Well with Arielle Lorre - 190: Life Hacks for Balancing Your Glucose with The Glucose Goddess

Episode Date: August 10, 2022

In this episode, I'm talking with Jessie Inchauspé aka The Glucose Goddess, about what happens in our bodies - both short and long term - when we have continuous glucose spikes, and life hacks for balancing glucose. Using her scientific background, she breaks down simple changes we can all make to reduce our blood sugar spikes without restricting foods, including her veggie first and dressed up carbs philosophies and the use of vinegar before meals. We also talked about cravings, PCOS treatment, anti-aging, and acne triggers.   You can find Jesse's bestselling book Glucose Revolution: The Life-Changing Power of Balancing Your Blood Sugar HERE for more great tips and helpful information.   Visit Houseofmacadamias.com and use code BLONDE40 to receive 40% off your first purchase of their nuts or bars.   Right now, Sakara is offering our listeners 20% off their first order when they go to Sakara.com/BLONDEFILES20 or enter code BLONDEFILES20 at checkout.   Article is offering our listeners $50 off your first purchase of $100 or more. To claim, visit article.com/BLONDE and the discount will be automatically applied at checkout.   Get a free LMNT Sample Pack for the cost of $5 shipping at DrinkLMNT.com/BLONDEFILES.   Treat yourself and your hair by searching “Conair SmoothWrap” on Amazon.com to try the new drying experience with SmoothWrap today!      Produced by Dear Media.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Go to your Reis-Adviseur or Sunnycars. The following podcast is a dear media production. Hey, welcome to the Blondefer podcast. I'm your host Ariel Lori, and I'm here to talk all things wellness. From how to achieve optimal health and well-being to the best beauty tips and everything in between, no topic is off limits and I'm bringing it to you real and unfiltered. I know there is so much information out there,

so I'm here to help you navigate it all. Thanks for listening. Let's get into it. Hi, everybody. Welcome to the show. I have such a good episode for you today. I really have to come up with a different intro here because I say that about every episode and then I say that I say that about every episode, but I always mean it. This episode, however, is one that I got so many requests for. I'm talking to Jesse and Shausby. She is known as the glucose goddess on Instagram. And I loved talking to her. I found her very charming. And also she's very smart. and everything that she talks about here, I think, will really resonate whether you have overt issues with blood sugar and glucose or not. And she has really applicable tips that we can

incorporate into our everyday lives and our routines that can help us avoid these like massive glucose spikes that can kind of have a trickle down effect on our help. So we are talking about first and foremost just what glucose is, what happens in your body. when you have a glucose spike and how it affects these various functions, both short term and long term. We talk about how it can affect our reproductive hormones. We talk about how it can affect our skin and acne. We talk about how it can affect our emotions and moods and so, so much more.

Obviously, we talk about how it affects energy. And she really got my attention when she talked about the connection between. glucose spikes and aging. So definitely stay tuned for that part. And then using her scientific background, she just breaks down really simple changes that we can all make to reduce our blood sugar spikes without restricting foods. We're not taking anything out. We're just talking about like really simple things like eating your veggies burst and dressing up your carbs. And she's a proponent of dessert because she talks about how eating a meal before you have something, sugary can help reduce the spike and just all these little hacks that you can incorporate into

your life. We of course talk about vinegar before mules and cravings and so much more. So I'm going to stop rambling and just let you guys get to the episode. So please enjoy glucose goddess. Welcome, Jesse. Thanks, Ariel. How are you? I'm good. How are you? I'm doing well. Very excited to talk to you. I put a question box up on Instagram. last night and everybody was freaking out that you're coming on. Very excited to hear from you. And we were just kind of talking off Mike about like my own experience with some of your tips and tricks and hacks and how it has affected me. And this is something that affects everybody that I think not everybody is aware of. So I'm excited to talk about all of your work and how all of this affects us. But to start,

Can you just tell everyone how you became the glucose goddess? I would be happy to do that. I have to say this is one of my favorite questions. I think it's so funny. So I never thought, hey, I'm going to become the glucose goddess. It kind of just kind of happened. I started being interested in my body and what I needed to do to feel good when I was in my late teens.

I developed a lot of mental health issues. I felt completely freaking broken. I was lost. I was scared. I was like, how do I just wake up in the morning feeling good? That was my number one goal. So I went on to study biochemistry in grad school.

And then I worked in genetics for five years in Silicon Valley. And up until then, like nothing had given me a clue as to what I could do to solve my mental health problems. So I was still, you know, eight years in, really confused, really lost. And then one day, something kind of wild happened. I had the opportunity to put on a continuous glucose monitor, which is a device made for people with diabetes that you put on the back of your arm and it measures your blood sugar levels in real time. And honestly, girl, like, I didn't think this was going to be that interesting,

especially because, you know, the prevalent idea at the time was that unless you have diabetes, like, what's the point of looking at your glucose levels? Well, lo and behold, I was wrong. I found out that, I could correlate my mental health episodes with glucose spikes. So with like big increases in blood sugar levels after eating. And that marked the beginning of my fascination. I was like, whoa, there's finally a link. I can finally find it like a trigger for my suffering.

