[00:00:00] You are listening to episode number 269 of Better Blood Sugars with Delane, Md. Welcome to Better Blood Sugars with Delanemd, where you can learn strategies to lower your blood sugars and improve your overall health. I'm your host, Doctor Delane Vaughn. Ladies, if you know you're capable of doing badass things at work and for your family, but you're confused and frustrated with why you can't seem to stop eating the chocolate cake, this podcast is for you. Let's talk. Hey there, and welcome to the podcast. I'm glad you're taking some time for you and for your health today and for the things that are important to you. I am honored that you're choosing to spend some of that time with me. So today we are going to talk about why we do this work. I will tell you that I'm having to listen to it, to the podcast live because my mic is acting up. I've recorded this podcast, actually, once before yesterday, and I nailed it, man. It was a spot on, but the mic cut out, so it's not. I'm having to listen as I record it, which is very distracting to me. So I apologize if I seem like there's something else going on, because there is. I'm listening to the podcast, so today I want to talk about why we actually look to fix our diabetes. Like, what is it that drives women to want to fix their diabetes? A lot of times it says, I want better. You know, women will tell me they want better labs. They want off their meds, they want to live health, healthy. And that's great. That's. That is, on some level, the answer. But what is the diabetes? What is your diagnosis of diabetes actually costing you? This week? I had an amazing coaching session with a client, and she was trying to deconstruct a thought she was having.
[00:01:45] This was a thought she'd had for years. She reported to me, she's like, I've been thinking this for probably the last two decades, and it has kept her stuck and sicken. And so that thought that she was having, that she was bringing to me was, we're going to die. I'm going to die anyway. Why not just die happy with the cake in my hand?
[00:02:04] And so we had a great coaching session breaking down this thought. And at the bottom, at the heart of this thought was, at the heart of it is, why are we doing this work? Why do I want to get healthier? And again, at first glance, it seems like we want a normal, a one c, or we want our biology to be functioning normal. We want our insulin resistance normal, or we want to not need medications, or we want to not be sick, or we want to not have to hear from our doctor that we're not doing enough and we need to do more. We need more meds, we need to eat differently, we need to do more exercise. We want to not feel that way when we're having that conversation with the doctor.
[00:02:45] Most women will report this is the reason that they want to fix their diabetes. And again, on some level it is, but it's kind of a superficial level.
[00:02:56] If we look at the deeper issue and think about what's deeper within that diagnosis of diabetes, most women find it's that they feel really like their diabetes, and their thoughts about their diabetes really creates a despair in them that they don't love. So how do you feel when you think about your a one c and your insulin resistance and your daily medication regiment? You know, how do you feel when you think about what the meds or the long term consequences of being diabetic means?
[00:03:32] Women tell me that the worst part of this is shame. From the belief that I've gotten myself here, I did this to me. And then, of course, that spirals into poor self discipline, and they have horrible thoughts about their lack of willpower and how they're out of control or some other horrible story about being broken in some way.
[00:03:54] So I want you to think about it right now. When your a one c, when you think of your a one c number, whatever that was at your last doctor's visit, how do you feel?
[00:04:03] Most women start to at least feel some amount of worry that something bad is going to happen. They feel guilty because they should have known better. They feel out of control.
[00:04:14] When they see labs that says, you know, that shows evidence of insulin resistance. How do you feel from that? Most women are feeling uncertain. They feel confused when they get a prescription from their doctor. When you get a prescription, when your doctor says you need out of med, how do you feel? Most women are frustrated. They're exacerbated. They're like at their wits end. I don't know what else to do.
[00:04:37] When they hear from their doctor that they need to do more. You need to eat differently. You need to exercise. Why aren't you doing this? I've told you, we've talked about this. What's going on?
[00:04:47] An amount of embarrassment and shame that most women talk about.
[00:04:52] Then women like, look at family members. They think of their grandmother, their great grandmother, their aunt, their parents friend who had to start dialysis or have a foot amputated because their diabetes. And then they get this debilitating fear and shame. It's a fear that stops them in their tracks. And it's shame that's so heavy that keeps them from moving.
