In clinical work, there are often patients who adopt a relatively strict diet control in order to achieve strict glycemic control. By strict, it means that their daily intake of staple foods is lower than the minimum requirement needed for a healthy human life. For example, roughly speaking, the daily staple food requirement for each person should not be less than 5-6 taels.
Some people may say, aren’t there many people who eat only a very small amount of staple food (1-2 taels) per day, or even 1-2 meals less, in order to lose weight? Didn’t they also achieve the goal of rapid weight loss and health promotion? This diet is a way to lose weight relatively quickly, but it is not suitable for long-term maintenance. Even if someone can maintain this program for a relatively long period of time, it is only a sacrifice of health to maintain the “bone” forced to do.
Too little staple food can be harmful to both the average person and diabetics. Grain is the body’s main source of energy, and the glucose formed after digestion goes directly into the bloodstream, where it is used as energy for muscles and organs throughout the body, including vital organs such as the heart, brain and kidneys. It is true that eating more food can raise blood sugar, but it can also cause damage to organ function and human health when it is lower than the minimum required amount. For example, people who eat too little staple food often show decreased brain function and sympathetic arousal. In addition, in order to make up for the lack of energy brought about by eating less staple foods, people instinctively compensate by increasing meat, etc., which in turn tends to lead to the premature development of atherosclerosis. I once had a patient who ate almost no staple food for 10 years, mainly beef, and as a result, multiple large artery stenoses were discovered before he was 60 years old, and multiple stents were placed to save his life.
Diabetics with too little staple food are more prone to hypoglycemia (symptoms), as well as impaired brain function and other physical damage. With the use of hypoglycemic drugs, when the staple food is reduced and the side dishes are not increased, hypoglycemia is still more frequent at the beginning, while after 1-2 months, the episodes of hypoglycemia decrease and enter a state of sympathetic excitement, which is manifested by having fever 3-4 hours after meals, panic, over-excitement to sounds and sudden events, easy emotional excitement and insomnia. At the same time, the body shows weakness, easy to sleepy, hair loss, dry skin, memory loss, etc. At this time, it is often difficult to find the low blood glucose value when measuring blood glucose, at this time, “hypoglycemia” becomes more hidden, and more manifested as a lack of energy in the brain tissue. The lack of energy supply to the brain tissues will also cause the brain cells to gradually lose their functions and eventually form Alzheimer’s disease, and the quality of life of sugar lovers will be seriously impaired as a result.
In my outpatient work, I have noticed that there is a group of patients who are emotionally abnormal – either depressed or nervous and anxious. Their mood changes also cause distress to their families and friends and relatives. Some would say that this is depression due to diabetes. In fact, if this group of patients were allowed to increase the amount of staple foods appropriately, raise certain pre-meal blood glucose appropriately, and reduce possible hypoglycemia, their mood state would improve significantly, and in some cases, their sleep would improve significantly. They also took off their depression or anxiety disorder hats as a result.
So you must be asking, what about the high blood sugar when you have more than one bite of a staple food? In fact, this is the essence of diabetes, impaired regulation of sugar. But this does not mean that the less staple food should be the better, the amount of staple food should be at least 5-6 taels / day (such as exercise can also be appropriate to increase), when the blood sugar rises can be taken to share meals, increase after-meal exercise and even adjust the method of hypoglycemic drugs. Do not waste food because of “sugar”. Also for different age and status of the sugar users should also be “age” according to the appropriate. Currently, there is a boom in individualized treatment in the field of diabetes treatment. For elderly people aged 60-65 years or above, the glycemic control target does not have to follow the standard of normal people, but can be relaxed appropriately. For example, in the age group of 70-75 years old, the postprandial blood glucose should reach 9-13mmol/L, and the preprandial blood glucose should not be lower than 6-8mmol/L. In conclusion, in the process of diabetic diet treatment, we should also avoid the excessive behavior of treating staple food as a flooding beast, think diligently, observe more and experience more, and believe that it will eventually lead sugar lovers to real health.