So I started researching this whole topic. I was like, oh, like glucose spikes, depending on who you are, they create different symptoms in different people. And just before the podcast, you were telling me that for you, it's like fatigue and just not feeling great. For me, I found out it was triggering mental health problems, acne, cravings. So I dove into all the research because I'm a scientist. And I saw that actually there was more and more evidence showing us that 90% of people without diabetes probably have glucose spikes every single day. And that these cause, you know, physical and mental problems.

So then I was like, okay, how do I avoid these glucose spikes? And the first idea I had was, well, glucose is in like starchy and sweet foods. So if I just cut those out, I won't have spikes anymore. But that was just not even an option for me. I mean, I like pasta. I like hog and dust, Belgian chocolate, ice cream. There was no way I was going to cut those things out from my life. So thankfully, I found these sort of principles in the science that allowed me to still eat all the

starchy and sweet stuff I liked while avoiding the spikes. So that was like the genius moment. So I healed. And then I started sharing the information with my friends and my family. And, you know, they healed whatever their issues were. And they asked me, hey, can you put this online? So I was like, well, Instagram is a good place to do it. So I put everything on Instagram. And now that was three years ago. And since then I changed my Instagram account name from my name, which was J.C. and Chisbee, which is impossible to remember or write or spell to glucose goddess because I thought it was catchy and now there you go I'm the glucose goddess I don't know what to tell you I love it and I love it because you're a scientist but it's like

I don't know it's just kind of funny how is that received in the scientific community interesting question so I kind of see myself as a translator so I don't do the research studies myself, I sort of take them, synthesize them and turn them into something sexy that everybody can understand and apply. I'm like the middle layer, you know, between the scientific teams and the general public. It's really a communications challenge. At the beginning, when I found all these studies talking about, for example, you know, food order and vinegar, I thought I'm just going to print out these studies and show them to my friends so they can apply the hacks. But when I printed out scientific studies and showed them to my friends, they weren't really too interested.

It's not very sexy to print out a scientific study and give it to someone. So I thought, I need to make this interesting and catchy and visual. So I started using data from my own glucose monitor to illustrate the scientific studies. And so that's when everything started changing and people started listening and becoming interested. So yeah, I'm a translator. I think scientists are really happy that I'm, you know, bringing their studies to the general public. And then doctors and practitioners are really happy that they can use my visuals to show their patients, you know, what's happening in their body. So I feel like I have a pretty, I'm pretty honored to be at this spot. It's a nice little place to be. And I'm sure so many people listening follow you. But if,

if anybody listening doesn't definitely go to her page because the graphs are, I mean, I go through and I'm like, ooh, what is this food? Because you show that the comparison of your glucose spike. when you have something without vinegar before and something when you do have vinegar and when you incorporate some of these little tips and hacks that we'll get to. But you see, you scroll through and you see the visual images and you're like, oh, that makes sense. And I want to keep going because I want to keep being different. Yeah, and you get it because like images are so, you know, images worth a thousand words or

whatever, but it's true. Yeah. That really makes people interested. Yes. Yeah. I'm glad you like my content. Yeah. You make that, I mean, this is the dumbest pun ever.

and I'm sure that you hear it all the time, but you make it easily digestible, right? You hear that all the time? I do that. Okay. It's perfect. Okay. Moving on. What happens in our body when we have a glucose spike? Like, what happens if we're eating something really starchy or really sugary?

That's a great question. So I'm going to back up a little bit and explain to people what glucose is, and that way it'll make it a bit clearer. So your body really likes glucose. and every single one of your cells use glucose for energy. So like right now your brain cells are using glucose to like have this conversation with me. You know, our feet cells use glucose to walk. Like a heart cells use glucose to pump. Like it's really key and important.

But it's a bit like if you have a plant, the plant needs water to survive. But if you give the plant too much water, then it drowns. Happens to me a lot. I'm really bad with houseplants. But there's kind of like the right amount. and then if you very into the too much space problems start happening. So if you give your body too much glucose in the form of glucose spikes, then bad stuff happens. So there's three main processes.

The number one thing that happens with every glucose spike is that you age. So like literally you will develop more wrinkles on your face. Your organs will slowly deteriorate and you will end up aging quicker and dying faster the more glucose spikes you have. So that's cool. second one is inflammation. So the more glucose spikes you have in your body, the more you're going to breed inflammation. And, you know, inflammation shows up on our face, for example, as acne, rosacea, psoriasis, whatever really affects our mood, our mental health. And it lays a terrain for

chronic diseases to develop, like polycystic-reverin syndrome, like type of diabetes, etc. So not good. And third thing that happens when you have a glucose spike is that your body is trying to to protect you and your body is trying to get that glucose down. And to do that, it releases insulin, which is a really fantastic hormone. And insulin takes glucose away and stashes it in your liver, in your muscles, and your fat cells. That's one of the ways we gain weight. And too much insulin over time is also like one of the main reasons that we develop problems like polycystic ovarian syndrome, which is more and more common. So basically, it's just not great. Like glucose spikes are not good for us. course, like a little bit of glucose increase after you eat is normal, but most of us are having

glucose spikes into ranges that are causing these issues. And so I teach people to, you know, reduce them a little bit so they can avoid some of those consequences without changing too much about how they're eating. This episode is brought to you by Element. One of my favorite wellness hacks that I have really been leaning into lately that I feel like not that many people do is adding electrolytes to my drinks throughout the day. So this is something that Rob Yang, my old nutritionist, recommended. It makes such a big difference in how I feel. It makes a difference in my workout recovery. It makes a difference in my bloating. I feel like it makes a difference in my skin, everything. So he told me years ago to add sea salt to my water, which was just something that I

