I think probably insulin resistance precedes weight gain, usually.

It may well but with my early understanding - low fat, high carb diet, I was doing myself a disservice in attempting to lose weight. Carbohydrates are the most efficient source of energy of the three macronutrients and bring into play insulin and fat storage. Upwards of 1 g protein per kg of body mass is utilized, not directly as fuel but in cellular growth and repair, manufacture of hair and nails... Fats are similarly not burned nearly as efficiently as carbs in that some of them are utilized in the production of hormones, fatty acid for use by the brain and not consumed directly as fuel. I had it all wrong in that I believed that a calorie = a calorie... and a laboratory calorimeter may indicate one thing (9.2 kcals/g for fats, 5.2 kcals/g for protein, and "only" 4.2 kcals/g of carbohydrate... but the human body is not a bomb calorimeter.

... and throw in carbs (excess, left unburned) and insulin --> stored fats. I had the first law of thermo down, but totally forgot about the second law...

/smile

That's probably true. With a surplus of insulin, you can lay down a prodigious amount of fat very quickly and create a negative feedback situation spiraling into diabetes.

In GCBC Taubes talks about how fat people (read "insulin resistant" people) can't burn their stored fat, all they can do is store more. Essentially they're starving. Now imagine that this begins to predate the weight gain. Your body starts having a harder time burning stored fat and an easier time storing glucose as fat.

Because you can't access the stored stuff, you're craving carbs because it is your only acessible source of energy. If you restrict calories you feel terrible because you're not able to access the stored stuff very well and you're limiting the incoming stuff. And if you're not dieting, you're going to be tossing almost everything you eat (and don't immediately burn) into a locker without a key to open it again later. Nasty vicious cycle.

Is it any wonder that people have a couple of weeks of feeling miserable when they first go low carb?

I'm going to reread GCBC. I wonder if the liver goes crazy with gluconeogenesis cranking out more glucose as it does in diabetic ketoacidosis?

Not sure I can get through it again. Don't get me wrong it is a favorite reference book of mine and almost a "full half" of it is in highlighter. He is just so detailed and well referenced that sometimes I felt he was beating a down horse... I give up, I give up!

/smile

P.S. Check that - Chapter 9 (2007) is two-thirds highlighter...

[Edit: Chapter 21 NOT Chapter 8 - with apologies...]Chapter 8 of Taubes (2007) talks a lot about obesity and mentions T2 diabetes in the same vein (but separately) and disputes the commonly held beliefs of cause and effect (except in a few cases). It is another one of his detailed reads............... but interesting. It all seems to come back to the "pick your parents wisely" for the most part.

/smile

Exericiseaholic? Okay, now this is an affliction I would welcome! So do you have a little exercise tip I can start with..you know, and then I'll become addicted and..and..and... LOL! Thanks for the tip about testing with various foods. I've kind of been doing that and found some that I can't eat without spiking. Of course that means going through countless test strips, but I realy don't care. I'm keeping super strict records of everything, too.

Sam

From what I have read today, this is true - hyperinsulinemia and insulin resistance (plus carbohydrate) causes the weight gain - obesity and T2 diabetes do not necessaily exist concurrently but they are both characterized by a "...'greatly exaggerated' insulin response to carbohydrates in the diet".

I wish I had known that when I weighed 160 lbs, 10 years ago...

Did you know that most studies suggest that "those who are overweight eat fewer calories than those of normal weight"? I didn't...

/smile

I think this was true for me, as well as for my father and probably for my paternal grandfather. It was definitely true for my maternal uncle, who had never been overweight a day in his life when he was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes at age 41 and was still not overweight when he died in an accident at age 44. I've seen a couple of posts on this board in the past week where non-diabetic members refer to others as "eating their way to diabetes." That's not what I believe has happened in my family, where the normal diet was garden grown vegetables and beef, pork, and chicken raised on the farm (and, yes, home-baked goodies, but more as treats than every day). We got type 2 diabetes more by heredity than diet.

Jenny has a great page on this issue at her Blood Sugar 101 website:

http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/14046739.php

Although I know there is a genetic component and i agree with it, I dont believe that everyone with insuline resistence need to be fat or that their blood sugar be whacky.
I am the classic example of that. I am just 20lbs above normal weight( but had all the symptoms when I was perfect weight), sugar levels are perfect but I am insuline resistent. I have PCOS and people with that are insuline resistent and some like me have perfect blood sugar levels. The thing is the pancreas work overtime to compensate but they can at this point and going further they might not be able to thats why I do low carb.My PCOS seems to fade with low carb whereas blood sugar has been solid.

My take on the whole issue is that you should not look at diabetes or insuline resistence in isolation but look at the whole picture. Stress is one of the greatest factor and adrenal fatigue is a direct resultant of that. If you have changed your lifestyle and still things dont budge this is one avenue people should venture into. Stress can be psychological,physical stress with over excercise,environmental stress (toxins in the environmnet),bacterial or parasitic.
People with adrenal fatigue over time can develop dabetes and yes it runs in family too. I inherit along with the syndrome X gene , a highly pressurized living from when I was a kid, a compulsary vegetarianism throught life. are these genetic or lifestyle based is up for debate. But truly in my heart I believe that the environment in which cells live is equally important to what they are composed of .

I don't much buy into stress being a major cause of disease. Sure it doesn't help but I suspect it is our diets that are the biggest source of disease in our society in the US.

Psychology is a refuge for ignorant doctors. If they can't help you then they'll claim your symptoms are due to mental states.

The only reason I have any doubt that insulin resistance precedes weight gain is that I'm not insulin resistant but I become more insulin resistant with weight gain. Weight gain is certainly a reinforcer of insulin resistance if nothing else.

Well, you're a little different from most of us too. I definitely think the cycle gets worse as you gain weight. Fat is hormonally very active stuff.

But the insulin resistance stuff could easily explain why they're finding people who look normal weight but are actually carrying around a lot of visceral fat. Or visa versa... *sigh*

My personal, pull it out of my a$$, theory is that insulin resistance is probably a positive adaptive mechanism that promotes fat storage that has run amuck in a carb-rich environment.