Introduction --- I think a standard scale fails us because it says you weigh a certain amount, let's say 200 pounds, you weigh 200 pounds. 200 pounds of what? Hi, and welcome to the solving type two diabetes podcast. I'm Tom. And I'll be your host as I share what I'm doing in my daily life to solve my type two diabetes. Listen in, as I share the food, movement, and tools that I'm using each day. This podcast is intended for entertainment purposes only. For a full transcript or to follow the solving type two diabetes podcast on social media. Please head over to SolvingType2Diabetes.com for all those links and more now onto the show. My Week in Review --- So I certainly hope that you have had a great week and, here in, Orlando, Florida at Walt Disney World. We have had a very exciting week. there's been a lot going on this week from nature to, a little mouse, uh, Christmas party and a bunch more. But first I'd like to take a second to thank you very. The solving Type two diabetes podcast has now had over 500 downloads, and, I'm shocked, to tell you the truth. we've just started. This is episode, number 11. And, uh, we've already had over 500 downloads. if you are enjoying this podcast, please share it with, your friends. send 'em a link, tell 'em about it. especially if folks who have type two diabetes, my hope is that it is helpful to them. So now for my weekend review. The day after I recorded the last episode, I did the wine and dine half marathon, part of the wine and Dine half marathon weekend. The 5K was on Friday, the 10 K was on Saturday, and then Sunday morning, bright and early I got up and did the half marathon. And it was a very good, race, as usual put on by run Disney. run Disney always does an absolutely fabulous job, with characters and, photo opportunities and music. this was a, half marathon was themed on the movie soul, and so there was jazz music, the entire, time, which is absolutely fabulous. Now, with regards to my, blood sugar and my type two diabetes during this half marathon, I was a little hesitant. it's been several years since I've done a half marathon, and for this one, honestly, I mostly walked, Walt Disney World has a very, lenient pace policy. With their races, you have to maintain a 16 minute mile pace, for the distance of their, race. Now that's counted from the last person who starts the race. So the very last person to cross the start line is when they begin that 16 minute per mile pace requirement. So if you started before that person, you actually have more than 16 minutes per mile. And I started well before, perhaps a half an hour before, the last person because there's thousands and thousands of people doing this race. So they start you in waves. And I was near the beginning. So that gave me quite a bit of a buffer. My actual pace for the marathon, the half marathon was 16 minutes and 20 seconds per mile. So if I was the very last person, that would not have been fast enough, but I had that. So anyway, I was not burning through a ton of sugar in my system, during that half marathon. At that pace, that was a brisk walk. I ran small parts of it. but generally speaking it was a very brisk walk, that carried me through. And I checked my blood sugar readings, using my glucose monitor, several. during the race, and honestly, my blood sugar levels really did not vary at all throughout that time. Now, I think if I had been doing more intense exercise, if I had been running the entire 13.1 miles, then I'm guessing that my blood sugar would've dipped a bit. But since I truly was not burning a ton of sugar and probably was burning mostly, The, blood sugar readings did not, waiver hardly at all. Now, I had gone into that, race, in what you would call a fasted state. I had not eaten since about 6:00 PM the evening before the race started at five o'clock in the morning. And I did not consume any type of sugary drink or sugar product at all. In fact, I didn't eat anything at. Until lunch after the race and my honest with my blood sugar really did not dip anywhere near out of the normal range. that was interesting. I thought. So after the wine and di half marathon, we had a couple of days and then we had a little lady called Nicole Hurricane Nicole, came through Orlando, Florida. this week, and thankfully by the time it got here, it was a tropical storm When it hit the Florida coast, it was a category one hurricane. When it came through our area, 5, 6, 7 hours later. It was a tropical storm, but it was a very large, wide tropical storm. And we were experiencing, very heavy winds and very intense rain for. 48 hours, almost two full days. And we had winds, that got up to maybe the high fifties gusts to 60, something like that. And I think we got six inches of rain over 48 hours. So it was quite intensive storm. We had a lot of branches and things like that down here around the resort that I could see. But the effect was that everything was shut down for two days. At the resort. The parks themselves were closed for about a day and a half. but the resort functions, the gym, the restaurants, things like that, they were all shut down. And, we were pretty much stuck inside of our room Now. It's very nice. It's not even a room, it's a villa. They call it, it's a separate bedroom, very large. Two room, bath, living area, kitchen, all