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via their performance coach or nutritionist. It's used by Olympic athletes and us regular people and podcast hosts love it too. You guys definitely need to get in on this and Element has a great deal for you. You guys can purchase an Element sample pack for the cost of shipping, which is just $5 for U.S. orders at drinkelement.com slash blonde files. And if you're not happy, they will refund your money, no questions asked. again, that's drinkelement.com slash blonde files. This deal is only available through my link, D-R-I-N-K-L-M-N-T dot com slash blonde files. Hi, guys, it's Jordan from the Balance Blonde's Soul on Fire podcast. On my show, we go deep on all

things astrology, awakening, motherhood, channeling, healing, and so much more. A few years ago, I was diagnosed with chronic Lyme disease and the healing journey I embarked on at that time, set me on the path to radical awakening. Let's just say I had no choice but to change my energy and that opened me up to the most beautiful healing of my life. On my show, you can expect to feel like you're sitting in my living room chatting with old friends. Tune in every Wednesday to connect and hang on the balanced bond soul on fire. I want to get into a couple of those, but let's rewind to the aging one because this one, that gets my attention. Can you explain that a little bit more? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

It really surprised me as well when I understood the link, like glucose spikes and wrinkles. Like what? Okay. So when there's a glucose spike happening in your body, trillions of molecules arrive really quickly into your bloodstream. And at that point, the trillions of glucose molecules, they go everywhere in your body. They just run around like kids on a playground. They get into every cell, every nook and cranny. And the problem is glucose molecules tend to bump in.

to other molecules quite often. And when a glucose molecule bumps into another molecule in your body, it damages the other molecule. And it does what's called glycation. It glicates the other molecule. And glycation is like cooking. It's like when you put an oven in the oven, when you put a chicken in the oven and it goes from being white to being brown,

that's glycation. That's cooking. It's the same process. And inside of our bodies from the moment we're born, we slowly cook, we slowly glycate. And then when we're fully cooked, we die. So literally the process of glycation is like cooking and is the process of aging. And so, of course, we don't brown really like a chicken in the oven,

but actually on the inside of our body, our cartilage goes from white to brown throughout our lifetime. And it also shows on our skin. So the more we're glycated, the more we have wrinkles on our skin and the more organs are being damaged. And we can't reverse this process, but we're just. but we can, you know, slow it down or speed it up. You probably have heard about glycation in the beauty industry.

You know, a lot of creams are about like reversing glycation and free radicals. That's all kind of the same world. And so with reducing our glucose spikes, we also slow down aging. Can you? Which is why I look so young, but I'm actually 65 years old. Yeah. I was going to say, you do look amazing. Is that just marketing from the beauty industry?

Can you slow down glycation with something topical or is it mostly from what you do internally? Amazing question, girl. So you can actually slow it down with antioxidants, which is what's in the beauty industry creams, but you can't antioxidant your way out of a big glucose-piking diet. It's a bit of a band-aid.

It's helpful for sure, and that's why we should also eat fruit and vegetables because they contain antioxidants. And that slows down glycation. But ultimately, it's really more powerful if you attack the problem from within and you just avoid those glucose spikes because those are the biggest drivers of glycation. Other drivers are things like exposure to too much sun, smoking, et cetera.

Like glycation has lots of different causes. But we can really affect how much we're glycated by what we're eating three times a day. The other one I want to touch on is PCOS. I have been diagnosed with PCOS only based on ultrasound, so like cystic ovaries. and slightly elevated testosterone, but I know that there's a connection there with the testosterone piece. So could you talk about that? Because I know a lot of people in my audience have this issue as well. Absolutely. So PCOS is a really growing thing. I think now one in eight females are diagnosed of PCOS, which is a very high number. So PCOS, it seems like it has several causes. But one of the

main causes of PCOS is having too much insulin in the body. And I explained that when we have a glucose spike, our body sends out insulin to take the glucose away and to reduce your blood sugar levels. The problem is, over time when there's too many glucose spikes and it's too much insulin, this too much insulin causes problems. So too much insulin does a couple of things. Number one, it tells your ovaries to produce more testosterone. Number two, it prevents your brain. It prevents your body from converting testosterone into female hormones, which usually happens pretty well. So you end up with kind of like an over saturation of testosterone, which can lead to symptoms like, you know, having hair on your chin, on your face, using hair on your head, cystic ovaries, missed periods,

etc. And we call polycystic ovarian syndrome this sort of combination of all these symptoms. but if you get your insulin levels down, you can pretty often get rid of those symptoms and then you don't have PCOS anymore. You know what I mean? So it is definitely lifestyle-based. There are some cases where it's due to other stuff like, you know, adrenals, et cetera. But what I've seen is that in most cases, it's first and foremost glucose issue. What have you been told actually about the PCOS and what to do about it?

I was diagnosed probably like in my early 20s. and I was told to go on the pill. And I had no other symptoms at that time. I had, I think my period was regular at that time. I think it was only the ultrasound at that time. I was told to go on the pill, which I did very briefly. I went off it because it made me absolutely psychotic. And then as the years went on, my period became irregular.

