Fitness Nutrition Tips

From Gerda Endemann, Ph.D.
Author of the book Fat is Not the Enemy

If feeling weak or faint limits the frequency and level of your exercise program, so that you have a difficult, time increasing your fitness level, you may want to learn more about hypoglycemia (low blood sugar), and about anemia (low blood oxygen carrying capacity). In otherwise healthy people, low blood sugar may actually occur as a result of exercise, either during or after the exercise period. In addition, low blood sugar and anemia can both be consequences of gastric surgery.

Hypoglycemia is defined as a blood sugar (blood glucose) level of less than 50 mg/deciliter. It can be responsible for weakness, sweating, hunger, and tremors, as well as headache, irritability, and confusion. Low blood sugar can result from excessive insulin administration in diabetics, since insulin lowers blood glucose level. However, it also can occur after gastric surgery as part of the dumping syndrome. After gastric surgery, a smaller or less functional stomach that is not able to hold an entire meal, can empty too quickly into the intestine. Once delivered to the intestine, carbohydrates are digested quickly, causing blood glucose to rise suddenly, and provoking unnecessarily large insulin response. Too much insulin causes hypoglycemia a short time later. Even without surgery, some meals may have a similar effect if they contain too much sugar, or starches that are digested quickly. This may be responsible for hypoglycemia that occurs in some people 1-4 hours after a meal. Exercise appears to cause low blood sugar under certain conditions because it induces increased sensitivity of the body to insulin, so that even normal amounts of insulin may result in plummeting blood sugar.

What can you do to prevent this? Avoid sugar and easily digested starches including white bread and potatoes that make blood sugar rise quickly. Use healthy fat as an alternate source of energy, especially before you exercise. The American Diabetes Association has suggested that blood sugar control could be improved in many diabetics by obtaining less energy from carbohydrates, and more energy from monounsaturated fat, e/g/ the kind in olive oil, canola oil, avocado and cashews. Because healthy fat provides lasting energy without provoking dangerous peaks and troughs in blood sugar, it is valuable for hypoglycemics as well as for diabetics. In addition, fat actually causes the stomach to empty more slowly, so that food is digested and absorbed more slowly. As an added benefit, healthy polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats also reduce risk factor for heart disease.