People don't often like to hear that sugar and refined carbohydrates (including white bread) can contribute to chronic fatigue.
It's usually the last thing you want to hear if you're having sugar and carbohydrate cravings frequently.
The ultimate challenge of restricting sugar and carbohydrates is in treating it like a prison sentence.
Many people adopt a very rigid approach to this topic and end up with an all or nothing mandate for carb and sugar consumption.
The minute you decide to make the dietary challenge a barometer of your self-worth, this approach can backfire and even hurt your health.
The most successful approach is noticing how you feel if you let refined carbohydrates and sugar be the bulk of your diet, versus if you eat it moderately or sparingly in combination with other important foods.
This less rigid approach takes into account that you are a real person, not just a guinea pig for a dietary regimen.
Real people will crave foods once in a while, especially tasty ones.
It's only natural and you'll see the same reaction from cats and dogs after they eat a food they like.
The issue becomes once the diet is primarily sugar- and white wheat-based.
With this imbalance, the digestive system is overburdened with one type of food that adds pounds, cannot sustain your energy, and is not digested well in excess.
It's not always just sugar and refined carbohydrates.
Sometimes it's dairy, or nuts, or even certain types of fruits or vegetables.
As an individual, you have to pay attention to your own body and the way it reacts to the foods and meals that you eat.
Which foods make you want to fall asleep afterward and lead to more lethargy than energy? Which foods make you feel irritable or moody? Which foods make your skin break out more often? Which foods is your body telling you to eat in more moderation, and which ones does it want you to increase in your diet? If you pay attention to what your body is telling you, the advice in a health magazine or from a health nut on T.
V.
will pale in comparison to what you innately know already.
And even if their advice sounds like it may contain a grain of truth, you know how to try out new dietary habits in moderation and with healthy scrutiny and intelligence.
Having said this, why is it that refined wheat and sugar often lead to more symptoms of fatigue than other foods? Most of us know that eating a whole plate of spaghetti or a ton of bread might trigger a sleepy feeling, so there must be a reason for why this happens.
Refined wheat such as white bread and sugary foods create a big spike in blood sugar.
The sugars found in other foods like vegetables or beans are connected in ways that are broken down more slowly in the body.
Those found in sugary foods and refined wheat are connected in chains that are very easy to break down in the body.
Of course these foods differ from one another slightly, but in general they don't take very long to get broken down into simple sugars and glucose that quickly enter your blood stream.
A quick spike of glucose in the blood triggers the pancreas to release a big flood of the hormone insulin that unlocks cells.
The body's cells then openly take in blood sugar for immediate energy or for storage and future use.
With the quickest spikes in blood sugar also come the fastest crashes.
This is because a bigger team of insulin is called upon as more of an emergency to take care of sugary foods and refined wheat.
This insulin quickly ushers the glucose into cells so that blood sugar levels don't get too high.
The body closely regulates blood sugar levels with its physiology.
Levels that are too high can be harmful to the body.
After the quick spike of glucose is ushered into cells, you are left with a crash afterward of low blood sugar, low energy, fatigue, and moodiness.
Does this phenomenon occur with other foods? Whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and legumes break down more slowly in the blood and don't issue an insulin emergency in the body.
They are better foods for keeping you satiated longer throughout the day, feeling a more constant flow of energy, and not experiencing sugar crashes.
Rather than going on strike tomorrow against sugar and refined carbohydrates, what moderate steps can you take to lessen the impact refined carbs and sugar have on your chronic fatigue? For starters, like we mentioned earlier, pay attention to how different foods make you feel.
If you're noticing lethargy and moodiness after certain foods, you may want to limit how much or how often you eat those.
Before piling a huge plate of the food next time, you may remember how you felt the previous time and not want to go through that experience again.
Add foods like whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and legumes into your daily diet to encourage a steady blood sugar level (so that you're not craving the quick energy spikes of sugar and carb-rich foods.
) These foods are harder to crave for most of us, but they feel better afterward and allow us to feel our energetic and attractive selves.
This feeling beats the sluggish mind and body effects that large loads of sugar and refined wheat can bring on.
What else can you do? When refined carbohydrates and sweets are consumed, there are certain types of foods that can slow down the release of their sugars when eaten in combination.
These foods include those that are high in protein and healthy types of fats such as omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids.
These foods slow down the digestive process and moderate the effects of insulin on blood sugar.
Sugars are released more slowly into the blood and you experience less of a blood sugar crash afterward.
Some of the foods that can help you out in this respect include olive oil, nuts or nut butters, avocado, and legumes.
If you do have a particularly sluggish day of eating, instead of berating yourself and calling yourself a bad person, just get active the next chance you get.
Go for a walk the next day, do some stretching, go for a hike or bike ride, or do some other activity to use the excess energy that may be following you around and interfering with a balanced appetite and metabolism.
There's no need to go crazy and spend two hours at the gym.
You can trust your body to tell you how to re-balance your energetic and dietary needs.
If there's anything you can carry away from this section on food and fatigue, it's that you have to trust your body and not have pre-conceived ideas of "good" ways to behave.
What seems like a good way to behave can get out of hand and even prevent you from observing your own body's reaction to sometimes rigid rules.
Food can lead to energy, and food can also lead to fatigue.
Most of us know that overeating, eating certain foods in excess, and emotional eating can all lead to more fatigue than energy.
The key is to trust your body and yourself to create a diet that supports energy levels and a healthy lifestyle.
Even if you seek outside guidance to do this from a nutritionist, health magazine, or some other source, make sure to always check in with yourself as the ultimate expert on your body's needs.