And only very recently did I have any like deviation in my hormone levels? before that they were always normal. It was only like in the last year that my testosterone was slightly elevated. So the symptoms kind of progressed a little bit, but I don't fit the typical like PCOS symptom mold. But the solution was always birth control pill. And then when that didn't work, it was progesterone only pill, synthetic. That didn't, I didn't want to do that.

I tried an IUD for 10 days like a year ago. It was awful because it was just like the effects of the birth control, but constant, you know, and I couldn't do anything about it because it was inside me. And then I started bioidentical progesterone. That didn't really help. The reason people often put on birth control pills or given hormones is because, you know, you're trying to rebalance the hormonal ratio. Right.

Then, for example, I see this often that somebody has been on the pill for a long time for PCOS. and then they want to have a baby. And so they get off the pill. And all of a sudden, you know, they don't ovulate anymore because their testosterone goes back up. So it's definitely like a band-aid, but there's a lot of stuff you can do from a food perspective to try to get those levels down. So there's a lot of hope and I've heard many, many success stories. Yeah.

And I want to get to the food piece as well and all of the tips because I know like, especially after just following you and learning more about it. Like, for example, right now, I'm drinking my macha and I sweeten it with maple syrup. And it's the only way that I like it. But I know that that's like causing a spike. And then, you know, I'll have my oats a little bit later. And I have, you know, protein and fats in there as well. But that's probably another spike. And then I have a smoothie, you know, and it's, so I'm like this. You're the poster child for so much, so much healing ahead of you. Peaks and valleys all day long. So.

Yeah. Yeah. This episode is brought to you by Sakharic. I have a lot on my plate lately. So I'm focusing on really making sure that I'm nourishing my body with nutritious, nutrient dense foods that are also convenient. Okay. I am just not into cooking for one lately. So getting my meals delivered just for me is such a godsend. It can be hard with a busy schedule and being on the go all the time and just having a lot going on. And when I start skipping meals or snacking on like really processed things, I really start to struggle on all fronts. So that is where Sakara comes in. Sakara is a wellness company anchored in food as medicine on a mission to nourish your body through the power of plants. This week they have these goji rose donuts.

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so if I can go a bit more in detail, we'll nerd out a little bit. So when the glucose spike happens, you know, glucose is supposed to go to your mitochondria because your mitochondria turn glucose into energy, that's their job. But when there's a glucose spike, too much glucose arrives in your mitochondria. And your mitochondria just kind of like shut down. They're like, I can't like I'm being, I'm overwhelmed, cannot deal. So your mitochondria just fully shut down. And as they shut down, they, they produce these free radicals. And that also leads to inflammation. And then depending on, you know, your own body, like your history, it can show up on your face is acne. I used to have a lot of pimples. And I just was like, I don't know, I guess it's just, you know, normal.

And now, you know, three years later, no more glucose spikes, no more pimples. So for me, pimples were a direct symptom that my body was trying to use to alert me that there were bucose spikes happening within. Yeah, that's a really interesting one. And, you know, recent studies have shown that if you avoid glucos spikes, you can reduce your acne, even if you don't reduce stuff that's known to cause acne like dairy. Interesting. Yeah, absolutely.

And of course, you know, like having a. a good skincare routine washing your face, et cetera, is key. But we don't realize how much the way we're eating and the spikes that we're creating then gets expressed on our skin, in our organs,

in our mood, in our mental health, and our feelings, and our energy, like your body's speaking to you with all of these symptoms. And often your body is trying to tell you, like, hey, girl,

glucose spikes. Like, can you please just fix this? Are there any less, obvious symptoms that are a result of these glucose spikes? I've seen so many. It's really interesting. Nausea for some people. Really? There you go. Breaking out in sweats, having the shakes, those are common ones, insomnia. If you're going through menopause, like way, really bad symptoms. I've heard people, you know that cold hand, cold feet thing, that going away with no more glucose spikes. So

I feel like depending on your body, you might be getting messages in so many different ways. So, but what's important to remember is that 90% of the population is likely to be having glucose spikes every day. So it's like check in with yourself and be like, okay, what are the symptoms that I'm having? Could this be my body telling me about glucose spikes? Perhaps you got to go find out. Okay. So let's talk solutions.

What do we do about this? I mean, do you recommend everybody go out and get a continuous glucose monitor or how do we start? Okay. So first of all, you don't need to get a glucose monitor. The ones that are in the market right now are quite complicated to understand. They're kind of like full of data and stuff and they can be quite confusing. So you do not need to do that. I've done the hard work of going into the studies and synthesizing everything into tips.

So number one, we're going to start with your breakfast. So you said that for breakfast, you have macha, latte with maple syrup and oats, yeah? Yes. Okay, cool. So breakfast actually controls our glucose spikes for the rest of the day. If we have a big spike at breakfast, then a whole day is going to be a glucose rollercoaster. And we're going to be on like this cravings cycle. We're going to feel, quote unquote, addicted to sugar, you know, that's saying,

when actually that's very likely just a symptom of this glucose roller coaster you created with your breakfast. So this is the number one thing to remember for breakfast. Have a savory breakfast. Try not to have anything sweet first thing in the morning because if you do that, you're going to set yourself up for success for the rest of the day. So you can still have starches, like your oats are okay, but make sure that you're really building your breakfast around protein. So if you want oats, maybe before the oats, you can have like, I don't know, some smoked salmon and a bit of avocado. You can have, you know, eggs, if you like eggs. You can have some tofu, you can have a smoothie with like lots of protein powder in it. And then definitely I would

recommend for, you know, the the coffee drink or the matcha to use, it's better to use sweeteners like stevia or monk fruit than to use like real sugar that really has glucose molecules in it. However, you don't have to give up all sweet stuff at all. If you want to eat sweet foods, the best time to do so is after a meal. So after your lunch or after your dinner is ideal. So hack on a hack two, we have savory breakfast and we have, if you want to eat something sweet, do it after a meal. Then this is super powerful. Before lunch and before dinner, have a veggie starter.