[00:05:15] So when you think about your diabetes and you think about what is my diabetes, what are these feelings that I have about diabetes costing me?
[00:05:27] I want you to think about when you're feeling these feelings. Are you living your best life? Are you doing all of the things that are really important to you? Are you interacting with your loved ones and making memories in a way that you want to be? When most women are feeling guilty or out of control or uncertain or confused or frustrated or exacerbated or embarrassed or shameful, when they're feeling debilitated with fear, are they even making the best health decisions?
[00:06:01] Are they living the life that they want to be living? The women who come to work with me realize the answer to this is, no, I'm not. I'm not doing the amazing things that I want to be doing. I'm not living my best life when I'm feeling this way.
[00:06:15] They want more from life. So fixing your diabetes and learning to manage desire for food and food cravings and learning what to eat and how to move your body is more than just an a one c, or a med regimen, or insulin resistance and cellular function, or a doctor's appointment.
[00:06:35] Fixing this means feeling in control, feeling certain, feeling clear, feeling confident, feeling proud, feeling at peace about your food and your health.
[00:06:47] When we continue to make concessions about our health for some tasty snack food that we've had a million times, it feels out of control.
[00:06:56] We feel embarrassed and shameful.
[00:07:00] Fixing our a one c is nice, but feeling proud about the work you're doing, about being the woman who can make decisions that lead to the things that are important to them, that feeling is priceless.
[00:07:14] Knowing you can trust yourself around any food and not eat it in a way that makes you sick, that is the important work.
[00:07:23] That's the important reason that we fix our diabetes. The woman I work with believe deep down on some level, and likely you do, too, that you do not want to be compelled by food to the point that you're so compelled by it that you're taking health risks. They are risking your health and your longevity just for a silly treat, a treat that you've had a million times.
[00:07:45] In fact, you've had it so many times that you've created disease in your body with diabetes.
[00:07:51] Women I work with, no life is too short for that.
[00:07:54] You know that you should be able to live your life healthy. And you know that the food that makes us sick is made for you to want more of it despite it making you sick, right? This is the thing. You don't need me to tell you to stop eating chocolate cake. You need to figure out why you're eating it even though it's making you sick. With diabetes. You believe that health will never come from a pillar of shot, and you need to figure this out.
[00:08:17] Deep down, you know that you want to learn how to not be sick with diabetes, and you want to learn how to live your life in that way.
[00:08:26] This is the conflict that we fix when we fix our diabetes. This is why women do this work. So I want to ask you, I want you to think about what you believe is keeping you from fixing your diabetes. What blocks you from that normal a one c. That normal a one c is a number that represents all of these other feelings, this feeling of in control, of pride, of peace. What is keeping you from normalizing your a one c? What keeps you making the same unhealthy decision that keeps your blood sugars high? What is it that you're doing that keeps making you make that unhealthy decision?
[00:09:05] Most women want to say it's their food environment. I hear a variety of different reasons, and I'm going to talk about just a handful of them. But most women have some element of their food environment. Food is everywhere, and they're not wrong. It's at work. It's in the gas station. It's on the tv and commercials. It's on the radio and commercials. Hell, I was at office depot the other day, and they had food in the checkout. As if you might be at risk of starving to death as you're buying a stapler. What is that even about?
[00:09:36] Food is everywhere. That's truth. I will give you that. Food is everywhere. But it's not the problem.
[00:09:42] Women will say that it's their busy schedule. And I get that, too, just like you. My kids have sports.
[00:09:49] My kids have school. They have school functions. I have multiple professional responsibilities. All of us do. Women do this. We have family events, and we have parents and aging loved ones. My 95 year old grandmother, I want to spend time with her. Her time here is growing short. I want to be with her. I want to see her. I want to talk to her. Right? Like, we all have these things within our schedule that keeps us moving and going. I have a social life. You probably do, too. I want to have good, tight friendships. My babies are growing. They're almost out of the house. And I'm not going to have any more kids at home. I want to have solid friendships so that I have other people, a life outside of my sweethearts, my babies, because someday they're going to have a life outside of me.
