Managing diabetes and related health challenges

Introduction

In response to many readers’ requests for a book about diabetes, NB Publishers approached me to write one. This is a topic close to my heart. As a medical doctor and an author specialising in natural integrative medicine since 1995, it is part of my healing philosophy always to look for the deeper cause, the hidden, trapped emotions underlying all ‘dis-ease’, and to address them, along with the required lifestyle adaptations and natural remedies. This ensures an integrative approach to managing all chronic diseases of lifestyle (CDLs), of which diabetes is an important one, especially when combined with its partners – heart disease, depression and metabolic syndrome (often called syndrome X).

The ever-increasing number of those diagnosed with diabetes, one of today’s most prevalent chronic diseases (called health challenges in wellness terminology), is unprecedented, clearly indicating the urgent and essential need for a different perspective, an integrative approach to its management. The statistics are staggering: the International Diabetes Federation (www.idf.org) estimates that the current worldwide population of about 382 million diabetics will increase to over 590 million over the next 20 years. That’s one in every ten adults! It is estimated that there are approximately three and a half million people in South Africa with diabetes, with about 50 per cent undiagnosed.

After taking over the Weight Control Clinic (established in 1974) from Dr WGG Gauché in 2012 because of my own weight challenge and insulin resistance (often a precursor to diabetes) and natural medicine as solution, it became clear, from practical experience, that most patients who need to lose more than about 8 kg of body fat either had insulin resistance with high fasting insulin (and often high blood glucose levels) or type 2 diabetes. We’ve had success with many patients who have diabetes, a health challenge where losing weight (especially body fat weight) is notoriously difficult.

This book is a culmination of three years’ practical experience in dealing with – and 20 years’ experience in learning, writing and teaching about – diabetes, within the context of a natural, integrative approach, including well-researched natural remedies and comprehensive lifestyle guidelines. The aim of my approach is to give those of us with this prevalent health challenge hope and access to the information and tools we need to take responsibility for our own journey into healing.

The book provides a body–mind approach to making sense of diabetes as specific example of a CDL. It uses the metaphor of an alchemical journey through the body, encountering habitual thought patterns and trapped emotions, then changing behaviour and, ultimately, obtaining the physical effect of healing from deep within cell memories, through DNA (using epigenetic and metagenetic restructuring) and brain reprogramming tools and techniques. It describes an integrative approach to a return to health. It discusses and explains a multitude of natural remedies, such as nutriceuticals, herbal remedies (nature’s gifts), colours, sound, light, aromatherapy oils and specific relaxation exercises. It also provides practical techniques for taking responsibility for our own health and healing.

Millions of people around the world receive the news that they have a serious, chronic and potentially life-threatening disease of lifestyle, or are at risk of developing one, during health screenings every day. Once the diagnosis is made, we want more information to reclaim our power and transcend the ‘poor me’ victim consciousness. Intuitively, we know that simply treating the symptoms is not enough. There has to be a deeper meaning and purpose to any health challenge, whether acute or chronic. ‘What can I do to improve or manage my health?’ must be the most common question asked in any health practitioner’s office. The aim of this book is to provide readers with practical answers and information they can work with every day. After completing the book and the various points to ponder, talk about and journal, readers will know how to approach and manage their own healing challenges with integrative healing practices to use every day. Even those without diabetes or metabolic syndrome as a health challenge will find that the healing, natural remedies, nutritional advice, advice about working with emotional issues and meditation practices in this book will allow harmonising of both body and mind for balance and wholeness.

The book follows the middle road, as a bridge between the left and the right brain – between the conservative and the liberal, between purely analytical, rational, scientific and physical thinking and emotional, creative, spiritual and symbolic right-brain thinking. The purely left-brain thinkers will find much to contemplate and use for their own healing, expanding their way of seeing and experiencing the world and themselves. The more right-brain and whole-brain readers will also find much of interest, including tools for optimal health and wellbeing.

The journey into healing is deep and mysterious. It involves changing old thinking and belief patterns, lifestyle and behaviour, as well as deep change in the cellular environment – the inner milieu of every cell, even reflecting in our natural environment. To temper the ego and subconscious (or unconscious) mind with its hidden saboteurs (trapped emotions), you will need some basic ingredients: the 3Ps of patience, practice and perseverance; some GNF (good-natured flexibility) combined with regular meditation, reflection, contemplation and prayer to invite the superconscious mind and Divine Intelligence into healing the body–mind unit; and a large helping of courage and discipline to keep going when it seems nothing is happening – or even, initially, when things seem to be getting worse. We can merely survive, or we can succeed and flourish in health, joy and happiness: our birthright. The choice is ours to make in every moment, every day of our lives. Becoming aware of this and deliberately choosing our way, moment by moment, is our most important task in this lifetime.