that. So it was very nice accommodations. we never lost power, so that was great. I think around here, most of the power lines are underground and I think they have generators if they need it, but it did keep me inside. Now it's true. I could have done. calisthenics or burpees or sit-ups or pushups here in the room to get exercise and movement, and I honestly did not. I was just hanging out, hunkered down during that time. when we get to my numbers, you'll see the effect of that. The storm did pass thankfully, and Thursday evening we were able to go to Mickey's very merry Christmas party at Magic. Here at Walt Disney World, and that's a nighttime ticketed event. And we went there and they had a fabulous parade, really, really, nice, fireworks, mostly as you can imagine, green and red, but a lot of, fancy fireworks. And they do this, projection overlay thing on the castle. That is really neat. It makes the castle change colors and they do little animated, projections onto the castle and it's really fancy and we got to ride some of our favorite rides for my wife that is, the Poo Bear ride, with Tigger and also Peter Pan and Small World. For me it's Haunted Mansion and the People Mover and also Pirates of the Caribbean. I think those are a few of my favorites. So we did all that. My wife was able to collect a bunch of Christmas cookies at these little parties. They hand out, if it's Halloween, they hand out candy. If it's Christmas, they hand out cookies and hot cocoa. And I think she collected a total of 27 Christmas cookies. she'll be snacking on those over a while. Now, I did not, partake in any of those sweet treats at the Christmas party. each one of those cookies, I check the. Because they're all individually wrapped and each one of those cookies has 17 grams of added sugar. and it's just not, it's just not worth it. I don't have, much of any added sugar, throughout the day. I try to avoid added sugar. I'm sure 3, 4, 5 grams will slip in there during the day, but as you I'm trying to keep my carbohydrates low, so I didn't have that, but I'm sure she's going to enjoy it. And then, So that was Thursday night and then yesterday Friday I was able to get back outside. I did a nice long walk outside, four and a half miles. I was so happy. I actually posted about it, on my YouTube short, my Instagram reel, and I hope you get a chance to check that out if you didn't know. I do, post a lot on social. Usually little tidbits. And I'm on Instagram and Twitter and TikTok. Facebook. We actually, have a private community on Facebook, a group, all those links are on the website, so if you're interested in any of that social media, just head over to the website solving type two diabetes.com and you'll find all the social media links there. My Numbers --- Okay, let's take a look at my numbers for this week. Now, I did not close my rings for two days, and I'm gonna blame that on little Miss Nicole. the hurricane kept us indoors, so I did not close the rings for those two days, but when I was outside, I did do a lot of walking. And of course when we were at the Christmas party, that was six hours of mostly walking, and I got in several intentional walks this week. So I was really enjoying that in this Florida weather. It got into the low eighties every single day and it was just great. Now, my seven day glucose was a little high. And honestly, I crept into the pre-diabetes range, for the first time in a long time. I think since we started this podcast, this might be the first week I've crept into the pre-diabetes range, the very low end of it. my average glucose was 1 29 for this week, and as my preferred place is between one 15 and one. But still, this did creep into the pre-diabetes range. It equals an A1C of 5.8 and pre-diabetes starts at 5.7. So it's not a place where I wanna stay and I am again, able to move more. No hurricane staying in my way, and we're not gonna be at Walt Disney World, after today. In fact, we're gonna leave, start driving North. As soon as I'm finished recording this podcast. I'm recording this on Saturday morning and you will hear it hopefully, Monday morning. we're leaving Walt Disney World and I think, not to blame the mouse, it's my choices, but that's gonna help my blood sugar just a little bit. my body fat percentage is two weeks old. I did not bring my smart scale with me, so I still have the same reading to report of 27.2. But on Monday morning, we will be home for me to step on that scale. Actually, we're gonna get home Sunday in the late afternoon, but I'll step on the scale for the first time Monday morning with my macros. my carbs have just a little bit. I this week have been attacking a jar of peanut butter and, my protein is a little bit low too. Now. We had some grocery shopping, but. here at Walt Disney World, I am not eating exactly the way that I would say if I were at home. it is a little difficult sometimes when you're traveling, but hey, no excuses. no. Great damage is being done and, we'll be able to straighten this right up next week. I hope to report better numbers and macros a little bit better in line. Chsllenges &Wins --- So my challenge this week, yes it has been. What was her name again? Nicole. Hurricane Nicole. And, she did keep us indoors for a couple days, we did not fare too poorly at all. Sure