Why is the glycemic index (GI) important? Are you foggy-headed, irritable, unwilling to move, soft in appearance with food being the only thing you enjoy about life? If you feel at all like this at any interval, there's a chance it's resultant of impairment in your body's management of blood sugar; and understanding the GI along with other factors is key to your body regaining sound blood sugar management.
The GI, insulin score, and digestive characteristics of the food you eat are among the main factors impacting blood sugar. The GI of the food you eat determines how quickly sugar enters the blood. Your food's insulin score effects how quickly the blood sugar is cleared from the blood. Digestive characteristics of food impact both the glycemic index and insulin score.
Glycemic index
The GI is a number assigned to foods based on how quickly their sugar enters the blood after ingestion. The more quickly a food's sugar enters the blood, the higher the number assigned to it. Conversely, a slower release of sugar garners a lower score.
Rate of sugar release is important because it's often proportional to how quickly insulin will lower blood sugar; which, if too rapid, will leave you feeling sub-par and increase susceptibility to fat storage. So keep consumption of high glycemic carbs minimal.
Low glycemic foods include most protein sources as well as fibrous carbohydrates.
Insulin score
The insulin score is a number assigned to foods based on how much insulin is released after consumption. Foods with a high insulin score trigger high insulin levels while low score foods stimulate less insulin. High insulin release can result in hypoglycemia, leaving you feeling incredibly out of sorts.
So, like the GI, the insulin score is important because it affects how stable blood sugar will be. Furthermore, it's wise to choose food with a lower insulin score.
Without confounding you with charts, low insulin score foods are usually minimally processed and require digestive effort. While most high protein foods have low insulin scores, whey protien and white fish have relatively high scores. Carbohydrate sources that have a low insulin score include those that naturally have a high fiber content; metamusil with cupcakes won't cut it!
Digestive characteristics
The digestive characteristics of food is what I describe as how easily the food is eaten and digested. Such characteristics correlate strongly with the glycemic index and insulin score.
The more easily a food goes from plate to blood, the more it will spike glucose/insulin; therefore it will also increase the likelihood of lethargy and fat storage.
Foods that fall into the easily digested category include anything that contains processed/starchy/sugary carbohydrates and certain processed proteins. So, unless you want lethargy and fat storage, think twice before eating convenient food.
Parting words
The glycemic index and related characteristics of food are important to consider when making food choices. Such characteristics determine how you use and store the energy you ingest. If you recklessly eat crap your body will perform poor and store the excess energy as fat. Nourishing choices, however, will fuel and forge a stealth body!