[00:10:39] I want adventures. I want all of these things. And my days are, you know, just like everybody else. My days are busy. I start at 04:00 a.m. and I run till eight or 09:00 p.m. every day.
[00:10:53] But that also, it's not the schedule that makes it hard.
[00:10:59] Women will tell me their families, this is what this is. The hard part is like, my family doesn't want to eat the way I need to eat. My husband doesn't like it. My spouse doesn't like it. My children don't like it. I go to family get togethers and we have these old family recipes, and there's comfort and nostalgia in that food. And my family, I'm not going to be able to bring a veggie tray, and my family's going to be excited about it. I got to bring that old recipe that my grandmother made.
[00:11:27] Of course, the ironic part is these are the recipes that likely created diabetes running in your family also. But women will say, my family makes it hard. You know, my family just doesn't like this food and it makes it really hard. But that's not why either.
[00:11:42] The other reason that I hear a lot is healthy food is expensive. Women will tell me that they're worried about, or if the food isn't expensive, they'll tell me, I can afford the organic stuff, you know, but I can't get everything organic, and then there's chemicals in it. And if I got to get the veggies that are more expensive, but there's chemicals on them, I don't want to do that. Or I buy all this fresh food and then I don't eat it and it goes bad. It's a waste of money. There's an expense associated with it, or there's something about the healthy food that they're like, oh, that's just, I can't do that.
[00:12:15] So I want to tell you that all of these things are not the cause of your diabetes. This is not the cause of the issue at hand.
[00:12:22] They are not the true reason that you're eating the foods that are making you sick. The reason that you eat the foods that make you sick with type two diabetes is because your brain wants these foods.
[00:12:33] When you eat these foods, when you eat oreos or when you eat potato chips or pasta or bread or cinnamon rolls or cookies or any of those foods. When you eat those foods, you get a large dopamine surge into your brain. And the thing about dopamine, I mean, and this is just the way it is. The foods that are causing type two diabetes cause a large surge of dopamine into your brain. And I always have to remind women, if you're eating it, you know, it's not the one bite of a cookie that's an issue. It's when you're eating so much of this food that you have created insulin resistance, a disease state in your body. That's where it's an issue. The reason that we do this is because these foods create a large surge of dopamine into your brain. And that large surge of dopamine then motivates you heavily to repeat that behavior. Dopamine, people will talk about it being a hormone, a feel good, a neurotransmitter of feeling good. And it is that true you will have a feel goodedness with it. But more than that, dopamine is a neurotransmitter of motivation. What it does more than it makes you feel good is it motivates you. And the more exaggerated your dopamine response is, the more motivated you are to repeat that behavior. Your brain is strongly motivated to repeat eating these foods that create a strong dopamine surge in your brain. And when you try to keep your brain from doing something that it's heavily motivated to do, it develops these very creative rationalizations to get what it's motivated to look for. And that's where these stories come up from, right? That's where it's too expensive. That's where my family doesn't like this food. That's where I'm got too much on my plate. There's, you know, too many things going on, too busy in my schedule. And that's where food is everywhere. And it's the fact that we live in this food environment that makes us sick. That is where your brain starts to rationalize, get very creative with these rationalizations.
[00:14:43] Food manufacturers know this dopamine business. They know about this and they spend millions of dollars in research and development each year to exploit it. They create foods that you want. They create foods that you specifically want. So you want lays over Pringles, you want Doritos over an off brand, you want Oreos over Hydrox. Hydrox I believe were the original Oreos and its a different brand. And Oreos have the reason you know about Oreos is because they made them better than Hydrox, and they did that by exploiting the way that your dopamine reacts to you eating the Oreo.
[00:15:21] Same thing with Coke and Pepsi. The reason coke and Pepsi are always at odds with each other is because they want you to want their products specifically more than anything else.
[00:15:35] Not only do you want their product specifically, but you always want more of it. You always want more of it. You just can't eat one. Once you pop, you can't stop. These taglines are there for a reason. They want you to keep eating these foods. The inability to stop eating these foods, these processed foods, is intentional. It's engineered. It is on purpose.
