The Amazing Diabetes Cure!

Well, last we spoke I told you about being diagnosed with diabetes 3 months ago. So I went in for my 3 month diabetes checkup last week and here are the results.

I got my labs done in the morning and saw my Doctor that afternoon. He walks in the room and says, ‘You are my poster person for diabetes’. If everyone did what you have done in the last 3 months there would be no problem with type 2 diabetes.

Here are the results:

Lost 31 pounds.
A1c went from 6.6 to 5.7 (very important for diabetics)
Mean Blood Glucose levels from 136 to 105
Cholesterol from 230 to 141
Triglycerides from over 500 to 70

Doctor said ‘as long as you keep doing what you’re doing you don’t have to worry about diabetes any more’. No medications for me!

I took this very seriously because both my brother and father died from diabetes and I knew just dieting was not going to help. They both went on diets and it still got worse and worse til it killed them. I work out 4 times per week for over 3 hours per day. My son was diagnosed last year and he’s only 37. He is dieting and was just put on insulin. He won’t listen to me about the exercise part of this, I hope I don’t have to outlive my son.

I don’t credit dieting with what I have done. I know too many people who have died from diabetes thinking just dieting would take care of the problem. One friend who I worked with died within 3 years of being diagnosed, he dieted until you couldn’t see him behind a fence post.

YOU MUST INCLUDE HEAVY, VIGOROUS EXERCISE.
And as Forrest Gump once said; That’s all I got to say about that!

That is the single absolute best thing i have ever seen posted here.

Superb.

I wish…i wish…that every type 2 daibetic out there would read this and get inspired.

Observations :
Keeping it at bay, have a look at supplemeting magnesium (may be a good corelation between mg++levels and insulin sensitivity) also take a look at intermittent fasting mathod as a way to preventchronic elevation of bm.

Well done.

Yes, congratulations on adding years to your life. Now if you can get thru to your son.

Awesome, Widgeteye!!

My mother got type II, most likely from the crap diet we had, and died from a stroke. It was surreal how I and my sister kept begging her to serve nutritious food and she didn’t get it.

Annoyingly, I can’t seem to get my cholesterol down without statins. How much does that contribute?

Wow, that is awesome!

[quote]cavalier wrote:
Awesome, Widgeteye!!

My mother got type II, most likely from the crap diet we had, and died from a stroke. It was surreal how I and my sister kept begging her to serve nutritious food and she didn’t get it.

Annoyingly, I can’t seem to get my cholesterol down without statins. How much does that contribute?[/quote]

Cav–take a look at the magnificent magnesium article on the main page.

I was trying also to find a link to walking–specifically fasted walking as another angle of atack on lipids but don’t seem to be able to find it in amongst all my files.

Nurse, I’ve supplemented with magnesium ever since my cardiologist told me ten years ago. Will check the article, though.

Excellent.

Just excellent.

Good stuff!

Nurse,
Could you explain how natural insulin in your body acts toward glucose. I know somehow your body has to direct that energy to the places it’s needed or something. My doctor explained this stuff on the day he told me I was diabetic but I just kind of sat there with a Deer in the headlights look. :slight_smile:

[quote]Widgeteye wrote:
Nurse,
Could you explain how natural insulin in your body acts toward glucose. I know somehow your body has to direct that energy to the places it’s needed or something. My doctor explained this stuff on the day he told me I was diabetic but I just kind of sat there with a Deer in the headlights look. :slight_smile:

[/quote]

Ok… settle in for a bit of science…

Also take a look at wikipedia for this–quite a good source of basic information.

I can well imagine the ‘deer in the headlights’ feel !!.
Daibetes is certainly a scary diagnosis when you are sat there in docs office.
It’s important to realise that there are 2 principal forms of diabetes (mellitus) : type 1 and type 2 and that in type 1 insulin has to be rplaced by injection wheres in type 2 there is plenty of it around–it’s just not doing it’s job !!

Basically :
Insulin is a hormone that is secreted by a specialised gland (the pancreas) in response to a raised level of glucose in the body.
Raised glucose levels occue primarily as a result of eating foods that get broken down (in the gut)and absorbed into the bloodstream as glucose.
Glucose itself is basicaly a small sugar molecule which is most commonly derived from carbohydrates which can vary in molecular size from the very small (sugar) through larger molecules (starches) up to the very large cellulose which we can’t use but the ruminant animals do.
The ‘small’ molecule sugars are absorbed very fast, when you see ‘glycaemic index’ mentioned it largely relates to the speed of absorption and the rate of rise of blood sugar.

As blood sugar rises insuiln is secreted in the pancreas and moves into circulation, then at cellular level is acts as a ‘signal’ on the cell mambrane at a ‘receptor’ which then allows the cell to take up glucose.

Cells (muscle) can only take up a given amount of glucose, once at maximum the excess has to go somewhere as it is actually toxic !!, spare glucose is usually taken up in the liver as first glycogen (useful secondary sugar store) and then as fat in the liver and in fat cells.

The strangeness in the system is thet the cells sensitivity to insuiln varies --the principal problem of type 2 diabetes is that there is plenty of sugar (glucose) plenty of insulin–but mr cell is saying no !!

What research and your example has shown is that hard exercise can and does hugely increase insuiln sensitivity.