Next, we'll talk about supporting healthy sleep habits to maintain your body's energy needs.
It's usually the last thing you want to hear if you're having sugar and carbohydrate cravings frequently.
The ultimate challenge of restricting sugar and carbohydrates is in treating it like a prison sentence.
Many people adopt a very rigid approach to this topic and end up with an all or nothing mandate for carb and sugar consumption.
The minute you decide to make the dietary challenge a barometer of your self-worth, this approach can backfire and even hurt your health.
The most successful approach is noticing how you feel if you let refined carbohydrates and sugar be the bulk of your diet, versus if you eat it moderately or sparingly in combination with other important foods.
This less rigid approach takes into account that you are a real person, not just a guinea pig for a dietary regimen.
Real people will crave foods once in a while, especially tasty ones.
It's only natural and you'll see the same reaction from cats and dogs after they eat a food they like.
The issue becomes once the diet is primarily sugar- and white wheat-based.
With this imbalance, the digestive system is overburdened with one type of food that adds pounds, cannot sustain your energy, and is not digested well in excess.
It's not always just sugar and refined carbohydrates.
Sometimes it's dairy, or nuts, or even certain types of fruits or vegetables.
As an individual, you have to pay attention to your own body and the way it reacts to the foods and meals that you eat.
Which foods make you want to fall asleep afterward and lead to more lethargy than energy? Which foods make you feel irritable or moody? Which foods make your skin break out more often? Which foods is your body telling you to eat in more moderation, and which ones does it want you to increase in your diet? If you pay attention to what your body is telling you, the advice in a health magazine or from a health nut on T.
V.
will pale in comparison to what you innately know already.
And even if their advice sounds like it may contain a grain of truth, you know how to try out new dietary habits in moderation and with healthy scrutiny and intelligence.
Having said this, why is it that refined wheat and sugar often lead to more symptoms of fatigue than other foods? Most of us know that eating a whole plate of spaghetti or a ton of bread might trigger a sleepy feeling, so there must be a reason for why this happens.
Refined wheat such as white bread and sugary foods create a big spike in blood sugar.
The sugars found in other foods like vegetables or beans are connected in ways that are broken down more slowly in the body.
Those found in sugary foods and refined wheat are connected in chains that are very easy to break down in the body.
Of course these foods differ from one another slightly, but in general they don't take very long to get broken down into simple sugars and glucose that quickly enter your blood stream.
A quick spike of glucose in the blood triggers the pancreas to release a big flood of the hormone insulin that unlocks cells.
The body's cells then openly take in blood sugar for immediate energy or for storage and future use.
With the quickest spikes in blood sugar also come the fastest crashes.
This is because a bigger team of insulin is called upon as more of an emergency to take care of sugary foods and refined wheat.
This insulin quickly ushers the glucose into cells so that blood sugar levels don't get too high.
The body closely regulates blood sugar levels with its physiology.
Levels that are too high can be harmful to the body.
After the quick spike of glucose is ushered into cells, you are left with a crash afterward of low blood sugar, low energy, fatigue, and moodiness.
Does this phenomenon occur with other foods? Whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and legumes break down more slowly in the blood and don't issue an insulin emergency in the body.
They are better foods for keeping you satiated longer throughout the day, feeling a more constant flow of energy, and not experiencing sugar crashes.
Rather than going on strike tomorrow against sugar and refined carbohydrates, what moderate steps can you take to lessen the impact refined carbs and sugar have on your chronic fatigue? For starters, like we mentioned earlier, pay attention to how different foods make you feel.
If you're noticing lethargy and moodiness after certain foods, you may want to limit how much or how often you eat those.
Before piling a huge plate of the food next time, you may remember how you felt the previous time and not want to go through that experience again.
Add foods like whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and legumes into your daily diet to encourage a steady blood sugar level (so that you're not craving the quick energy spikes of sugar and carb-rich foods.
) These foods are harder to crave for most of us, but they feel better afterward and allow us to feel our energetic and attractive selves.
This feeling beats the sluggish mind and body effects that large loads of sugar and refined wheat can bring on.
What else can you do? When refined carbohydrates and sweets are consumed, there are certain types of foods that can slow down the release of their sugars when eaten in combination.
These foods include those that are high in protein and healthy types of fats such as omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids.
These foods slow down the digestive process and moderate the effects of insulin on blood sugar.
Sugars are released more slowly into the blood and you experience less of a blood sugar crash afterward.
Some of the foods that can help you out in this respect include olive oil, nuts or nut butters, avocado, and legumes.
If you do have a particularly sluggish day of eating, instead of berating yourself and calling yourself a bad person, just get active the next chance you get.
Go for a walk the next day, do some stretching, go for a hike or bike ride, or do some other activity to use the excess energy that may be following you around and interfering with a balanced appetite and metabolism.
There's no need to go crazy and spend two hours at the gym.
You can trust your body to tell you how to re-balance your energetic and dietary needs.
If there's anything you can carry away from this section on food and fatigue, it's that you have to trust your body and not have pre-conceived ideas of "good" ways to behave.
What seems like a good way to behave can get out of hand and even prevent you from observing your own body's reaction to sometimes rigid rules.
Food can lead to energy, and food can also lead to fatigue.
Most of us know that overeating, eating certain foods in excess, and emotional eating can all lead to more fatigue than energy.
The key is to trust your body and yourself to create a diet that supports energy levels and a healthy lifestyle.
Even if you seek outside guidance to do this from a nutritionist, health magazine, or some other source, make sure to always check in with yourself as the ultimate expert on your body's needs.
Next, we'll talk about supporting healthy sleep habits to maintain your body's energy needs.
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