[00:15:59] If you're not sure, if you don't believe that this is the issue, you're like, no, seriously, it's my schedule. It's really busy. No, seriously, it's the food environment. It's really, like, out of control. No, seriously, my family is so picky about what they eat. If your brain's like, no, no, no, it's not about this processed food thing. It's all of these other things. I want you you to take a moment and look up the bliss point. The bliss point is defined. Like, that's something they, the food scientists talk about. It is the optimum concentration of sweetness, where your sensory pleasure is maximized so that you want more of it, and it dictates what you want to eat and drink. Food companies shoot to ensure that their products hit the bliss point spot on every time.
[00:16:43] Or you can look up more ish ness. Mor ezde more ish ness. It's the quality of a food that creates the human desire to eat more of it, no matter how much you've eaten.
[00:16:55] This, my friends, are why you are struggling to stop eating the food that's making you sick.
[00:17:01] Your brain's dopamine response and food manufacturers exploitation of this response is why you struggle. It's not the modern environment, it's not your busy schedule, it's not your sweet family, and it's not the expense of your food.
[00:17:14] It's that they are built, they are designed, they are engineered to make you want them. It's why. And think about this. If you're at a free food buffet, I just did this Friday, I had to go to an event at the university that I work for. I had to go there, and I didn't have to. I chose to go to it. But there was a morning brunch thing, and there were eggs and there were hash browns, and then I think there was sausage like links, and then there was bacon, and then there were waffles, and I think there were rolls, and then there were donut hole type things.
[00:17:47] Before all of that was fruit. There was a tray of fruit.
[00:17:52] When I went there, what was gone were the waffles and the donut holes, and the fruit was plentiful, and that was free food.
[00:18:00] This whole idea that it's about how expensive it is. No, it is not. How about about how expensive it is? It is about the fact that your brain will choose donut holes and waffles and rolls over fruit every day. And it's because of this neurochemistry that occurs in your brain. The food was free. It had nothing to do with a fee, had nothing to do with convenience, had nothing to do with a busy schedule. Families weren't even there. And again, this was a group of, like, 200 people, and that's the result that we got. The fruit was untouched, and all of the food that creates all of this dopamine in our brain was what was gone.
[00:18:42] This is the problem.
[00:18:44] This is at the heart. This is at the crux of why we're overeating this food.
[00:18:50] This food is the cause of your food desires, of your overeating. And in the end, because your food desires and your overeating is creating this disease in your body, it is truly the cause of your diabetes. This is what is blocking you from resolving your a one c and your blood sugar issues.
[00:19:08] This is the heart of it. So let's go back to my coaching call, right? Like, what is the skill that has to be uncovered to help you move beyond some of these thoughts and beliefs towards your health goal? Right? My client, her brain wanted the cake, and we used cake just as an example. It wasn't necessarily specifically cake, but her brain wanted this food that creates this dopamine surge. So much, much that created this clever rationalization that, like, hey, girl, we're going to die something someday anyway. You might as well die happy with the cake in your belly.
[00:19:45] How do you handle these thoughts her brain gave her? Why don't I just die happy with the cake?
[00:19:50] That thought drives confusion and then this feeling of permissiveness, like, yeah, I guess so. That makes sense. I guess I'll do that.
[00:20:03] Similar thoughts that we have are, I'll start tomorrow. Right? Again. It drives this permissiveness. One bite won't matter. That's another big one. These are three thoughts that I see very common with women.
[00:20:15] So when your brain is making a rationalization for the cake, how do you stop it? How do you change it? So let's take each of these thoughts one at a time.
[00:20:27] So when your brain offers you a thought in the form of a question, like, I gotta die something else, why not? Why stop this? Why not just die happy with the cake in my hand? When your brain offers you a thought in the form of the qu of a question, it does two things. It keeps you confused. And that confusion then is like, oh, I don't know what to do. I'll just do what I've always done, which is eat the cake. That's what's comfortable for your brain, even though it's making you sick. So when your brain offers you a thought in the form of a question, answer it, because that stops the confusion. Do not let it sit in your brain in the form, in the question form. An unanswered question will confuse a brain. And again, that confusion then you're just going to lead to what's familiar, and that's going to be eating the cake. So why not just eat the cake? We're going to die anyway. That's the thought in the brain. Answer, why not?
