Chapter 1 - Contrasting Type I and Type II DiabetesWant More Diabetes Info? Search HERE
carbohydrates and sugars by other names. They often contain nearly as many carbohydrates as the sweet desserts you looked at earlier. With carbohydrate comparisons being so close, it’s like eating sweet desserts with every meal we eat! Is it any wonder then that our carbohydrate metabolism becomes overwhelmed? Simple carbohydrates are molecules that break down into sugars, including glucose, very quickly. Again, these simple carbohydrates are typically converted into glucose within 30 minutes to two hours. Non-sugar, simple carbohydrates are just one step more complicated than sugars themselves. We find simple carbohydrates in all fruits, grains like corn, rice and wheat and in starchy or sweet vegetables - potatoes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, carrots and peas, and in breads – some of the most prevalent staples of the American diet. As carbohydrate molecules become larger and more complicated, they enter the category of foods that have “complex carbohydrates.” Because these are larger molecular structures and more complex, it requires a little more effort and takes the digestive system a little longer to break them down into simple sugars and glucose – blood sugar. These carbohydrates typically take about two hours to break down and their glucose is released into the blood stream a bit more gradually over those two hours instead of just 30 minutes likethe simpler sugars. Whole grains and pastas are said to be in this “complex carbohydrates” category. So glucose is the simplest sugar - blood sugar. Simple sugars break down into glucose quickly. They take about 30 minutes. Complex carbohydrates take about 2 hours to break down into glucose. The more complicated the molecule, the longer it takes to convert into glucose.Now that you have a basic understanding of the scale of simplicity and complexity of carbohydrates ranging from the complex carbs in pastas and grains down to simple sugars by any name, and glucose – simple blood sugar, let’s look at how they all contribute to type II diabetes, AOD. One more time, all food is converted to glucose. Glucose is thefood that feeds every cell in the entire human body. Whether we’re |
