My husband has been doing the Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) study and I showed him my data from SAD Effect on Blood Glucose (Part 1) and he commented “Wow…that’s crazy. Your peaks are so high!” He’s also been acing the OGTT, which was a much bigger challenge for me, as described in The Dreaded Oral Glucose Tolerance Test. I think I am beginning to understand the differences, or at least some of them, in our glucose responses.
Remember the data I showed in CGM Study Results – Low-Carb Eating where my glucose levels were essentially unchanged when eating low-carb meals?
And, remember the effects I showed in CGM Study Results – Controlled Carb Eating where I did planned experiments and showed the effect on my blood glucose?
I hope the data I present today will start to explain where I am going with all of this…
Going back to my Takeaways – I probably should have added a couple in my previous blog, so I will start there:
Takeaway #13: The more sugar I eat, the more sugar I crave!
The second OGTT put me on a sugar roller-coaster that it was impossible to get off. Even when I was able to stabilize my blood glucose, it didn’t solve my cravings. Looking back, I probably could have muscled my way through and fasted the day after the OGTT and I likely would have been okay, but eating decent amounts of carbohydrates basically derailed me.
Takeaway #14: The SAD, especially when ice-cream seems to be involved, can cause my blood sugar to do crazy stuff!
This is another variation of Takeaway #12 from the Torchy’s/Ice-Cream Experiment. But, this time, my results were even more nuts. I don’t think this type of swing is normal, but what’s causing it? Basically, I think it’s my body being used to not having sugar and enjoying that scenario.
We are getting to why I believe that… let’s continue the story of my second 10-day CGM period….
Day 13
Every morning, I take my blood glucose with my meter and after Day 12, I woke up to a value of 112mg/dL. That was my record high for the entire 20-day study!!
I continued to eat the standard American diet (SAD) with wild abandon. Day 13 was a particularly adventurous day. For breakfast, I had two McDonalds chocolate chip cookies (Figure 1). My glucose started at 114mg/dL and went to 148mg/dL, an increase of 34mg/dL.
I followed that up with a glazed donut at church (Figure 2). This donut raised me from 116mg/dL to 161mg/dL, or an increase of 45mg/dL.
Lunch was a tequila sunrise (lots of juice), chips and queso, and a taco on an actual tortilla (Figure 3). Basically, my glucose was on the decline. There was a late small rise, but nothing terrible.
Then, I went to the movies, had a sweet watermelon margarita, some “buttered” popcorn (see Black Listed Foods: Movie Theatre Popcorn for more info on the quotes), and dark chocolate – like a large serving (Figure 4). I ate a ton of carbs, but the effect overall wasn’t so great.
Finally, I went out to a wing joint to have dinner. I had a house margarita (normal sugar), 6 boneless wings, and some onion rings (Figure 5). I wasn’t able to even come close to finishing my drink or my food, as I was feeling pretty terrible. However, there was a pretty good spike here, which was probably compounded by the carbs from earlier.
I wasn’t feeling any better by the time I got home, so I went to bed at 8:30PM. I’ve included the overnight data for completion (Figure 6 and 7). My overnight didn’t go as insane as the previous overnight and started to stabilize as the morning progressed.
I didn’t calculate nutritional information on all of this, as it would be highly inaccurate, but I think it’s safe to say that Day 13 was the highest amount of carbohydrates I have had in a very long time, even more Day 12 (including the brownie sundae). Now, I didn’t have any ice cream, but otherwise, I pigged out on the SAD!
And, I wouldn’t say my blood glucose behaved well, but it seemed like it was starting to behave, well, better…. Basically, I stayed on the sugar roller coaster, but the peaks weren’t as high…. only one day later.
The next morning, I woke up to blood glucose value of 85mg/dL from my finger-stick glucose meter. Perfect!
You’re not convinced… it’s because I didn’t eat ice cream, right? Oh, there’s so much data to share… I think this is going to be a Part 2 of many because I really don’t want to leave anything out…
Day 14
I continued on my SAD journey. I enjoyed two warm chocolate glazed donuts for breakfast (Figure 8). Remember that donut from Day 13 that raised me from 116mg/dL to 161mg/dL, or an increase of 45mg/dL. Well, here’s two donuts…. and I went from 114mg/dL to 148mg/dL, or an increase of 34mg/dL. Twice the amount of donuts and a smaller glucose response… Hmm….
Then I had a Spicy chicken sandwich (the kind with a bun) for lunch (Figure 9).
I later drank 16 ounces of beer (Figure 10).
I had more beer, chips, and some meat at our Memorial Day party (Figures 11 and 12). I pretty much grazed the entire time we were there. There was barely an effect on my blood glucose, a little hump towards the end of the party, but nothing compared to what I ate!
For good measure, I finished up with some ice cream (Figure 13). No response in the normal one-hour time frame! Of course I wasn’t feeling well again, so I went to bed a little after 8, and that’s when I started to see an effect, but I was surprised to see that I had around six hours of relatively stable blood glucose, and that’s even after eating ice cream!
Continuing through the night (Figures 14 and 15), look how nicely everything recovered, allowing me to wake up the next morning with a perfectly stable blood glucose (from my meter) of 87mg/dL.
Honestly, other than the donuts and ice cream, Day 14 wasn’t a terrible day, but it was still significantly more carbohydrates that I normally would ever consider eating in a day. Regardless, the overall effect was less on Day 14 than it was on Day 13, and clearly less than the data I showed from Day 11 and Day 12 in my previous post!
I’m seeing a pattern, but there’s still 6 more days to go of my study… Stay tuned… My eating gets even more crazy as we continue…
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