Posted on 01/05/2012 7:50:58 AM PST by Brookhaven
I had a bit an epiphany yesterday, but it seems so contray to what I've been told about eating all my life, I'm having a hard time believing my analysis is corret.
I've been working on changing my diet. One of the things I ran across was the fact that eating carbohydrates spikes your blood sugar. Then I heard someone make the comment (and it was almost a throw-away side comment) "of course, carbohydrates are just complex forms of sugar." Really?
The following lines are pulled from here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/161547.php, my insertions are in brackets [my comment].
Saccharides, or carbohydrates, are sugars or starches.There are various types of saccharides:
Monosaccharide - this is the smallest possible sugar unit. Examples include glucose, galactose or fructose. When we talk about blood sugar we are referring to glucose in the blood; glucose is a major source of energy for a cell. In human nutrition, galactose can be found most readily in milk and dairy products, while fructose is found mostly in vegetables and fruit.
Disaccharide - two monosaccharide [simple sugar] molecules bonded together. Disaccharides are polysaccharides - "poly…" specifies any number higher than one, while "di…" specifies exactly two. Examples of disaccharides include lactose, maltose, and sucrose. If you bond one glucose molecule with a fructose molecule you get a sucrose molecule.
Sucrose is found in table sugar, and is often formed as a result of photosynthesis (sunlight absorbed by chlorophyll reacting with other compounds in plants). If you bond one glucose molecule with a galactose molecule you get lactose, which is commonly found in milk.
Polysaccharide - a chain of two or more monosaccharides [simple sugar molecule]. The chain may be branched (molecule is like a tree with branches and twigs) or unbranched (molecule is a straight line with no twigs). Polysaccharide molecule chains may be made up of hundreds or thousands of monosaccharides.
So, carbohydrates are made up of sugar or starch. Monosaccharide, disaccharide, and polysaccharide are all forms of sugar. But, what is starch?
Starch - these are glucose polymers made up of Amylose [short chains of glucose] and Amylopectin [long chains of glucose]. Rich sources of starches for humans include potatoes, rice and wheat.
So, startch is a form of glucose. And, what is glucose? Remember the paragraph above about monosaccharides?
Monosaccharide - this is the smallest possible sugar unit. Examples include glucose, galactose or fructose. When we talk about blood sugar we are referring to glucose in the blood;
So, if carbohydrates are made up of one of the three saccharides (mono, di, or poly--all a type of sugar) or starch (which is made up of glucose--a type of sugar), doesn't that mean carbohydrates are--at the end of the day--just a complex type of sugar?
That's a hard fact for me to accept, because it contradicts everything I've been taught about nutrition. The current recommendation is that at least 50% of a person's calorie intake each day come from carbohydrats (as can be seen in the food pyramid).
But, if carbohydrates are just complex forms of sugar, does that mean 50% of my calories should come from sugar (a complex form of sugar, but sugar none-the-less)?
Given sharp rise in not just childhood obesity and diabetes, but obesity and diabetes in general (all commonly called an epidemic by the medical community), I'm starting to wonder if we just didn't make a mistake. By emphasizing grains (carbohydrates) so heavily in our diets, did we unwittingly emphasize sugar in our diets and cause these epidemics?
Humans without agriculture - outside the arctic circle - tend to derive the majority of their calories from non animal sources - those sources tend to be high in carbohydrates, nuts, fruits, tubers, etc.
Not quite, my friend. TAGs or stored fats are converted to acetyl-CoA, which is downstream of pyruvate. Pyruvate is the endpoint of glycolysis. Proteins don’t feed into glycolysis readily. Rather they provide cataplerotic replinishment of TCA cycle intermediates...
Other than that, you got it all right...
Thanks for the info - in years past I would see diets for diabetics that had corn and white bread and lots of fruit. Seemed odd to me but I’m glad they have changed their instructions
That’s just it. Zero Carb diets make you stop using the citric acid cycle (Krebs).
Instead, if you don’t take in much glucose, you don’t produce much pyruvate, which doesn’t get converted to much acetyl-CoA, meaning the citric acid cycle won’t run.