[00:21:21] When I asked my client to answer this question, she said, because I want to be in control of my food. She gave me three reasons. I want to be in control of my food, because I don't want to die the death of a diabetic, and because I believe that I am a healthy human, and this is not the healthy way.
[00:21:40] Suddenly, instead of confused, she had an answer, and she got clarity with that answer that gave her a direct way forward, like, oh, well, I'm going to die of something. Yeah, that's true. Why not have the cake? Because I want to be in control of the food. I don't want the food to control me because I know I'm going to die of something, but I don't want to be dying of diabetes, because I know I want to be healthy. And this is not the healthy choice. Answer the question. There's so much power in that.
[00:22:11] The other thoughts that women give me, I'm going to start tomorrow. This was mine. I struggled and struggled and struggled. I always joke about the most expensive cupcake in the world. My kids had had a birthday party, and there were special cupcakes that were, you know, purchased for their birthday party, and there was one in my fridge, and I had been considering a coaching program, but it was really expensive with a specific coach. It was really expensive, and I was torn with paying the money. Even though I had the money, I was torn with paying it. And this cupcake was beckoning to me, and, um, I knew at that point, I was like, girl, listen, if you're going to kick this, if you are going to get on top of your food cravings, you're going to have to invest the money that's necessary for it. If you want to put this behind you and be done with this, if that's important to you, you're going to have to invest this money. Because my brain was like, I'm going to eat that cupcake, and I'll start tomorrow.
[00:23:06] And so I joke that that was the most expensive cupcake ever. But that coaching program helped me move past this. What they showed me is that thought, I will start tomorrow is a thought error.
[00:23:18] A thought error or thoughts that produce results that are the exact opposite of the thought that you had, I will start tomorrow creates the result of you eating it. And then tomorrow, you're going to tell yourself the same thing. And here's how you know that. Because you have practiced complying with that thought. So when it shows up, what you have done a lot is agree with the thought and eat the food, and then tell yourself your start tomorrow.
[00:23:50] You have gotten very good at that. What you have not gotten good at is sitting with the desire for the food, for the cupcake, and not eating it. That's what you have not practiced. You've not done that at all. So why will you think that tomorrow you're going to be more qualified to not eat the food than you are today? Because you've just practiced eating the food, not getting better at not eating the food.
[00:24:13] Okay? That's the challenge to this. That's the thought error that's here. When I started seeing this as the thought error, that it was suddenly it diffused it. It was no longer compelling to believe it. And again, if you're like, no, but like, some days, maybe I'll start tomorrow. No, if it was true that you would start tomorrow, you'd start today. Because chances are really good you said the same thing yesterday or the day before, or the day before. Today is tomorrow.
[00:24:42] If you would start tomorrow, you'd be doing it today.
[00:24:46] Do not believe this thought error.
[00:24:49] One bite won't matter. That's another one. It's a thought error. And we've all said this, right? Like, one bite won't matter. So here's the deal, friends. If that were true, you wouldn't have to point it out. If it really wouldn't matter, you wouldn't have to be talking about it.
[00:25:04] Because one bite wouldn't matter if that were the truth. It really wouldn't matter. You wouldn't say it. One bite won't matter. Leads to another bite and another bite and another bite. And then because you had all that salty stuff, you need a little sweetness to go ahead and even it out. So you have a few bites of the sweet stuff, and then you kind of overdid it on the sweet stuff, and you need to have a little bit more of the salty stuff, and you have a couple bites of that.
[00:25:25] That's how one bite won't matter ends up. Most of us have proven that to ourselves a thousand times.
[00:25:32] One bite really doesn't matter. The lie, the thought error is that it's never just one bite. And again, if one bite didn't matter, you wouldn't have to talk about it. One bite just wouldn't matter. We wouldn't be talking about it. Instead, one bite leads to another to another to another, and then we lead to enough at night and eat all the things.