So start your meal with a plate of whatever vegetables you like. I mean, this can be anything from like some salad to leftover broccoli to tomatoes to olives, to baby carrots, like whatever vegetable you like. Because if you start your meal, like that, the fiber in the vegetables is going to land in your stomach first, then in your intestine first. And there it's going to create this protective like transformers vibes mesh. The mesh is going to get glued to the side of your intestines and it's going to protect your body from absorbing too much glucose from the meal afterwards. So that is super, super powerful.

And you can also combine it to another hack, which is the vinegar hack. So if you want the ultimate best way to start your meals to avoid glucose spike and feel better. Avoid glucose spikes and feel better. It's veggie starter plus some vinegar on it. It's like a tablespoon of vinegar in a dressing. You can also drink the vinegar if you want in some water. It's also, it appears to be really powerful to avoid the glucose spikes. So yeah, those are a few tips. What do you want to go into? What about if somebody just can't stomach like drinking vinegar or putting it on their food? What about vinegar supplements, like when it's in a capsule? Is that as a fat? or does it release too slowly or how does that work?

So we have to differentiate like the gummies. So gummies are the ones that you chew and those are full of sugar. So just completely avoid those. The capsules seem to work actually. You kind of need like three capsules to get the same amount of the acetic acid molecule as in a tablespoon of vinegar. And those seem to work pretty well. So you can have those like 10 minutes before a meal.

And that's that's pretty great. But also, you know, if you don't like the vinegar thing, just don't do it. There's lots of other stuff you can do. And I think the savory breakfast piece and the veggie starter, I mean, those already will get you to a point where you have so many, you have way fewer glugose spikes. And it'll get you on a ramp to just better health and more balanced hormones. That's a really, this is a really powerful combination. And to go a bit further in the veggie starter thing, the hack is actually to eat your food in the right order. so doing a meal to start with the veggie starter and then try to have the proteins and the fats in the

middle and then the starches at the end of your meal because there's a study that shows us that if you eat your food in this order so veggies first and carbs last you can cut the glucose spike of that meal by up to 75% without changing anything about what you're eating and I think this is why it's such a revolution because these tips they don't require you to they go on a diet or cut out, you know, the food group, that kind of like just these core principles and tools that you can use to just help your body deal with the food better and just be in optimal health. It's so powerful. This episode is brought to you by article. So by now you guys know that I am in a new place, which means decorating, designing, new decor, all the things. And

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So definitely check this out. Treat yourself and treat your hair by just searching for the Conair Smoothwrap on Amazon.com. And you can try the new drying experience with Smoothwrap today. Again, that's the Conair Smooth Wrap on Amazon.com. Interesting because whenever I have like a nutritionist or a dietitian or, you know, anyone in that profession on, people always ask about food combining. I know like food combining was super popular. I don't know if it still is and I don't really know like the principles. But I remember everyone that I had on was like, no, there's really no science around that.

And I think that the method at least that was popular was like fruit first on an empty stomach. Do you know this? Oh yeah. And everybody was always asking me like, okay, but if I eat my my food in the right order, I have to eat their fruit last, but won't that, like, rot in my stomach? There's this urban myth that if you eat your fruit last, it's going to rot in your stomach. Not true. I did some research. This dates back to a doctor from, like, the 300 hundreds or something who wrote this book, yeah, who wrote this book saying that fruit last is going to putify and make you have all these gases and stuff. It's completely incorrect. Like, nothing can rot in your

stomach. So you're good to go. If it causes you personally bloating, like, you know, don't do it, but for most people, it's totally fine. The food combining thing, so I have another hack called put your clothes on your carbs, like put clothing on your carbs. Again, you don't have to cut out carbs, but to reduce the glucose spike they cause, puts some clothing on them. So that means add some protein fat or fiber to them. So example, I want to eat. I want to eat. You eat a slice of chocolate cake because it's Tuesday and it's 3 p.m. and I just run a slice of chocolate cake. The slice of chocolate cake, those are naked carbs. Those are just, you know, starches and sugars naked. And they would create a big glucose spike in my stomach. And what I do is I add some Greek

yogurt to that. The Greek yogurt has protein and fat in it. So when you combine those two things together, you slow down the speed at which the glucose is going to hit your system. And so the glucose spike is much smaller. And as a result, you don't set off this cravings roller coaster. Because I hear so many people say, I'm addicted to sugar. I can't stop eating it. And it's like, well, actually, the sugar you're eating is just starting that roller coaster and keeping you throughout the day on this roller coaster of wanting more sugar, eating sugar, glucose bike, glucose crash. You want more sugar during the crash. You eat it and it goes back up, et cetera. So if we want to eat sugar in a way that doesn't start the roller coaster, the trick is to put some clothing on it.

