whygetfat on Nostr: Zoë Harcombe: "There's two hormones that are trying to keep our blood glucose even, ...
Zoë Harcombe: "There's two hormones that are trying to keep our blood glucose even, in an incredibly tight range, like four grams of glucose in your entire bloodstream at any one time. That's one teaspoon of glucose. There's two hormones trying to achieve that, and that's insulin and glucagon.
"If your blood glucose goes high, because you've just had an apple, then insulin is going to be trying to take glucose out of the bloodstream and it will store it as glycogen, stores it as carbohydrate. If you don't use it up it turns to fat, which is why high-carb diets make you fat.
"The other hormone is trying to get your blood glucose level back up into the normal range is the one called glucagon. So at about 3 o'clock in the morning, assuming you have a sort of normal eating pattern and you're not binging on 10,000 fuel units a day, at about 3 o'clock in the morning your blood glucose level will naturally dip. That's when your body calls upon glucagon to say, 'Hey, it's getting a little bit below that four grams. Go and put some glucose back into the bloodstream.'
"Glucagon does that by breaking down triglyceride, which is basically breaking down body fat. So when people say how do you lose weight? It's like you have to create circumstances in which glucagon can do what it's designed to do.
"Weight is nothing about calories. Weight is about getting your body in the physiological states that it needs to and wants to break down body fat.
"Now alcohol inhibits the operation of glucagon, and that's its major impact on weight. You have a couple of glasses of wine in the evening. When you get to about 3 o'clock in the morning and the body is saying, 'Hey, let's get the glucose level back up to normal.' If you still got some alcohol in the body, if the body is still prioritizing the processing of the liver, basically, it's prioritizing the processing of that alcohol, the liver isn't not going to be waking glucagon up to do its thing. It's just like, 'Hey look, I'm sorry glucagon. I'm busy over here dealing with the alcohol.' So you can have your blood glucose go lower.
"So let's say you started drinking quite early in the evening. That's when you're walking back from the bar and you see one of those burger vans or kebab vans. They look like shit in the daylight. But at 11 o'clock at night when you've been drinking for a few hours and your blood glucose is dropping and you've got no way of getting it back again, that actually looks quite attractive, because you're now in a hunger situation.
"So, it can make you crave food, because that's your only alternative way of getting your blood glucose levels back up. So that's one of the problems it's going to cause.
"Of course, the other one is, let's say you carry on drinking into the night. When you would normally be breaking down body fat at 3—4 o'clock in the morning, it can't do it because it's still processing the alcohol that you were consuming late at night, because you were watching a film or something, or at a dinner party.
"So there's a couple of way in which it's sabotages our ability to get glucose levels back to normal. And it'll probably wake you up. If at 4 o'clock in the morning you don't have that ability to get your blood glucose back to normal, you'll probably be woken up, and you'll probably be woken up with the munchies.
"So alcohol and weight is just fascinating. It really is."
Zoë Harcombe with Jerm @ 12:12—15:28 https://podbay.fm/p/jerm-warfare-the-battle-of-ideas/e/1739869806?t=732
"If your blood glucose goes high, because you've just had an apple, then insulin is going to be trying to take glucose out of the bloodstream and it will store it as glycogen, stores it as carbohydrate. If you don't use it up it turns to fat, which is why high-carb diets make you fat.
"The other hormone is trying to get your blood glucose level back up into the normal range is the one called glucagon. So at about 3 o'clock in the morning, assuming you have a sort of normal eating pattern and you're not binging on 10,000 fuel units a day, at about 3 o'clock in the morning your blood glucose level will naturally dip. That's when your body calls upon glucagon to say, 'Hey, it's getting a little bit below that four grams. Go and put some glucose back into the bloodstream.'
"Glucagon does that by breaking down triglyceride, which is basically breaking down body fat. So when people say how do you lose weight? It's like you have to create circumstances in which glucagon can do what it's designed to do.
"Weight is nothing about calories. Weight is about getting your body in the physiological states that it needs to and wants to break down body fat.
"Now alcohol inhibits the operation of glucagon, and that's its major impact on weight. You have a couple of glasses of wine in the evening. When you get to about 3 o'clock in the morning and the body is saying, 'Hey, let's get the glucose level back up to normal.' If you still got some alcohol in the body, if the body is still prioritizing the processing of the liver, basically, it's prioritizing the processing of that alcohol, the liver isn't not going to be waking glucagon up to do its thing. It's just like, 'Hey look, I'm sorry glucagon. I'm busy over here dealing with the alcohol.' So you can have your blood glucose go lower.
"So let's say you started drinking quite early in the evening. That's when you're walking back from the bar and you see one of those burger vans or kebab vans. They look like shit in the daylight. But at 11 o'clock at night when you've been drinking for a few hours and your blood glucose is dropping and you've got no way of getting it back again, that actually looks quite attractive, because you're now in a hunger situation.
"So, it can make you crave food, because that's your only alternative way of getting your blood glucose levels back up. So that's one of the problems it's going to cause.
"Of course, the other one is, let's say you carry on drinking into the night. When you would normally be breaking down body fat at 3—4 o'clock in the morning, it can't do it because it's still processing the alcohol that you were consuming late at night, because you were watching a film or something, or at a dinner party.
"So there's a couple of way in which it's sabotages our ability to get glucose levels back to normal. And it'll probably wake you up. If at 4 o'clock in the morning you don't have that ability to get your blood glucose back to normal, you'll probably be woken up, and you'll probably be woken up with the munchies.
"So alcohol and weight is just fascinating. It really is."
Zoë Harcombe with Jerm @ 12:12—15:28 https://podbay.fm/p/jerm-warfare-the-battle-of-ideas/e/1739869806?t=732