Pajaro Street Health and Wellness

Quick Links: Health Home Encyclopedia diet Sleep Exercise Disease&Stress Health Links

Preventing Degenerative Disease- Diabetes - Identifying Diabetes - Syndrome X - Obesity -Treating Diabetes - Diet and Diabetes - Diabetes and Supplements - Low-Glycemic Meals

Obesity

All of us have heard the media and physicians claim that the reason diabetes is becoming epidemic in the United States and the industrialized world is because so many people are developing obesity. This is really not the case. The media has put the cart before the horse, so to speak. Insulin resistance (Syndrome X) leads to central obesity, not the other way around. In fact obesity is a major aspect of this syndrome.

What do I mean by central obesity? This has to do with how your weight is distributed in your body. If it is evenly dispersed all over or you are heavy in the bottom (pear-shaped), you may need to drop some weight, but in relation to Syndrome X, you are fine. But if you have gained substantial weight around your waistline (are apple-shaped), you may be in trouble.

I have had many patients in their late twenties or early thirties come into my office complaining that they are gaining a significant amount of weight. What bothers them is the fact that their eating habits and activity level have not changed, but they've put on thirty to forty pounds in the past two or three years. Why are they gaining so much? Typically it is because the patient has developed a resistance to insulin. These patients have begun various diet programs but were not able to lose much weight. Such diets are essentially high-carbohydrate, low-fat; this makes the insulin resistance only worse. If these people do not correct the underlying problem for their weight gain-insulin resistance-they will not lose weight. How frustrating it must be to keep going back to their support group but never coming close to losing the kind of weight the others are!

I encourage all of my patients to begin balancing their diet by eating low-glycemic carbohydrates with good protein and good fat (which I'll explain later in this chapter). When this diet is combined with a modest exercise program and cellular nutrition Table 1, the underlying insulin resistance may be corrected. The weight will then start coming off as mysteriously as it came on. My patients are often amazed at how they are losing weight without really even trying. They feel good, and their energy level is remarkable.

Please know that when I say diet, I'm not referring to a fad diet. A fad diet is something that you start with the intention of someday quitting (the sooner, the better!). Instead, I'm talking about a healthy lifestyle that has the side effect of fat loss. I work aggressively with my patients for about twelve weeks so they know exactly how to apply these principles to the way they like to eat. Losing weight is not the answer. Correcting insulin resistance is the key.Treating Diabetes

"What Your Doctor Doesn't Know About Nutritional Medicine May Be Killing You."
Dr. Ray Strand http://www.raystrand.com/bookstore.asp