So another example would be if you want some dried mango. Okay, have that, but have it with some almonds. If you want some bread. Okay, that's fine, but have it with some cheese or some avocado on it. If you want some pasta, totally cool, but have it with some spinach mixed in and maybe, you know, whatever, a little bit of protein as well. So it's keeping in mind like no naked carbs. And that's such a powerful way to just steady your glucose levels and feel way more in control over your desire to eat. You mentioned kind of like alternative sweeteners like monk fruit or stevia or something like that.

Obviously, it sounds like those are a better choice than like loading up on, you know, maple syrup or honey or sugar, regular sugar. But do you find that that can increase the cravings to keep having something sweet? Is it better to like stay away from those as much as possible? Or what is your take on that? I mean, like in a vacuum, it's way better to just not have any of them for sure 100%. You know, there's no positive effect to adding sweeteners to your diet if you don't already have them. But if you look at what happens between like maple syrup versus monk fruit or ad lios or something like that, like the problem is the maple syrup is creating a massive regrow spike and also making you

enjoy the taste of sweetness so keeping you hooked on the taste but the maple syrup is also creating biological reaction in your body of inflammation aging insulin release and then doing the crash it activates the craving center in your brain so in my experience and from what the science shows that's the much worse choice because it just intensifies cravings even more if you look like in a vacuum at just people who do not have sweeteners versus people who do have sweeteners, it does seem that sweeteners also have side effects, like microbiome problems, like keeping you used to sweetness, because we know it's like it's a habit. So I would say, just try to remove the maple syrup and the honey and go to sweeteners and then so do you win yourself off of it.

Or if you love honey, you love maple syrup, have it, you know, for pleasure. Don't have it thinking that it's going to be good for your body or like healthy is a lot of misinformation around there. And then if you want to have something that's super sweet like maple syrup, whatever, put some clothing around that foods, then maybe have some vinegar before, maybe go for a walk afterwards to help your body process it. We need to get you off the matcha maple syrup thing, at least first thing in the morning. I'm like, what am I going to do? Because I don't love, I mean, I've done monk fruit.

I've done Stevie. I just don't love the flavor of those. And I feel like I do end up getting like bloated and I've tried to do it naked and I just don't like the taste of the matcha without it. So I got to, I'm like, I got to figure something out here. Do you think you could like reduce a little bit the amount? Yes. And I have. And do you think maybe before you have the matcha with the maple syrup, you could have something else to eat? Or do this is what I normally do. So I wake up. I have a shit ton of water. And then I have like a handful of macadamia nuts. It's just like one of my weird things. I'll have macadamia nuts. And then I'll have the macha. And the macha is I have it with like a like a nut milk or like a hemp milk or something like that. And then I'm probably around like half a teaspoon of maple syrup.

It's not a ton. Okay. Yeah. That's not too bad. Especially because you have a new macadamines nuts before. So your body already has, you know, some protein and fat in there. So half a teaspoon is really not that bad. I wouldn't worry too much about it.

A lot of, I had people send in questions and we'll get to those because there were a lot. But a lot of people asked like what to do about their morning coffee or their morning match if they added sugar to it. And I got a lot of questions about collagen. Does collagen have any effect on the- No, so collagen protein? Mm-hmm. I mean, it's a little bit helpful because it's protein.

So protein reduces a glucose spike of something. So definitely not a bad thing to add in. But like, okay, so about the morning drink and about having that sweetened. So just know that if that's what you wake up with, it's going to create a glucose spike in your body. But you have to make a choice. Like, how much do I love this versus how many symptoms and how much am I suffering? You know, like if you're feeling great and everything's fine in your life and you're like thriving, like, who cares? Drink whatever you want.

But if you're struggling with something, start asking yourself, which parts of my diet would I be willing to make a few changes to? Because it can really help. So an easy thing would be, you know, if you really want a sweetened coffee drink in the morning, have it after you eat something and eat something that's based around protein in the morning. That'll really help. You can also go for a walk as you're having the sweet coffee drink because your muscles as they contract, they soak glucose up from your bloodstream. And then if you're keen to like try to actually get off the sugary thing, you know, try alilose, try mung fruit, try stevia. I know the taste is not like the best. I definitely prefer real sugar, but those are options.

And you can also tell yourself, okay, that's a non-negotiable. Like I'm not going to change that because I love it too much. However, it's totally easy for me to add a veggie starter to my lunch in my dinner. You know, it's about like finding what works for you. I love that. And I like that you, because I see like on your content, if somebody is like, well, what if I want to have a piece of cake? you're like, have it, but do this first. You're not like, no, take that away from your life.

I mean, it's very realistic because I feel like people kind of have this all or nothing mentality. Yeah, and we're not, you know, this is not a diet. Like, we're not here to do something for two weeks and then give it up. This is just me showing you how your body functions from like a biochemical perspective. And I hope that these hacks will become as common as you should drink water and, you know, get some sunlight every day. These are just things that are so fundamental to helping our body do well that they should become something people teach in, you know, school. Like start with your veggies. That would be great.

You don't have sugar in the morning. That's my long-term dream. That's such a space in 20 years, I'll tell you, if I managed. I had a nutritionist that I used to work with. And he was like, we have this idea, especially in the United States, that you have to have a sweet breakfast. And he's like, you don't have to have, like, have leftover dinner for breakfast, like vegetables and whatever protein. We don't have to have pancakes and syrup. Yeah.