I invite you to join me in this alchemical journey. The journey is more important than reaching any future goal. It involves finding meaning in ‘dis-ease’ in a spiral process of turning within, moving without, and ultimately finding freedom and release from trapped emotions, understanding that each one of us can choose to take responsibility when our bodies show us, through physical symptoms, that we’re out of balance. We’re all looking for a state of inner ease, to live our real passion and purpose as joyful human beings – to live from the heart, in peace, thriving in optimal health and wellbeing, spreading our light to those around us, inspiring all to a life of joy. Alchemical healing teaches that the inner search is less about the end result than the journey and inner healing process.

Sometimes we need to remind ourselves that our bodies’ natural inclination is to be healthy and well!

Part 1

CHAPTER 1

Setting the scene

Facing some facts before moving to positive solutions

STATISTICS

The International Diabetes Federation (IDF) estimates that there are currently 382 million people with diabetes worldwide, a number expected to increase to 592 million by 2035. An estimated 3.5 million people in South Africa have diabetes; about 50 per cent are undiagnosed. Most are between 40 and 59 years of age. Poorly managed diabetes can lead to serious complications and even premature death. Approximately 85–95 per cent of people with diabetes have type 2 diabetes, which usually begins in adulthood.

Type 2 diabetes is often referred to as a lifestyle disease, because risk factors include obesity, poor diet, high levels of unhealthy or negative stress and physical inactivity. People with a family history of type 2 diabetes are especially at risk: a genetic predisposition indicates weak links in the enzyme chains responsible for glucose metabolism and insulin manufacturing, secretion and functioning. Those over 40 years of age – especially if overweight, inactive and having a family history of diabetes – should have their fasting blood sugar levels checked once a year. A simple finger-prick test in any doctor’s office can do this.

COMPLICATIONS

Complications of diabetes include infections, cardiovascular disease (heart attacks, strokes and peripheral artery disease), chronic kidney disease, eye disease that can lead to blindness, and nerve damage. Nerve damage caused by diabetes can be a source of pain, tingling and loss of feeling. Injuries, therefore, often go unnoticed, leading to serious infections and ulceration, diabetic foot disease (gangrene) and major amputations. Other consequences of nerve damage include problems with digestion and urination, and erectile dysfunction (the inability to sustain an erection).

In nearly all high-income countries, diabetes is the leading cause of cardiovascular disease, blindness, kidney failure and lower-limb amputation. As the number of people with diabetes increases, so does the impact of these costly and devastating health challenges.

People with type 2 diabetes can remain undiagnosed for many years, unaware of the long-term damage that the disease is doing to their bodies.

Now for the good news!

People with diabetes can manage their blood sugar levels effectively and live normal, active, high-quality lives with few, if any, restrictions. There are many health-enhancing treatment and lifestyle options available. Maintaining blood glucose levels, blood pressure and cholesterol – or, rather, lipids (total, HDL and LDL cholesterol, triglycerides and homocysteine) close to normal can help to delay and even prevent complications from diabetes.

GLUCOSE IS THE FUEL FOR CELLULAR FUNCTION

Our bodies need fuel for the optimal physiological functioning of all biochemical reactions inside each of our 50 trillion cells. This primary fuel is glucose. For brain and body health, glucose levels have to be balanced within a narrow range. This is managed by the hormone insulin, as well as by glucagon, leptin, ghrelin, adiponectin and others (more about this in a later chapter). Insulin is made by the beta cells in the pancreas and released based on the levels of glucose in the blood. After a meal, insulin levels will rise so that glucose can enter cells to be used as fuel for energy to drive cellular function.

Diabetes is diagnosed when the pancreas does not secrete enough insulin or when insulin receptors on the cell membrane are less sensitive to insulin, starting as insulin resistance but with the potential of developing into full-blown diabetes.

WHAT IS DIABETES?