Now how will you ever get energy?
Your body now thinks that you are starving to death. Instead of using glucose, it decides that now would be a good time to burn fatty acids (lipolysis). This produces ketone bodies and a condition called ketosis. Ketone bodies will keep feeding your brain without the use of glucose.
Also, your body produces enough glucose to get along just fine without having to ingest it.
Again...argue all you like.
I’ve been doing this over 5 years, VERY strictly. Test after test say my health is better than ever. Da Doctors say so, too.
Who do you think would win the 50,000 meter rowing race, the guy who didn't eat dinner the night before, the guy who ate a lot of carbohydrates in the form of pasta, or the guy who ate 10 snickers bars?
Why would there be a difference?
This goes to the heart of the question this thread is about - the difference between eating carbohydrates and eating sugars.
Fat feeds into the Krebs cycle.
Look it up.
Thanks :-)
So... pyruvate is the end? I always considered it a cycle, you know, round and round?
Can you remember where amino acids are introduced into the cycle? Was it pyruvate as the end, or the beginning, or perhaps it was the acetyl Coa?
Are you saying that AA's do not have a path to get into glycolysis directly, (or perhaps indirectly via gluconeogenisis first, then glycolysis)?
From a doctor or from personal choices?
I know some diabetics that look at their insulin as a magic supply, doesn’t matter what they eat, the just adjust the amount of insulin.
I don’t know any that are old that did that.
I know this may be surprising to hear, but as someone who has studied athletic performance and happens also to BE an amateur athlete, I can tell you that your hypothetical scenario doesn’t necessarily give enough information to determine who of those three would perform better.
But since I don’t think you would be interested in seeing the journal citations or learning about things like ATP, VO2 etc etc I’m not going to bother any further.
Are you a doctor or a nutricinist or is this just your opinion? I ask because I’ve survived for over 49 years with a very severe form of diabetes and your info s 100% contrary to what I have lived and been taught.A person’s carb intake really should be only about 20% of their diet.
Are you a doctor or a nutricinist or is this just your opinion? I ask because I’ve survived for over 40 years with a very severe form of diabetes and your info s 100% contrary to what I have lived and been taught.A person’s carb intake really should be only about 20% of their diet.
bfl
Look, the point is that when insulin rises, fatty acids get stored. If you keep insulin stable and low, then there is simply no reason to store fatty acids.
You should be able to tell that it’s not at all about calories or any notion of a negative/positive caloric balance. Our bodies don’t work that simply.
The food we consume today has to be converted and synthesized amidst a long-term supply of food.
The reason a zero-carbohydrate diet works is because eating only fat and protein provides your body with the best opportunity to mobilize fatty acids and provides no reason to store fat by making triglycerides.
Yes, like people who have diabetes.
My hypothetical scenario gave plenty of information for any betting man. My money would be on the guy who ate carbs over the guy who ate nothing or the guy who ate sugar - and I would have a sound biochemical rationale for why.
That sound biochemical rationale was behind my illustrative point about ‘carbo loading’ vs ‘sugar loading’. Sorry you gained so little by my pointing out this fundamental difference.
I would respectfully disagree with you here. Before agriculture became the norm-we were hunter gatherers. This meant a diet high in protein, along with foraged foods such as nuts berries and wild growing fruits/veggies.
In uncivilized tribes still today, hunting/gathering is the main source of food in remote village tribes. Very low obesity there and almost no carbs.
Until very recently, eskimos existed on almost exclusively whale meat and blubber, seal meat and fish since veggies/grains could not be grown in permafrost and ice. It was not until western style carbohydrates were introduced into their diets that obesity and heart disease entered their world.
I do agree that whole grain carbs are good for you due to the fiber content not affecting blood sugars negatively, but to say that carbs were the mainstay of most in human history is incorrect.
A healthy person on a healthy diet should derive the majority of their calories from carbohydrates rather than from proteins and fats. This was and still is a widely accepted standard, despite a small but fanatical group of followers of a fad diet that peaked in popularity around 2002.
Biochemically we are set up to burn carbohydrates as our primary energy source.
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