Laura Cipullo - The diabetes comfort food diet cookbook: 200 delicious dishes to help you lose weight and balance blood sugar

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To my family: Dennis, Gene, Richard, and Joan

The Lowdown

on Diabetes

Like many people, you might think your life is over if you receive a diagnosis of prediabetes or type 2 diabetes. Suddenly, meals and lifestyle choices that you didnt think twice about before must come under scrutiny, and needing to make changes can be scary. You cant help but panic. Your mind just shuts down. You close your ears to the doctors advice and explanations about blood sugar and insulin. It all sounds like a pronouncement that lifes pleasures for you are over... forever. Now I must be on a diet for the rest of my life, you may find yourself thinking. Restaurants, favorite foods, holiday feasts, and all social events will become tainted and nearly impossible to enjoy. Well, think again. This does not have to be your reality. Theres no need to plan your own pity party!

Diabetes is definitely not a doomsday diagnosis. You can still eatand yes, even some of your favorite foods, like hot, crusty bread or sweet, silky ice cream, can stay on the menu! Research clearly supports the fact that there really are no foods off-limits for individuals with prediabetes or diabetes. You can have it allyou just need to be smart about how you do it. Thats where The Diabetes Comfort Food Diet Cookbook comes in. This cookbook is designed to give you the tools you need to manage or reverse insulin resistance while continuing to eat the foods you love. As a registered dietitian, I have directly witnessed this amazing nutrition plan in action with my clients. Youll read their stories over the next few chapters and be wowed by their results. Read on to learn how to transform your life, your diet, and your health. You can continue to love your foodand not fear what it will do to your blood sugar. Just implement the three simple steps to make over any meal so you can balance blood sugar, lose excess weight, and beat this disease. Well talk about these three steps specifically in . First, though, let me help you understand a little more about diabetes and how to manage it.

Note: When discussing prediabetes or type 2 diabetes in this book, we will refer to the diagnosis simply as diabetes. While the advice in this cookbook is aimed at those who have the ability to prevent or reverse insulin resistance, the recipes themselves can also benefit individuals with type 1 diabetes and even people who want to eat healthier to lose weight, improve their heart health, or just promote general good health and wellness.

THE EASY EATING SOLUTION THAT WORKS FOR LIFE

Please keep this important reality in mind: The main goal of diabetes management is to learn how to best and most effectively balance your blood sugar levels through food and physical activity. The Diabetes Comfort Food Diet is about living your life to the fullest by learning to eat in ways that are beneficial to your bodyand especially understanding how different foods influence your blood sugar levels and endocrine system. And though this daily diet will likely result in weight loss, you must recognize that this is a lifetime methodology, not a fad plan.

You will see positive changes in just a few weeks, but you should not stop this diet when you feel you have reached your goals. Rather, its a diet to learn thoroughly, implement totally, and follow diligently. You must make it your healthy nutrition habit for the rest of your life. The good news is that it is easy to learn and will help you look and feel great... and youll still get to eat all the foods you enjoy! Well show you how to make enjoyable foods work for you and ultimately help you beat diabetes.

Definition of diet:

1. Food and drink regularly provided or consumed, 2. Habitual nourishment

Look up the definition of diet in Websters Dictionary and youll see the noun defined as habitual nourishment. The Diabetes Comfort Food Diet focuses on this definition so that you, the reader, recognize this is a lifelong approach to nutrition and health. Stop thinking of a diet as restrictive and start thinking of it as providing the building blocks that nourish your body each day.

Theres no reason to feel overwhelmed with despair when a doctor diagnoses you with prediabetes or diabetes! To immediately help dispel your fears, lets cover the basics of diabetes so that you better understand your body and why you need to fuel it in specific ways.

ALL ABOUT BLOOD SUGAR

When we talk about blood sugar, what we really mean is blood glucose. This is a measure of the sugar also known as glucose present in your blood at any given time. When you sit down to a meal, your body digests the food and breaks it down into three macronutrients known as carbohydrates, proteins, or fats. Carbohydrates, whether they are monosaccharides, disaccharides, or even some of the digestible polysaccharides, are further converted or broken down into the simple form of sugar known as glucose, which is then absorbed into your bloodstream. That glucose gets transported throughout your body for your muscles and organs to use as fuel. Most glucose is used immediately; however, excess glucose is converted to glycogen (which gets stored for use in your muscles and liver) or fatty acids (which are stored in your adipose tissuea.k.a. your love handles and other visible body fat).

But how does the body know to use that glucose? The endocrine system is the bodys active metabolic map that directs the where, when, what, and how much of hormones that help the body convert food into sugar and then energy. Insulin is one of the endocrine hormones produced by the pancreas. This organ releases insulin, which functions to open your cell doors and take up sugar from your blood. Sugar is mostly converted into energy when it enters the cells. This process helps you do everything from running a marathon to simply staying awake at your desk during that after-lunch slump. If this sugar gets locked out of your cells due to a malfunction with insulin, you are likely to feel shaky, sweaty, mentally foggy, and anxious. This means your blood sugar is likely very high. When this starts to happen, you probably have developed insulin resistance.