We have a belief that eating something sweet is going to give us energy. I'm here to break that myth. Okay, let's break the myth. So eating something sweet gives us pleasure. It secretes dopamine in our brain. That's the same molecule that, you know, gets secreted when you have sex, when you use illegal drugs, when you go gambling. like it's a really pleasurable chemical. However, the science shows us that when it comes to energy levels,

actually having a breakfast that creates a big glucose spike leads to less energy available for your body because of the insulin thing. Insulin takes that energy and stores it away to reduce the glucose spike. And on top of that, with every glucose spike, you're harming your mitochondria's ability to make energy long term. Because as I mentioned, like, they just go like, I can't. I'm going on strike. Cannot deal with this. And so your mitochondria get harmed. And so over time, you become so tired. You're like, you're eating, but your body's just not energized. You're drinking

coffee, but you're so tired, you know, going to the grocery store is exhausting. You can't get up. That's your mitochondria, having gone on strike for so long because of glucose spikes. And they're just not there anymore. The good news is your mitochondria can very easily regenerate. So you can get them back to a really optimal shape. But the first thing starts with breaking this concept that sugar gives us energy. Sugar gives us pleasure. It does not give us energy. The best thing for breakfast is actually just protein, fat, and fiber.

You don't even need starches and sugars to have energy. And that'll set you up with a really nice day. My favorite breakfast was growing up. I used to have a Nutella crepe every morning, not glucose goddess approved. But I still have these pans, these like fat crepe pans. So now I make an egg crepe. So I break two eggs, just like mix them together. And I make this really thin omelets.

I put a bunch of butter in the pan and then I put them in and it cooks really quickly. And then I put some feta cheese and some cherry tomatoes cut in half. And then I just fold the omelet crepe, the egg crepe in half. And I put it on my plate and it looks just like a crepe, hot sauce, little greens. And this is like the perfect breakfast. And I feel so good. Because when I was younger, I would have this intoler crepe every morning. And then by 10.30, girl, I was so hungry.

Like, do not talk to me when I'm hungry. I was in such a bad mood. And I remember being in school and just my stomach, you know, in pain, hunger pains. That was just a glucose spike and a glucose drop. So, yeah, sugar is not for energy. That sounds really good. So I have one more question. Then we'll do a couple audience questions.

I know we don't have a ton of time left. But will people experience any symptoms if they start to incorporate these? So I know that sometimes like if you're reducing your carbs or reducing your sugar, like you might feel tired. If somebody is starting to incorporate these tips, might they feel a little bit more fatigued for a little bit as they kind of adjust to the. I really appreciate this question. I think this is really important to address.

So if you've been having glucose spikes for your whole life, your body has been trained to expect glucose every few hours. And so your body only burns glucose for energy. But actually, your body's also able to burn fat for energy. And when you start avoiding the glucose spikes, your body has to learn to burn fat again, which is good because it's going to burn your fat reserves. But your body has to like build that muscle back up.

And so at the beginning, I can feel a bit like, whoa, I just don't have any energy because your body is not used to burning fat. And that's called metabolic flexibility. So I highly recommend going slowly. Like go at your own pace. Do something that feels super easy to you. So, you know, I mentioned like savory breakfast, having a veggie starter,

eating your carbs last. If you want to have something sweet, having it as dessert, moving after your meals. Like pick one of those. It's like, oh, I could do that in my sleep. No problem. And start with the really easy stuff so that the transition is super smooth. And then you'll get to like the meteor stuff. And then you'll become glucose.

God is. But yeah, take it easy. It's a big shift for a lot of people. And your body's going to catch up with it and your body is going to thank you and you're going to be feeling so much better, but definitely go easy. Don't go like full out, cold turkey. Take it slow. Be kind to yourself too. If you really want to make this change and heal for the long run, piano, piano, like they say in Italian, slowly. I love that. Slow and steady. Let's get to some listener questions really quickly. carbs after a workout. Is that an ideal time to have like more starchy, maybe naked carbs? Yes, absolutely. So best time to have carbs either at the end of a meal or before or after a workout. Because at that point, your muscles have used up a bunch of the glucose in your liver and in your

muscles. And so when you have the carbs at that point, it's not going to create a spike. It's going to go straight to your muscles. Now, obviously, like, if you do five squats, don't go and eat like 20 donuts thinking you won't have a spike, but, you know, kind of feel it out. Definitely a good time. Can the vinegar be kind of counterproductive? Like if somebody has a sensitive gut or they have issues, this person said that she had ulcerative colitis. So I don't really know the answer to that. I've heard many things. I've heard that vinegar actually helps people who have like heartburn and difficulty digesting things. In this, studies, like it's from the science. It seems that vinegar, as long as it's diluted in water,

can't really have a negative effect unless you drink like tons and tons of it, like 20, 30 tablespoons a day. But for this, definitely use caution. But I would just remind people that vinegar is less acidic than your gastric juices. It's less acidic than lemon juice. It's less acidic than Coca-Cola. So it tastes strong, but actually in terms of how strong it is to your body, it's not that strong. I think the biggest concern is probably enamel of your teeth. So definitely that's why we want to dilute it. Always dilute in water. I'm actually drinking some vinegar now in water. I just always put it in my water now. So dilute the vinegar in some water and start off with a tiny bit, you know, like a little tiny little splash and then use a straw if you want to be

extra cautious for your teeth. But for this stuff, listen to your body. A hundred percent. Yeah, like your body is your best source of information. See how you feel? If it doesn't agree with you, don't do it. Somebody asked, I didn't write it down, but I remember seeing this question. Like, does it matter if it's a teaspoon or a tablespoon? I mean, does it have to be exactly precise? So it does matter in the sense that like the more you put in, the more of an effect it's going to have. So in the studies, they test things like one tablespoon or two tablespoons. However, I would say, like even a tiny little quarter teaspoon is already going to help you. So it's not like nothing happens until you hit a tablespoon.

