Fasting insulin - fasting glucose tolerance tests are crucial in determining your risk.

Grandpa's Fight

One key motivator for this entire website, especially this section, is my now late grandfather who died a victim of obesity and diabetes. I recall the many tests he would take and how he struggled to keep his weight down. At the time I knew nothing about fasting for weight loss and fitness.

The night came when my precious grandfather passed away due to a diabetic seizure. Right beside him where he was found was a cup of water mixed with sugar which he never had the chance to drink. So, in many ways, this website is dedicated to him, and to the many other beautiful people that can be spared from the scourge of diabetes via the discipline of fasting.

Fasting Insulin Measurements

If you are overweight or have notable fat deposits around your midsection, it is possible your doctor may have checked (or want to check you) for insulin resistance - also known as pre-diabetes or impaired fasting glucose IFG.

A fasting glucose or fasting insulin measurement test will determine if your body is producing and properly utilizing insulin.

Diabetes Prevention through Fasting

If the fasting insulin test shows signs of trouble with your body’s capacity to produce and/or use insulin, then I strongly suggest you consider fasting as a viable alternative.

It can help you lose weight quickly and get your body back on track. Quick weight loss can, in turn, notably reduce your risk of developing full-blown diabetes.

Even if you have never had a fasting insulin measurement test, chances are you are in the risk category if you are more than 20 pounds overweight. If you have arrived at our site searching for diabetic-related products, we highly recommend the Diabetes Store site linked below for all your needs.

Further in the page you also will see other hand-picked resource links we have put together geared at addressing the dieting needs of diabetic patients, and a program that could reduce monthly supply purchase costs.

Is It Safe for Diabetics to Fast?

Diabetic patients sometimes come up to us and ask some very key and repetitive questions related to fasting and health. The repeated questions I get from diabetics are: Is it safe for me to fast? How long can I fast without being in danger? Do I still take insulin when I fast?

If so, do I take less? How do I know how much? How do fasting insulin levels change if I plan not to eat for more than three days? The variables to answer these questions are many and include; age, race, eating habits, general health, weight, type of insulin you use, last time you used insulin, your metabolism rate and other illnesses and/or health problems.

Juice fasting is considered by many health practitioners we have talked to, the safest form of fasting for a diabetic. The reason is that, although not eating solid food for a season, the person continues to ingest juice which contains calories and therefore requires insulin injections as customary.

The amounts of insulin to inject while juice fasting, however, will more than likely vary from those one was using prior to the start of the fast. So, even if your primary interest is to follow a juice fasting program, our top recommendation is for you to see your doctor and remain accountable.

We will continuously expand this section to provide more detailed answers to these questions. In the meantime, however, there are some obvious things we need to address as part of this discussion on fasting insulin and fasting glucose tests.

Overeating Cause

Many diabetics and persons with high fasting insulin levels have gotten the disease -- to a great extent -- because of overeating and obesity.

Again, we are by no means categorizing diabetes as a disease that strikes ONLY overweight persons. What we are saying is that, if you are more than 20 pounds overweight as I was, then the risk factor is much higher.

That is not much of a secret. The purpose of insulin, in simple terms, is to lower blood sugar levels after you eat. Overeating puts an excessive demand on your body to overproduce insulin. When eating too much, the pancreas keeps up with the added demand for insulin by producing more.

But eventually this vital organ loses the ability to secrete enough insulin in response to meals … period. Type II diabetes often develops when the body fails to properly respond to insulin. The culprit in these Type II cases is, nearly always, poor eating and obesity.

Type I diabetes is when the pancreas stops producing insulin altogether, as the example we just described. This type of diabetes does not have to do with eating and/or obesity. Many people develop Type I as children and are quite thin.

The good news is that both of these can often be improved with juice and/or water fasting programs, AND (for those with Type II), a commitment to permanently changing eating habits once the fast is over. I cannot say that fasting can 'cure' Diabetes, particularly Type I. But I have known of people with Type I diabetes that have found much relief and improvement through responsible fasting.

Addicted to Food

Like we said, being addicted to food is tricky because, unlike alcoholics and/or drug addicts, one cannot simply stop eating for good.

To be on the safe side, the best suggestion I can give you if you are interested in fasting and are a diabetic is -- go see your doctor. Have a fasting insulin or fasting glucose tolerance test done and see how it affects your diabetes.

If you have not been diagnosed with diabetes, then I do suggest you ask your doctor for a fasting insulin measurement test to see if you have any signs of insulin resistance / impaired fasting glucose.

Diabetics Who Should NOT Fast

But there are definitely some diabetic persons who, fasting insulin test or not, should avoid fasting for more than a day or two at the most.

These include:

* Diabetic patients who are not committed to changing their diets and increasing daily activity (fasting in this case would just be a temporary band-aid).

•Elderly patients that are weak and lack alertness.

•Those with poorly controlled type I or type II diabetes.

•Diabetic patients with infections such as acute purulent bronchitis, recurrent chronic bronchitis and bronchiectasis.

•Long-time type I diabetic patients who are physically deteriorated (eyes, kidneys, heart) or very brittle.

•Diabetic patients with complications as hypertension or angina; patients with a history of diabetic ketoacidosis (high blood glucose levels caused by illness or taking too little insulin).

•Pregnant diabetic patients.

•Any diabetic that starts fasting and has two or more episodes of hypoglycemia and/or hyperglycemia should stop at once.

Obesity Epidemic

The US Department of Health and Human Services has indicated that pre-diabetes is becoming more widespread throughout the nation. Around 40 percent of U.S. adults ages 40 to 74—or 41 million people—had pre-diabetes in 2000.

More recent research appears to suggest that, today, more than 54 million American adults have insulin resistance pre-diabetes as a direct result of obesity. Type II diabetes used to be called non-insulin dependent diabetes and/or adult-onset diabetes.

This is no longer the case because, in recent years, fasting insulin measurement tests indicate childhood obesity has tripled. Even minors today are developing Type II diabetes.

If a ten year old child can have it as a direct result of obesity, then it goes to reason that it is no longer an “adult-onset” illness. This was virtually unheard off twenty years ago.

Obesity Threatens National Security?

Former US Surgeon General Richard Carmona has said the problem is so severe that it is reducing the eligible pool of service men because so much of the nation’s youth is fat.

Childhood obesity, Carmona said, threatens to cut the lifespan of overweight youth below that of their parents! Fasting insulin measurement tests are therefore crucial because research seems to indicate that many persons diagnosed with insulin resistance will develop full-blown Type II diabetes within a decade.

People with pre-diabetes also have a higher risk of heart disease.

And, what is the best way to keep that from happening? That’s right - lose weight – about five to seven percent of your body weight, according to the studies. This is not much if you are 10 to 15 pounds overweight.

But if you, like I did, have more than 40 or 50 pounds to lose – then I can safely tell you that you are in danger of developing insulin resistance or impaired fasting glucose “pre-diabetes.”

Why? Because obese or overweight affects the way insulin works in your body. Again, that is the reason why fasting insulin – fasting glucose tests are important. Extra fat tissue can make your body resistant to the action of insulin.

Fasting for Weight Loss and Improved Health

Exercise and weight loss, however, can reverse this trend and help the body better utilize insulin. Our message is that, with careful yet determined fruit and/or water fasting, you can easily drop unhealthy pounds that put you in the risk category.

If you are already a diabetic, then with your doctor’s assistance and supervision you may wish to consider short-term fasting as a tool you can use to lose weight fast and improve your condition.