Do You Get Enough Fibre?

When it comes to diet one thing that many peoples diets lack is fibre. This is a shame as fibre is very important, especially when it comes to controlling insulin levels. If you don’t know what insulin is well it’s a fat storing hormone that is released when sugars from food enter the bloodstream. The way fibre helps to keep you insulin levels stable is because it slows down the digestion process, which means that loads of sugar doesn’t end up entering your bloodstream all in one go.

Many people think fibre is just fibre however there happens to be two different types of fibre. The two different types are insoluble and soluble and both types have very different but important health benefits to the human being.

You can find soluble fibre in foods such as seeds, oat bran, seeds, legumes, vegetables, fruits and rye. Soluble fibre has many different powers in the body and can hold moisture in poo, slow glucose absorption, slow digestion and also lower blood cholesterol levels.

When it comes to insoluble fibre it has the important job of helping to keep your digestive system working properly and it also helps to reduce the risk of you getting colon cancer. You will find insoluble fibre in foods such as fruits, wheat bran, seeds, legumes, whole grains and vegetables.

Not many people know this but unlike other foods, your body can’t digest fibre. Instead what happens is the fibre you eat just passes straight through you. Be sure to remember that you can’t acquire fibre from meat or dairy items. It can only be gotten from vegetables and similar types of food so make sure to eat plenty of them every day.

One drink that is very popular is fruit juice. Do you happen to drink it? Well, if you do then you shouldn’t. The reason you shouldn’t drink fruit juice is simply because it is high in calories and sugar, both which make you fat. It also happens to lack the important vitamins, nutrients and fibre that whole fruit has. Stop drinking fruit juice then and drink water instead as it is much better for you.

In 2006 I went to a conference in New York and there was a number of leading health professionals speaking there. One professional was Dr Sam Baker and he conducted an experiment right there and then using members of the audience in order to show us how food affects blood sugar levels. To do the experiment he got 20 volunteers and split them up into three groups. All three groups were given a 230-calorie breakfast composing of different food items.

The first group was given half a bagel and a small glass of orange juice. The second group was also given a glass of orange juice but had a cereal bar instead of half of a bagel. The last group was given no solid food; instead they were given a shake containing a balanced amount of all three macronutrients and high in fibre.

As for the results of the experiment well the first and second group before experienced a spike in insulin levels in a rather short time span. The third group experienced no such insulin spike. What this shows is that you need to be careful what you eat because if you eat the wrong foods you can easily spike insulin and cause an increase in fat.

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