[00:25:52] So this is how we coach through these things. When we get thoughts like this that, like, this one's keeping me stuck, I keep believing it. We got to challenge it, because clearly, the story you're telling yourself, the thought that you're telling yourself, is not creating the results that you want. So let's challenge it. What else is true? Most women have to learn to see these thoughts as optional. It feels so real in the moment. I mean, one again, like, one bite really wouldn't matter, but the reason that you have to tell yourself that one bite won't matter is because one bite does matter for you, and we have to see that. We have to see that that's a thought, and it's optional.
[00:26:30] That's the only way you can get to a point where you can challenge them. And, of course, that's easier with somebody who can help show you what your brain is telling you.
[00:26:37] Women bring these things to me and feel like they're really real and true, and through coaching, they're able to see that these are optional thoughts and decide which thoughts they want to keep and which are better left alone. Like, I need to drop this. From my experience. It's not serving me. That's what I did with my client. And she's like, well, you know, I gotta die something anyway. I might as well die with the cake in my hand, right? Like, okay, we do have to die of something, but we might as well die with cake in our hand is, like, not a helpful thought to your experience, and it's optional. We don't need to think that. That's not the only truth. We challenged it once. You can let go of these thoughts, the thoughts that we believe are the source of our diabetes.
[00:27:19] It's the food environment, my busy life. My family doesn't like the food. Food's expensive. Once we can let go of those thoughts, the food becomes not the issue. This thought is what's keeping me stuck. You can gain some control. You can gain some peace. You can make consistent decisions, and you can create the health that you want. You can drop the frustration, the confusion, the worry, the guilt, the embarrassment. For the love of all that's holy, you can stop feeling shameful and like you're broken.
[00:27:51] Instead, you get confidence, you get control, you get pride, you get excitement, you get peace of mind. Ladies, hear me. This is why we fix our diabetes. This right here, this is why you invest resources, both time and money, to doing this work.
[00:28:08] That is the important thing. It's really not the a one c. I mean, the a one c is nice. And, you know, getting off your meds is nice. And all of those things create so many more experiences in your life. But life is too short to feel crappy because you're worried and shameful about your health all the time.
[00:28:29] So I do have help for you, right? Coaching, certainly. Like, there's always my long term coaching program, which is available anytime anybody's like, hell, yes. Let's go. I'm ready to put this behind me. But there is a shorter coaching program for the month of October, and it's directed at taming the chatter in your brain about food. It's really directed at this specifically. You can find out more
[email protected] forward slash tame.
[00:28:59] And again, this is really directed at dealing with this, this chatter in your brain, these stories, these thoughts that you tell yourself that you keep getting tied up with that leads to eating the foods that are making you sick because that, my friend, is at the heart of fixing your diabetes. We do this works, that we can have peace. So stop postponing the things that you need and start giving yourself the gift of this again, you can find out more about that specific program. It's four weeks. Delanemd.com forward slash chain.
[00:29:30] That is all I have for you this week. I will be back next week. But I do want to give you my warning about medications. If you have been medicated for your type two diabetes and you start making these dietary changes, please be very careful. You have been medicated for the way that you've eaten in the past. If you change the way you eat, you need to change your medications. And that means you need to call your primary care, the provider who wrote you the prescriptions, and you need to ask them, how can I share my blood sugar logs with you? And then they will tell you how they want you to share your blood sugar logs with them and how you can expect to hear medication changes from them. If you don't open this line of communication up, you can end up very sick, the kind of sick that looks like hospitalization and even death. And that is not why you're making these changes. So I heavily encourage you to call your primary care provider and have a discussion with them about making these changes. I also have an ask if you have been finding benefit from this podcast and these episodes. If you've started to see healthy changes in your numbers and start to find helpful tools, tools for creating the health that you want, please rate and review this podcast on your podcast player. The more ratings and reviews this podcast gets, the more the podcast players present it to others.
[00:30:44] Nine out of ten of Americans have insulin resistance and are on their way to type two diabetes. Everybody needs to hear that they don't need to be sick with diabetes for the rest of their life. That's what this podcast is dedicated to. The more times you rate and review it, the more people can hear that. So I have I ask that of you to help others out. So that's all I have for you. Keep making the decisions for your health, your vitality and your longevity, and I will talk with you next week. Bye.
