Finger Pricking

We are all kind of unique pigeons.

As much as we tend to have similar biochemistry in many ways, we are also very, very different in terms of how we metabolize food individually.

Many different things influence this: Gut Biome, mitochondrial function, level of insulin resistance, gene expression, etc.

This is why I am always a fan of monitoring YOUR response to foods (not just trusting what I say in a video, because it could be different for YOU).

The four items I listed below are things that I have recognized to be true by wearing a Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM). If you want to get a wearable CGM that continuously monitors glucose, I would recommend SIGNOS – Here’s a 25% off Access Link.

Gets you access to a CGM plus a really cool tech that uses your blood glucose data to algorithmically help you learn your data and how you respond to food. Disclaimer – I am on the Advisory Board for Signos – but I consider that a good thing and why I can share this stuff with you.

On to the reasonings – Oh, and if you cannot swing the CGM, you can still pull this off by pricking your finger, it’s just more cumbersome, but totally doable.

1) Predictor of Diabetes – Look, your glucose monitor cannot diagnose you with anything, but it can give you insight into how you respond to foods.

One of the most frustrating things to me is when people take a look at ONLY their fasting blood glucose and jump to conclusions with that data.

For example, when I was 300lbs, I was pre-diabetic, but my fasting glucose wasn’t too high. The big indicator for me was how I responded to foods (post-prandial response).

If you’re continually monitoring your glucose, you can learn a lot about the path that you are on, especially if you track your data over months!

2) Tells You a LOT about Stress – People don’t always realize that stress affects glucose.

People often don’t realize that they are also stressed in the first place. But sometimes having hard data can help you conceptualize it and do something about it.

Stress triggers cortisol, adrenaline, the whole works… all which liberate glucose from their stores. This can affect insulin levels as well, but more importantly, it is an indicator that your lifestyle might need a bit of an overhaul.

If your glucose peaks after receiving a stressful phone call, you may want to put measures in place to combat those stress responses. Could be a number of things that work for you, but the bottomline is that if you don’t know it’s causing a physiological issue, you likely won’t have a call to action to correct it!

My CGM makes it pretty clear when I am having a stressed day.

3) SLEEP!! Such a huge one. Sleep tracking is great, but its ambiguous because we don’t know how much sleep we always need for a given day (recovery).

You can see a pretty clear line from days that you are sleep deprived vs well rested when it comes to how you respond to food.

When I don’t sleep, I notice a huge spike after even fruit. But if I am well rested, that response is attenuated. Again, that can be different for everyone, but…

A study in Lancet looked at the effects of sleep deprivation on how metabolism is altered in terms of glucose levels.

The study enrolled 11 healthy young men who went through 6 nights where they were deprived of sleep – only being allowed to sleep 4 hours, which was followed by 7 nights of 12 hours sleep. Subjects were on the same 3 carbohydrate-rich meals. At day 5 of each condition (day 5/6 during sleep deprivation and day 5/7 for 12 hour sleep condition), intravenous glucose tolerance test were conducted.

On day 6 of each condition, blood was taken every 10-30min for 24 hours to measure glucose.

They found that when sleep was restricted, the rate of glucose clearance from the bloodstream was 40% slower and insulin function was 30% less than when sleep was extended. This suggests a lack of sleep increases blood glucose levels and can subsequently cause insulin resistance.

There are many studies like that as well, that one just painted it nicely.

4) You Can Learn WHEN to Exercise for more Fat Loss– This one was golden for me.

I had learned that when my glucose was stable-low, I could tap into a bit more a fat loss zone better. Having a CGM is very important for this because you need to know your timing quite well, but another thing is the OPPOSITE side of the equation:

Dr. Betul Hatipoglu – Director of Diabetes and Obesity Center – has some rough guidelines for what a safe blood glucose level is before exercising. She recommends that if your blood sugar level is between 150 and 180 mg/dl, you are in a healthy range.

She suggests that anything above 300 mg/dl can be dangerous. This is extremely high so for the most part, you should be good to exercise after eating to use up some of the ingested sugar.

This is because you can have a decent SPIKE in glucose when you workout as the body liberates fuels to offset the demand from exercise. Insulin Resistant or not, you should be cognizant of where your glucose levels are.

So, it also taught me when to time my workouts after a meal to mitigate the damage from a few too many carbs. Cool thing is that SIGNOS actually notifies me when my blood sugar is spiking and suggests activities to help bring it back into healthy range (i.e. going for a walk or doing some air squats).

We think we know our bodies until we start looking at the data.

I just think that everyone can benefit from testing their responses to given stimuli and foods now and then. Whether you test ketones, prick your finger, or monitor wearing a CGM, it is important to know your data!

I appreciate your time and attention today, because this was an important one!

See you tomorrow!