It's like every tiny little acetic acid molecule that you add will have an effect. So as little as you want is totally fine. Can you talk about pickle juice? Yeah. So many questions about that. Okay, guys. So if you want to drink pickle juice instead of a vinegar, which is totally fine, you actually have to drink more because pickle juice doesn't have that much

acetic acid in it. So to get as much acetic acid as in a tablespoon of vinegar, you have to drink five tablespoons of pickle juice, which is fine. Like if you want to do that, no problemo, but just note that you have to drink more of it. I don't, I don't drink pickle. You took pickle juice? I mean, I could, I guess. I like pickles. I think, yeah, I think a lot of people probably find that a little more appetizing than the vinegar. I don't know why. I mean, I like, like pickles, but I would rather drink less vinegar than more pickle juice. I should make like a glucose goddess, like a glucose goddess pickle juice drink, you know, and sell it at Irwan.

Oh my God. For $25, yes, for sure. I don't know if you have an answer for this, but somebody said that she's wearing a monitor and her glucose is spiking higher after COVID. Have you heard this or seen this? Oh, interesting. No, I have not heard this. What we do know is that people who got COVID were more likely to survive COVID if they had steady glucose levels. So definitely like the other way around, like glucose spikes are

more difficult. Well, make it more difficult for your body to defend against COVID. But I mean, there's so much we don't know. You know, glucose, we can get bigger glucose spikes depending on the time of the month, depending on how dehydrated we are, depending on like how stressed we are. So I'm, not surprised if that could have an impact. Yeah. Also be mindful that like the monitors, they can read quite off. So I would be less focused on like the absolute numbers that you get,

but more looking at like the overall shape of your glucose curves. Because mine, for example, it read off for a little while and I was really concerned. I was like, oh my God, like my glucose levels is so high. And then I got a blood test and it was fine. So I'm a little bit mindful of, paying too much attention to the absolute number. Okay.

So my last question is, is there a certain amount of time, like say that you have symptoms of PCOS or you're having emotional symptoms or your energy is very erratic or you have fatigue or acne, any of these things? How long can someone expect it to take

to start seeing some changes? I mean, I'm sure it varies in everybody, but I think it depends on like what you do and, you know, how many hacks you put in place So there's no studies like looking at like applying all these hacks and seeing how quickly you feel better. But I hear dozens of stories from people every single day through Instagram and through my book and stuff. And for most people, like within a couple days, they start feeling so much better.

And then GY is just like mental health wise, they sleep better. And then depending on what it is that you are currently battling, it can take a week, two weeks, a month. Like it really depends. But have a look. So on my Instagram, I have this highlight called testimonials. And have a look there. There's like hundreds of messages. And it might give you a sense of what you can expect.

But in my experience, these things can change really, really quickly. Your body's so happy when there's no more buco spikes. I like the symptoms start, you know, start disappearing super fast. But girl, I'm here. I'm with you. And like, I can totally help if you have any questions or, you know, I'm super happy to help you because VCOS is something. you can completely like manage and even fully, you know, put into remission with this kind of lifestyle

change. So if there's anything I can do to support, really don't hesitate. Thank you. I really appreciate that. I remember I had a guest on years ago and they said you lifestyle your way into PCOS and you can lifestyle your way out of it. Yeah, girl, exactly. I'm going to send you my book if you don't have it yet. Thank you. I would love that. Thank you so much. Well, I'm definitely feeling inspired. I'm like going to go make my eggs and avocado and an egg crepe for breakfast and drink some vinegar and and veggie starters. Also, that's super powerful. Veggie starters.

Yeah. All your meals. Yeah. Okay. So I like to ask my guests, one thing we should stop doing and one thing we should start doing. Does it have to do with glucose? Anything.

It could be anything. Okay. So one thing we should stop doing is sleeping with no blackout blinds. There's more and more studies showing that like. I mean, you know this, but I've seen such a difference in myself as well. Sleeping in a full blackout room, I wake up feeling so much better. It's something we should start doing. Go outside first thing in the morning, put your feet on the ground, look at the sun,

like kind of connect with this crazy planet we're on. It helps me a lot. Have a better day. I love that. We'll tell everybody where they can find you and find your book and all of that. Okay, so Instagram, glucose goddess. And my book is called Glucose Revolution, the life-changing power of balancing your blood sugar.

You can find it anywhere online. I love that you just had some macho with your maple syrup in it. I'm like, this is my last day of this, so I can enjoy it while I can. Thank you so much. I hope to meet you in person soon. I hope you enjoyed that episode. If you liked it, and if you like the show in general, please take a second to rate, review, and subscribe.

It goes a long way and it's actually the best way to support the show. Also, if you want to see more about each episode, you can head over to The Blond Files podcast on Instagram. I'm always posting about each episode there or over on my personal page at Ariel Lorry.