The whole ‘other’ side to insuiln is that it i also powefully anabolic (enhances muscle size) by also acting as the signal for the cell to take up amnino acids (building blocks of muscle protein).

In fact for us older lifters it is the insuiln response we really use to go anabolic–the trick being to :

  1. Create insuiln sensitivity by exercising (lifting) hard.
  2. Stimulating the insuiln response with a fast carb ‘hit’ immediately after exercise + a protein hit so taht muscle cells take up both glucose and amino acids.

Hope this helps–big technical subject.

EDIT.
Couple of things to look at :
1.An article on T Nation by editor/boss man T C Louma recently where T C himself basically describes how the much touted 5-6 small meals bodybuilder style eating had given him chronically elevated blood sugars.
2. Articles on the intermittent fasting strategy (martin burkhams site) about how feeding during a shorter window (and larger meals) coupled with a longer fasted period may be much healthier in terms of blood sugar control.

Sorry–would do links to these but although very physiology savvy i am a total non computer dweeb and have never worked out how to do links.

[quote]big nurse wrote:
That is the single absolute best thing i have ever seen posted here.

Superb.

I wish…i wish…that every type 2 daibetic out there would read this and get inspired.

Observations :
Keeping it at bay, have a look at supplemeting magnesium (may be a good corelation between mg++levels and insulin sensitivity) also take a look at intermittent fasting mathod as a way to preventchronic elevation of bm.

Well done.[/quote]

X 2 Awesome

Wow that explains a lot. Especially the insulin sensitivity part. That explains why I was able to lower all the bad stuff in my blood so quick. Also a good ass kicker since I see now WHY exercise is so important to treat diabetes.
That will be in the back of my mind from now on. Thanks a ton. Great explanation.

There is also a very neat article by John Meadows (harness the power of insulin) if anyone can do the linking it would be really nice to be able to jump to that one and the recent ‘magnificent magnesium one’.

And diet also affects insulin sensitivity, right? Eat tons of carbs day in and day out and you just wreck all sensitivity. Go to high protein and low carbs and it comes back.

Oh, and it’s real easy to set links in this forum. Just type in the url:

and VOILA! T-Nation automatically makes it a link. (Remember to get that “http” in there.)

Open a new window in your browser . . . browse to the page you want . . . select the url text . . . hit cntl-C or whatever to copy . . . go back to your T-Nation post . . . and paste. Foolproof.

Well done!! So many people neglect the exercise part, glad you’ve figured it out. Please come teach my dad, he just doesn’t get it. Guess it’s easier to take a shot than lift something heavy.

Absolutely Cav…
I didn’t specifically mention the common problem of frequent high gi carb foods continuosly elevating blood sugars and probably being part of the ‘triumvirate’ cause of type 11 diabetes.
With regard to this site i take it as well accepted that the folks around here know enough about the perils of continous high gi carb eating as to not even mention it.
Would be interesting to hear what widget (op) has to say about diet before and after–might be that some individuals (and it does sound like a familial problem) are much more sensitive and predisposed to become insulin resistant.

Having read up a bit about this in the health journals i do know that type 2 diabetes is hugely more common in (for example) native americans and polynesian peoples like the maori.

Well here goes, I am a type 2 diabetic, have a blood clot disorder, my testosterone production is gone, I do shots for that now. I used a product in 2006 called SUPERDROL which caused the blood clotting issue. Before all this happened I was about 270lbs and after about 2-3 years on this shit it did a number on me. I almost died twice (DVT) CLOT IN LEG AND LUNGS and again 3 years later from a blood clot in my head which also caused seizures. Then 6 months later came the diabetes at age 40. After reading these posts I have learned alot I have had a few knucklheads tell me to keep using the humalog (insulin) as it will drop bodyfat fast and that all these top bodybuilders do it all the time. Right now i am at about 257lbs. I still have good size but want to get lean. I realize I cant take in as much protein anymore because of the diabetes and can’t do really any green veggies because of the blood thinners i take. I really dont want to give this up and really don’t know what to do. My goal is to be 200lbs but shredded.

right now I am doing about 5 shots of insulin a day
1000mg pills of metforman
20 units of lantus every night
4 shots anywhere from 4-10 units of humalog
tesosterone shot every other week
13mg of cumadin (blood thinner)

great job man!

one of the endocrinologists that i work with has a saying: “you do not “get” type II diabetes, you EARN it”

well sir, seems like you “earned” a cure, and a lot of respect from myself and many here in this little community.

best wishes to your son, hope he finally gets it and follows your example.

a little thread necromancy here -

  • checked into the hospital for chest pain on Monday June 27
  • they tested everything including blood
  • hemoglobin A1C came back as an 8
  • Wednesday 29th started tracking my food using an app on my phone
  • July 5th doctor actually diagnosed me
  • last night 2 hours after dinner blood sugar was 85
  • this morning fasted it was 83

Still a lot of work to do
have been doing both cardio and lifting daily - going hard at both of these
went with a lower carb (40 to 50 a day) diet
down about 10 lbs since this started
Also tracking body fat but have not measured that again yet, will do monthly

In digging around for help and motivation on Tuesday July 5 I ran into this thread. It helped tremendously. Thank you to all who participated in it. I will continue to kick this thing in the ass.