In today’s society, diabetes is now so common that it’s rare for someone not to know a relative or friend who has it. There are 30 million people living in the United States alone with diabetes. 2.3 million (roughly) in Canada. It’s an epidemic health crisis to say the least. But, before we get into a deep discussion let’s start with explaining exactly what diabetes is.
What Is Diabetes?
When we eat carbohydrates, most are broken down into simple sugars in our bodies. Our cells then use these sugars for energy. However, they are not able to get into our cells on their own. They are shuttled there by insulin. Ketones on the other hand can also produce energy without the assistance of insulin but we’ll get to that later.
There are two types of diabetes that people are generally aware of. However, adults with diabetes could benefit from better treatment if the condition was categorized into the full five.
Type 1 Diabetes
This is the conclusion of a new study published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology. (1)
Type 1 diabetes is the body’s inability to create enough insulin. The pancreas is responsible for creating insulin but can no longer do so sufficiently. Type 1 is thought to be caused by genetics or viruses that early in life infect and break the pancreas’ ability to do its job of creating insulin.
People with type 1 diabetes need to inject themselves with insulin to match what the body would have created to process the sugars. Because this is a tricky matching process, there is a danger of too much or too little insulin.
Type 2 Diabetes
Type 2 diabetes is considered a lifestyle disease or an illness created by the standard American diet. It is also termed insulin resistance. Diabetes occurs when the body is unable to make enough insulin or use it makes properly. Insulin is a hormone used by the body to control glucose levels (the amount of sugar in your blood). Glucose is one of the main sources of fuel for the body. Providing the body with the energy needed to perform all necessary functions. (2)
Sugar And Its Affects On Our Bodies
After many years of inappropriate levels of sugars in our diet, our pancreas isn’t able to function as it should. It’s either no longer able to quickly match our bodies sugar intake and/or our body is no longer accepting the insulin that our pancreas is creating to shuttle sugars into our cells. This leads to rising levels of unprocessed sugars in our blood stream. Increasing damage excess sugar has on our bodies. For further reading, click here to read, “These Food Additives are Linked to Cancer, Diabetes and Obesity”.
I could go into detail about what that excess sugar does to your body (one thing is it is stored as fat) but I want to get to the main reason for this article. What excess sugar does to your brain!
Type 3 Diabetes
Type 3 diabetes is not a common term that people have heard of unless you read a lot about health. It is however becoming more mainstream.
Type 3 diabetes is what excess sugar does to your brain’s ability to keep itself fueled. It is like saying Type 2 diabetes but the brain edition. Your brain’s ability to run requires that it be given constant energy. Much like a car needs X litres of fuel per 100 KM. That is unless you own a tesla / run your brain on ketones.
Your brain needs a steady source of energy. For most of us, that is coming from carbohydrates (sugars). However it would be great if we could use ketones …. Oops, getting ahead of myself ….
As we constantly expose our bodies to excessive simple carbohydrates and thus simple sugars our bodies begin to take notice. It then creates a safety mechanisms to protect us from the excess damaging sugar. One of these mechanisms to protect the brain is called the blood brain barrier.