiron Books; 2017.
7. Fisher K. Straight Up Food. Santa Rosa, CA: Green Bite Publishing; 2017.
