Wellness Journey 6: Fuel Cycle

This post is the crux and summary of how my program works. This uses a lot of concepts that I explained in blogs 1-5 so do make sure you read them before going through this section.

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Here is how our fuel cycle works:

1. As shared earlier, what we eat gets converted into the sugar (or energy) and gets into the bloodstream. If we eat simple carbs or sweets, the rate at which sugar gets into the bloodstream is very quick as compared to when we eat complex carbs (like millet or ragi) that take 24-48 hrs to digest and finally let the sugar reach to blood.

2. Our body has a high and low level or threshold of sugar level defined and body always maintains the sugar within this level (both low or high is life-threatening)

3. As soon as sugar gets to the blood, the body releases INSULIN. This is an indication from the body that all the excess sugar will be stored. Now, this excess sugar will be either consumed by muscles or by fat as explained in the previous blog post. Hence you can always conclude that - As long as INSULIN is present in the blood, you cannot achieve weight loss. For example - if out of 24 hrs, your body is having insulin for 14 hrs, this means that your weight loss window is now only for 10 hrs.

4. INSULIN tells

Muscles - to take out the sugar from bloodstream and store (as glycogen)

Fat Cells - to take out the sugar from bloodstream and store (w/ fatty acids)

5. Muscles are efficient and can store only a small amount of sugar. The rest go to the fat cells which have unlimited capacity.

6. As soon as the sugar is consumed, INSULIN disappears.

7. When there is no INSULIN /Sugar, the body requests muscles and fat to give back some of the sugar and they get added to the bloodstream (this is required for the normal functioning of the body).

8. This cycle of sugar consumption and release happens many times throughout the day. If this cycle is effective, weight loss is easy and quick.

[If you have tried a calorie deficit diet that claims to get 500 calories deficit per day to get 1 pound of wt loss per week and it fails - this is the reason. The calorie deficit diet always works but only if you have a healthy gut and hormones are effective]

Now think about this

Q - Why we should eat 2 hrs before going to bed or why the 30-45 min post-dinner walk that we recommend?

This is to consume all the sugar from the indigested food (from lunch/dinner). At rest, your muscle doesn't need much of sugar so most of them can be converted to fat. That's why the post-dinner walk is recommended and go to bed with minimum insulin (and sugar) in the body.

Now we are one step closer to starting the weight loss journey but before that, it's important to be aware of energy management which will help us in this exciting journey. The most important one is BMR or Basal Metabolic Rate which we will learn in the next post.

-Saurabh