It’s a common misconception that insulin is the reason you feel hungry immediately after a high-carb meal. You might feel weak, shaky, and fatigued – but eating lunch or a quick snack only helps for a short time before the cycle repeats itself again.
Although insulin levels rapidly increase after eating in order to regulate your blood sugar, insulin alone is not the reason you’re always hungry.
Insulin isn’t what makes you feel hungry
Consuming foods like refined carbs increases your insulin levels, and the amount of leptin in your blood.
Leptin is a hormone that gives you the feeling of being full. So, a big plate of french fries may increase the amount of leptin in your blood – leaving you feeling full and satisfied.
But because refined carbs are digested quickly, your blood sugar levels may rise quickly, too. High blood sugar, in turn, causes a spike in insulin levels. This spike in insulin can lead to a blood sugar crash, which is around the time you might start to feel hungry, along with decreased energy levels. But, this isn’t because insulin causes hunger.
Ghrelin is a hormone that signals hunger during periods of low blood sugar, and is one of the reasons why you end up feeling so hangry during a blood sugar crash!
Here’s where it starts to get tricky, though… Your body may respond differently after having high blood sugar for an extended period of time – which can sometimes be due to eating a lot of high glycemic carbohydrates like corn, white potatoes, sweet potatoes, and white rice.
Chronically high blood sugar can result in you becoming resistant to insulin, because your body stops responding to it. So, your hunger signals may end up being out of whack as a result.
Insulin resistance can lead to prediabetes – and if it’s not addressed, it can develop into type 2 diabetes.
One of the ways to be proactive about this is to take care of your blood sugar before it becomes a problem.
Blood sugar and your DNA
Luckily, you can check your genes to find out if you’re more likely to have high blood sugar levels that can lead to conditions like diabetes!
Discovering how your genetics play a role in high blood sugar can help you be more proactive about taking care of your blood sugar levels to begin with.
For example, if your Blood Sugar Report mentions that your SLC30A8 gene variant is linked to high blood sugar – zinc may be one of your top prioritized recommendations because it may reduce blood sugar, and the likelihood of type 2 diabetes.
Checking your DNA can help you understand why you need a strategy for keeping your blood sugar in check. SelfDecode helps you find out if some of your genetic variants are associated with high blood sugar, and knowing what will work best for you and you only helps keep you focused on what you need to do to stay healthy and happy.
Are you taking care of your blood sugar levels?
The easiest way to make sure you don’t end up developing a resistance to insulin, is to prevent chronic high blood sugar levels in the first place.
This means:
- Consume fewer refined carbs
- Reducing your sugar intake
- Exercising more
- Consume more fiber
PLUS, make sure to check your Blood Sugar Report! Finding out if your genes contribute to high blood sugar is more important than you think…
Because up to 80% of the differences in people’s chances of getting type 2 diabetes can be attributed to genetics.
If it has that much to do with your DNA, you’d think EVERYONE would be checking their genes!
Did you know?
Resistant starch doesn’t increase blood sugar like most digestible starches do. Resistant starch can help reduce your blood sugar, prevent diabetes, and can even boost your response to insulin!
Check your Blood Sugar Report to see if resistant starch would be helpful for you, then check out Jo’s Resistant Starch – we’ve created the simplest formula possible so that you can reap all of the benefits of fiber for blood sugar without the side effects that other resistant starch supplements may bring with it.