Diabetes is a genetically inherited, or lifestyle, disease caused by abnormal blood sugar (glucose) energy metabolism due to an insulin malfunction. Diabetes occurs when the body cannot produce enough insulin or is unable to use insulin effectively. The main function of insulin is to enable blood sugar to enter cells where it is used for energy. Therefore, when the effect of insulin is reduced or absent, blood glucose remains high. This is potentially damaging to body tissues over time.

Important factors that increase the risk for developing diabetes include being overweight or obese, having a poor diet, being physically inactive and having high stress levels. It used to be a disease almost exclusively associated with adults, but because younger people are often less active physically, while simultaneously overeating, the incidence of type 2 diabetes is increasing in children and adolescents. If someone else in the family has diabetes, the risk is even higher.

Like high blood pressure or hypertension, diabetes is often called a silent disease because people with type 2 diabetes are often unaware that they have it. This is one of the main reasons why regular health screenings are so important.

TYPES OF DIABETES

There are three types of diabetes: type 1 or juvenile-onset, type 2 or adult-onset, and gestational diabetes (often classified under type 2), which develops in the mother during pregnancy and can be transferred to her unborn baby. Gestational diabetes is increasing throughout the world. Women who develop a resistance to insulin and subsequent high blood glucose during pregnancy are diagnosed as having gestational diabetes. This tends to occur around the 24th week of pregnancy. Uncontrolled gestational diabetes can have serious consequences for both the mother and her baby.

Type 1 diabetes

Type 1 diabetes manifests during childhood or puberty, and sometimes in young adults (mostly before the age of 30). Fewer than 15 per cent of diabetics have type 1 diabetes. This is a more serious form than type 2 and requires regular insulin injections. It is caused mainly by an autoimmune defect: the body’s immune system attacks and destroys its own cells, those that manufacture the hormone insulin in the beta cells of the pancreas. Seventy-five per cent of insulin-dependent diabetics have antibodies against their pancreas cells. This results in too little insulin to clear the sugar from the blood into the fat and muscle cells.

Type 1 diabetics usually need to have insulin injections daily for the rest of their lives. They can, however, decrease their insulin needs by taking the correct food supplements, using specific herbal remedies and considering underlying trapped emotions that can be inherited, while making a few lifestyle changes, such as exercising regularly, practising relaxation techniques, and making better food choices. The aim for type 1 diabetics should be to keep their insulin requirements as low as possible and their bodies, especially their cardiovascular systems, as healthy as possible.

Lifestyle changes include healthy eating habits with unrefined, low-glycaemic-index, wholegrain, high-nutritional-value carbohydrates, high fibre intake, fresh vegetables and limited fruit (three a day), sufficient intake of proteins and healthy oils, no alcohol (alcohol increases blood sugar levels), the same supplementation as for type 2 diabetics, plenty of exercise, daily relaxation and stress management. High stress levels precipitate hypoglycaemic attacks and make it extremely difficult for type 1 diabetics to control their blood sugar levels.

The glycaemic index (GI) is a measure of the impact of carbohydrate-containing foods on blood sugar. Carbohydrates are ranked as very low, low, medium, or high in their GI value. Foods with a high GI (unrefined bread, pastries, sweets, white sugar) elevate blood sugar quickly, with a sudden rise in insulin levels to clear the glucose from the blood into the insulin-dependent cells, whereas foods with a low GI (whole wheat, stone-ground or rye bread, brown rice, oats, quinoa) ensure a more gradual release of glucose from the intestines into the bloodstream, with a slow secretion of insulin from the pancreas and a gradual clearing of glucose from the blood into the cells – which is much healthier and more balanced.

Type 2 diabetes

Type 2 diabetes (adult onset) usually starts in middle age or during pregnancy (in which case it is called gestational diabetes). It is the more common form of diabetes. With type 2 diabetes, the body does produce insulin, but the cells are unable to utilise it effectively because the insulin-dependent cells either lose their sensitivity to insulin or have too few insulin receptors. (More about this in a later chapter.)

Insulin-dependent cells – muscle, fat and most other tissue cells – require insulin for glucose uptake. Brain, pancreas, red blood, intestine, liver and kidney cells do not need insulin for glucose uptake.

A general cause of type 2 diabetes is being overweight or obese and too little exercise. Losing just a few kilograms and doing moderate exercise, such as walking for half an hour four times a week, will improve the condition. Type 2 diabetes is inclined to occur in families.

