How To Reverse Insulin Resistance and Type 2 Diabetes

Currently about 9-10% of adults worldwide have diabetes.  By 2050, many experts predict that number will triple in countries like the United States, to ⅓ of all adults.  We are moving in the wrong direction.

Diabetes is a classic “mismatch disease”.  We develop it because our Cro Magnon bodies are mismatched to our modern day society lives.  Think slight, thin runners on the savannah munching roots, tubers, and leafy greens all day, with the occasional bite of fish or small game.  Our hunter gatherer ancestors and modern day hunter gatherers typically consume 100 grams of fiber per day, compared to our measly 15 grams that is typical today.  

Cheeseburgers, chicken nuggets, pizza, soda, and donuts are not exactly what we were designed to consume.  So when we flood our bodies with these foods, where do the excess calories go?  Many of those calories get deposited in the organs of our body like our muscle and liver.  We use the term “insulin resistance” to describe when fatty liver and muscle cells are unable to soak in excess glucose (sugar) from the blood and store it away as glycogen, so glucose builds up in the bloodstream.  When our body cannot keep up with the rising glucose in our blood, we call it diabetes.  So the underlying cause of diabetes is insulin resistance, which is caused by the buildup of fat inside the cells of the muscle and liver and other organs.  

How much insulin resistance do you have?  We all lie on a spectrum, and our own insulin resistance is determined by our genetics, our diet, and our lifestyle.  In general, the less insulin resistance you have, the healthier and more diabetes-resistant you are.  Insulin resistance increases meaningful medical problems like diabetes, kidney failure, memory decline, and heart attacks.  We can get a rough measurement of our insulin resistance by measuring our blood triglyceride to HDL ratio.  We have more insulin resistance at the end of each day than at the beginning.  Exercise drops our insulin resistance not only long term, but in the hours after exercising.  

It turns out that you can reverse your insulin resistance.  Food in particular may be the #1 factor.  Foods that cause insulin resistance and diabetes include anything with excess fat, especially saturated or trans fat, like meat, dairy, eggs, desserts, processed foods especially those containing palm or coconut oil anything with excess calories foods rich in branched chain amino acids, including meat, dairy, and eggs foods that cause inflammation

To reverse your diabetes, we recommend building a lifelong habit of consuming more fiber-rich whole plant foods.  These are naturally low in harmful fats and rich in water and fiber.  Special mention to legumes (beans, lentils), whole grains, and vegetables.  When people switch to this whole foods, plant based diet, this change alone is frequently sufficient to lead to reversal of insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes.  

Other behaviors which play a very large role in reversing diabetes include: exercise in all its forms, adequate sleep (7-8 hours of natural sleep), mindfulness, and stress reduction.

Other Rules

• Don’t make any medication changes without consulting with your doctor or provider.  
• If you are ever having low blood sugar, then this is an emergency.  Make an appointment soon with your doctor.  Adjust your diabetes medicines so you are not having low blood sugar.  Low blood sugar can kill!
• If taking diabetes medicines other than metformin, beware low blood sugar.  Metformin alone cannot cause your blood sugar to decrease below normal.  But most other diabetes drugs can!  If you are slimming down or losing weight, while taking diabetes drugs, you are at the greatest risk.  When people slim down or lose weight (thru healthy changes like a plant based diet, exercise, or through unhealthy changes like surgery or cancer or a cocaine habit), their diabetes gets under better control and they need less diabetes medicines.  THe drugs that pose the greatest risk of low blood sugar are insulin and sulfonylurea drugs like glyburide, glipizide, glimepiride.
• If type of your diabetes is not 100% clear (type 1, type 2, etc) then get a C-Peptide blood test.  This can pinpoint the cause of your diabetes.  Type 1 diabetes is from an autoimmune destruction of your body’s insulin secreting pancreatic cells.  Type 2 is due exclusively to insulin resistance.  Type 1.5 is a combination of both.  If you have type 2 diabetes, it can be completely reversed in most cases by reversing your insulin resistance.
• If you take insulin for type 2 diabetes, find out if you can switch to a healthier alternative.   If you have adequate insulin production, then you may be able to get off insulin in the long term (don’t stop any medicines without consulting with your provider!).  Insulin itself can cause weight gain and it can cause the underlying cause of type 2 diabetes to get worse.
• If you have prediabetes and you are gaining weight, then it is likely a matter of time before you develop diabetes.  The good news: lifestyle change now can prevent diabetes altogether in most people, regardless of their genes.