5 Tips for Better Blood Sugar Control

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The most important thing you can do to get healthy is to get your blood sugar under control. And if losing weight and keeping it off is your goal, you should focus on getting healthy first. In this video, I'm going to give you five easy ways to balance your blood sugar. And surprise. I'm not just talking about food. This channel is all about smart, safe, proven ways to get healthy and lose weight and keep it from coming back. So if that's your goal, hit like and subscribe to see more videos like this. Okay, let's get your blood sugar under control, because those wild swings and crashes you're going through every day aren't just making you miserable and irritable, and they're making you sick and could be setting you up for diabetes and heart disease. So getting your blood sugar under control is one of the most significant things you can do for your health. The very first thing you want to do is become more sensitive to insulin. And your insulin sensitivity is mostly regulated by your liver and your muscles. All right, so how do you do that? I'm going to share ways to do that that will guarantee surprise you because you're probably thinking it's got to be food. And yes, that's one way to increase your insulin sensitivity. But there are actually a few other things that you never suspect that can have a big impact on your blood sugar, your health, and your weight. And case in point, I started meditating the past year and I lost five pounds of fat. Meditating, sitting, not moving. I didn't make any big changes in my diet or exercise or anything else. So that's huge. Now, would you ever have suspected or connected meditation to weight loss? Probably not. So what's going on here? Well, meditation. And meditation isn't the only option here. But meditation lowers your stress hormones. When your stress hormones are elevated, they shoot your blood sugar up. And when your blood sugar is constantly up, it leads to insulin resistance. Well, why is that? Well, because you have to crank out insulin to bring your blood sugar back to normal. Insulin is trying to get all that sugar out of your blood and into your cells. And eventually your insulin receptors have had enough and start to resist that message. So your body pumps out more and more insulin and to try to get the insulin receptors attention. And eventually, no surprise, you become insulin resistant and then diabetic because your pancreas can no longer pump out those high levels of insulin. But prior to becoming a full blown diabetic, there are loads of clues along the way. Now that means when you're pre diabetic, you have the chance to course correct. Before you become diabetic, you may notice that your blood sugar is slightly elevated, as is your insulin. And when insulin is elevated, that's a bad thing because it's inflammatory and it locks the doors to your fat cells so you can't burn stored fat for fuel. So that means you're hungrier than you should be. Like you just ate. Now you're hungry again. And in that state, you don't always make the best choices. You go for that sugary or carvery quick fix. So now you're back on the wild ride of blood sugar spikes and crashes and around and around you go. So stress is a huge factor in blood sugar control. And even finding just one thing that works for you that you can use to lower your stress hormones is so important. There's a reason they say that stress is a killer. So, you know, stress relief for you might be meditation, like it is for me. Or it might be tapping where you use your fingertips to tap on energy points on your body. Or it might be watching something funny or going down a TikTok rabbit hole, or just hanging out and petting your dog, Right? See what works for you. The second thing you can do to lower your blood sugar is to get some really good, deep, restful sleep. Now if you're not sleeping well, there are things you can do that will really, really help you. And I am not talking about prescription drugs here. Those aren't your only option, I promise you. And those really are your last resort. Now some of this goes back to stress. We all know that stress can impact sl. But did you know that just one night of poor sleep, just one night, makes you more insulin resistant? That's crazy. And you know how when you haven't slept well, you're tired, you're cranky, and you're also hungry? Well, when you don't sleep well, your hunger hormone ghrelin is also higher. And by the way, when you're in that state, you're not craving brussels sprouts and salmon, are you? Are you? Nope. You want that donut, that muffin, you want those carbs. So not sleeping well sets you up for hangry choices. Not to mention that zombie brain fog. Your body is pounding you with messages trying to soothe itself, and it's almost impossible to fight. So getting quality sleep every single night is mission critical for Stabilizing your blood sugar. Now