Diabetes and its complications is the third-most common cause of death. Diabetes can also cause or aggravate cardiovascular disease. Cardiovascular disease is the main cause of death. Diabetes, like high blood pressure, is often a dormant disease that can cause advanced damage before it is diagnosed.

Most type 2 diabetics can control their blood sugar levels by losing weight (fat weight); following a diet based on protein, healthy oils, nuts, seeds and carefully selected unrefined (complex) carbohydrates and fibre; using food supplements; and exercising regularly. People who have a family history of diabetes or whose blood sugar levels are in the high–normal range can prevent the disease in the same way.

Alzheimer’s disease as type 3 diabetes

Studies carried out at the Alpert Medical School at Brown University identified the possibility of a new form of diabetes after finding that insulin is produced by the brain as well as the pancreas. Researchers identified resistance to insulin and insulin-like growth factor as being a key in the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.

Whereas increased blood sugar (hyperglycaemia) is typical of type 1 and type 2 diabetes, another study – carried out by the University of Pennsylvania and published in 2012, which excluded people with pre-existing diabetes – indicated that Alzheimer’s can develop without the presence of significantly high blood sugar in the brain.

Some researchers have begun to call Alzheimer’s disease type 3 diabetes. In type 1 diabetes, the pancreas does not make enough insulin. In type 2 diabetes, the body’s cell receptors do not respond to insulin efficiently. This affects the functioning of the whole body. In Alzheimer’s disease, it appears that a similar problem occurs, but instead of affecting the body, it affects the brain itself. Researchers found evidence of this in post mortem brain studies. They noted that the brains of those with Alzheimer’s disease who did not have type 1 or type 2 diabetes showed many of the same abnormalities of those with diabetes, including reduced levels of insulin. Researchers concluded that Alzheimer’s is a brain-specific type of diabetes, subsequently termed type 3 diabetes.

If a diabetic person’s blood sugar becomes too high or too low, the body sends distress signals to the brain. Symptoms and signs of the problem might be manifested as behaviour changes, confusion, seizures, or, as in Alzheimer’s disease, a gradual decline in the brain’s function and structure. When a group of researchers reviewed the collections of studies available on Alzheimer’s disease and brain function, they noted that a common finding in Alzheimer’s disease was the deterioration of the brain’s ability to use and metabolise glucose. They compared the decline with cognitive ability, noting that the decline in glucose processing overlapped, or even preceded, the cognitive decline. They also found that as insulin functioning in the brain worsens, not only does the brain’s cognitive ability decline, the size and structure of the brain also deteriorates – all things that occur as Alzheimer’s disease progresses.

Research is ongoing about whether type 2 diabetes can cause Alzheimer’s. One study suggests that diabetes may likely exacerbate and contribute to the development of Alzheimer’s disease, but is probably not its sole cause. Studies show that approximately 50 per cent of people with type 2 diabetes will develop Alzheimer’s disease.

LOW BLOOD SUGAR

Young girls and women with low blood sugar (hypoglycaemia) should be aware of the possibility of developing diabetes later in life. The fact that their blood sugar level drops too low, is an indication of over-secretion of insulin by the pancreas and/or over-sensitivity of insulin receptors on the cell membranes. This causes cells to absorb glucose too rapidly; the blood glucose level drops very low, resulting in a decreased supply of glucose to the brain and insulin-dependent cells. This is already an abnormal glucose metabolism.

Another general problem with low blood sugar is referred to as ‘dumping’ of blood sugar levels. When you become too hungry because of irregular eating habits and eating the wrong foods, your blood sugar level drops very low. You feel nauseous, low in energy and even hungrier. So, you eat a large slab of chocolate – and your blood sugar level shoots sky high. The pancreas goes into top gear and secretes an oversupply of insulin. Your body cells clear the glucose too quickly, causing your blood sugar level to drop even lower (see the spiky line in the figure). You feel ill, listless, irritable and depressed. If you do this frequently, you will feel constantly tired and even depressed, nauseous and dizzy. The see-saw life of unbalanced blood sugar levels is very unhealthy. A few years of fluctuating glucose levels can also lead to type 2 diabetes, whereas healthy eating habits, with gently rising and falling glucose levels throughout the day (see the wavy line in the figure), will prevent this from happening, allowing your body cells to use glucose for fuel in a balanced way.

An example to