to sleep. Better check out my video on details on specific solutions, but here are a few little highlights. All right, number one, go to bed and wake up around the same time every single day. Now, what's important is let's say that, you know, you want to get seven to nine hours of quality sleep. So really make sure that you're getting yourself in bed at least a half hour before. And I always do something called a power down hour. So I like to make sure that I'm asleep by 10. So by 9, I'm powering it down. All the techs off, I've cooled down, down the house, I've taken the lights down, I'm wearing my blue blocker glasses, and I've taken my hot bath with Epsom salts, right? So all of those things that tell my body, oh, we're getting ready for sleep. I have a bedroom that's set at 68 degrees. You want to sleep between 65 and 68 degrees. It is pitch black in there. We have no noise in there. So that it's conducive for sleep. And sleep is for the bedroom is for rest and, and restoration. That is it. Right? No TVs in the bedroom or any other craziness. Then every night I take my sleep candy and my magnesium body calm as well. Now, again, more on that on one of my other YouTube videos, but that gets you a start. Okay, third thing. The third thing that can help you heal from a sugar imbalance is exercise. And it's really one of the best ways to increase your insulin sensitivity quickly. Research has shown this over and over and over. One example is a 2018 review of 11 studies, 11 different studies that found an association between increased physical activity levels and improved insulin sensitivity. So the one I love the most, resistance training. Resistance training is especially good for building lean muscle. And by the way, remember, you don't have to go to a gym to do that. There's lots of easy ways to do this at home. You can use handheld weights, resistance bands, your body weight. My favorite of all, though, is these TRX. This TRX home trainer. Literally like 100 bucks, you can do a full body workout, loads of good exercise, little guidebooks that they give you in a little videos on YouTube so that some body weight and a couple big dumbbells and you are good to go. Simple, easy peasy. Now, not only will doing this resistance training help your body respond better to insulin, but you'll also improve the way it uses blood sugar. And of course, you're Burning sugar when you're doing that type of exercise, depleting your glycogen stores and getting your blood sugar back into range. So that's super good. High intensity interval training can help here as well. So that is where you do, let's say if you were going to go out for a walk. And by the way, I love walks. I love doing a walk after you eat because it lowers the blood sugar response to the meal. But high intensity interval training is a little different. This is where you would go out and you would walk for a minute and then sprint for 20 to 60 seconds and then walk it off for twice as long and sprint and walk it off for twice as long. So you go all out and recover, all out and recover to accumulate 4 to 8 total minutes of working out. So that's another thing that I want you to do, but I also would love you to just make a point every day that after one of your meals, nighttime's the best, is to go for a walk and it doesn't have to be long. 10 to 20 minutes is going to lower that blood sugar response to a meal. Easy to do. Easiest way to make sure you do that, get a dog. All right, then you have to walk it. All right, fourth thing, let's see. Oh, I have to talk about this. I mean, diet does matter, but here's the twist. It's just not just what you eat, it's also when you eat that matters. Timing is super important. So I recommend that you give intermittent fasting a try. I swear by it because it has a hugely positive impact on blood sugar and of course, weight. And that makes sense because if you're constantly eating, you're constantly bringing up blood sugar, constantly bringing up insulin levels to deal with it. But when you do a fast, you give your body a break from dealing with the sugar and you give it time to rest and improve its insulin sensitivity. So what I love to do with intermittent fasting is cycle intermittent fasting. On the weekends I tend to sleep a little bit later, just a little bit, like half hour hour. And then I meditate, do a fast workout, and I'll push my brunch to about 11 and then we'll have an early dinner around 5. And then during the week I tend to have my little breakfast between nine and ten and dinner somewhere between six and seven. So during the week I try to do ten hours, but I try to rotate in six to eight hour intermittent fasts a couple times a week. Because I believe just like we cross train exercise, we cross train Our diet. Now, one of the cool things with intermittent fasting that research shows is that besides helping you lose weight, it also can lower your fasting blood sugar and insulin and help reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes. And by the way, when you're eating by the plate and you're getting clean protein, healthy fats and loads of fiber from lots of non starchy vegetables, little bit of slow carbs, and you're not going to be hungry, so because you're teaching your body how to use stored fat for fuel. But if you are a little hungry, remember, hunger equals younger. And go have a big glass of water or a big green tea. Like, I've got one right here to the side that I've been drinking all throughout filming all of this. All right, so first of all, you're sleeping for a big part of the fast, remember? So when you think about, okay, I'm going to fast for 12 to 16 hours, well, you're sleeping for eight, so that only leaves eight other hours. And part of that you're waking up, meditating, working out. And part of that is three to four hours that you stop eating before bed. So this is really, really easy. All right, I've included, I just mentioned the plate. I've included a graphic of the plate in the links below. Now, here's another food tip where you can add flavors with things that can help with blood sugar balance. So here's some ones that you may not know. Lemon juice. You can throw a little lemon juice on your salad or in your water. I have something called my lemonade that helps with blood sugar hunger and blood sugar balance and your hunger. What's cool about lemon juice is it lowers the blood sugar response to the meal. Also, sour can take your sweet tooth away. So lemon juice is a great one. I also like to use a little cayenne pepper in my little lemonade because it will boost my metabolism. Another one just like lemon juice. Apple cider vinegar is another great one. You can make an apple cider vinegar salad dressing. You can pour some apple cider vinegar in your green tea. Apple cider vinegar acts like the drug metformin to help with insulin sensitivity. I mean, how cool is that? Okay, next one. Cinnamon. I remember looking at this company that was creating these cinnamon supplements because they help with blood sugar balance. I'm like, why do we need a supplement for cinnamon? Like, just put some cinnamon in your food. I mean, think about this. You can put it in your coffee, you can put it in your smoothie. So, so cinnamon is definitely one that you're going to want to put in as well. And when I talked about the plate, I mentioned eating loads of fiber. We want to get a lot of fiber because fiber is going to slow down the blood sugar response to the meal. Right. Your body takes longer to break down foods. With more fiber, it's slowing down, stomach emptying, you're feeling fuller, longer, and you've got lower blood sugar response. Lower blood sugar response means then you also have less of an insulin response.

Okay.

The fifth thing that you can do to help balance your blood sugar and improve your insulin sensitivity is to take supplements that can help with that. Now, if you are on medications for diabetes, like some metformin or some of the insulin meds, you really want to make sure you're talking to your doctor first because these supplements work. And the bottom line is they could actually work and you could end up not needing those medications. So make sure that you are talking to your doctor about this. Some of the ones that I love, love, love here, I love chromium, magnesium, vanadium and zinc. They're called like the four horsemen for blood sugar balance. So those are super duper important and that should be in your multi. The chromium, vanadium, magnesium, zinc. But I find most of the time you need to take some extra magnesium. You're not going to get enough in your multi. And I really love to take a magnesium before bed. Really good with sleep. Now another one that is just amazing is berberine. Berberine, it's hard to assimilate, sort of like curcumin is. So you want to get one that's got a good phytosomal availability. But berberine's amazing, incredible research on this one in diabetics and showing people getting better blood sugar control. Lipoic acid as well. So lipoic and berberine are two of my like powerhouse support workers for blood sugar balance and insulin sensitivity. And then one other I got to mention is fish oil. Because fish oil actually can help your receptors work better to hear the message of insulin. So they're super important too. Also remember, fish oil can lower inflammation. There you go. Five easy ways to lower your blood sugar and get healthy. Now if you found this helpful like and subscribe to stay in touch. And in the next video, I'm going to share my top three secrets to a better diet. See you there. For more info on this and other health topics I cover or to rate and review, find me on Instagram, Facebook and my website, jjvirgin.com and don't forget to subscribe to my show. So you won't miss a single, single episode. Go to subscribetoj.com thanks again for being with me this week.

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