we had to stay indoors and there was some, branches down and the resort looks a little sloppy, but they'll get that cleaned up. I feel bad for the people nearby the coast. evidently they had, tremendous flooding and beach erosion, and unfortunately they're reporting now that, five people have lost their lives due to hurricane Nicole. And I understand that she's causing a lot of havoc as she's going. Along the coast as well. thoughts go out to all those folks and, in the end, it did not impact us too poorly. News --- Let's take a look at the news. This first article is entitled Can Type two Diabetes Go Into Remission? They're saying that remission occurs when blood glucose levels remain below the range that defines diabetes. However, remission does not mean a cure. They go on to say that someone with type two diabetes that's in remission can return to a state of type two diabetes, especially if weight is regained or unhealthy lifestyle habits return. That's good news that just because you have a diagnosis of type two diabetes, that doesn't mean that your symptoms and the, long-term effects have to continue to get, worse and worse, which often happens with type two diabetes. And there's things you can do, They say here in this article to put that all into remission. and they say that remission is a more appropriate term when you return to a normal blood CLOs levels because cure is not used because the thing that caused you to have type two diabetes, the inability to properly utilize insulin or produced the proper amounts of insulin can still be there. So you can get rid of the symptoms. Through lifestyle changes in many cases, but that doesn't mean that you don't still actually have type two diabetes because they're stressing in this article that if you go back to doing the things or living the way that caused you to have those symptoms to get that diagnosis, you're gonna have it again. So it's important to realize that it really doesn't go away. It just is. Active is just as not, causing you to have these bad side effects. So what do they recommend, for keeping yourself in remission? They say here that diet is key. They say that having a variety of vegetables and lean protein, low fat dairy now, I don't personally go with that. I personally think the high fat dairy is better. But anyway, that's just me and I certainly can't tell you what to do. I'm not a nutritionist, but what they say here is to certainly limit the amount of highly processed foods and added sugar in your diet because those are the types of things that typically lead someone to a diagnosis of type two diabetes. So they say you might wanna try using the plate method, and that simply is getting a, let's say a nine inch plate, and think of it as a clock. The face of a clock, if you still remember the old clocks that have hands, but half your plate, say from 12 o'clock to six o'clock, half your plate, fill it up with non-starchy vegetables such as leafy greens or broccoli or carrots or peppers, or summer squash, anything like that. That's half your. And then a fourth of your plate can be protein. It could be meat, fish, or if you prefer beans or lentils. So something with a high protein, and if it's vegetables based, make sure it has high fiber as well. And then the remaining fourth, that's where your, complex carbs can go. something like whole grains. things that aren't. heavily processed, maybe not bread, maybe rice or brown rice or, things like that. quinoa or some potatoes I guess. But having that only be a one fourth of your plate and then certainly avoid. the sugary drinks. The sweetened drinks, things like that. They also say, keep up your physical activity. they say a common recommendation is to get at least 150 minutes of moderate intense physical activity. So that could be, a nice brisk walk, whatever brisk walk is for you or step it. Maybe running or swimming or dancing or biking, playing a sport, doing some pretty intense housework or yard work. But, that's 30 minutes, five times a week or 25 minutes every day. at least 150 a week. They're saying in this article is, important. They say, feel free to add in strength training two or three times a week, and you don't need gear for that. You can use your body. a certain amount. And if you move that against gravity, you're gonna be doing weight training. So squats or pushups or sit-ups, burpees, that's a great one. trust me, that'll get your heart rate up and it'll turn it into an aerobic activity as well as a strength training activity real fast. So they say by doing this, you have a greater, chance of staying in remission. So that's a very good article. The next article here is entitled, Making a Type two Diabetes Exercise Plan. Now, we've just discussed, in fact, we often discuss how movement and exercise can, help to regulate your blood sugar. And because, let's face it, when you move your muscles, that's when they use blood sugar. So the blood sugar is encouraged to go into your muscles, and that's one of the jobs of insulin. But they're saying here that if you have a routine, you're more likely to stick to your exercise program. So the first thing they say here is plan a time. Figure out in your schedule when you can get 30 minutes. And I know for me, All I had to do was give up 30 minutes of tv. I'm a big TV guy and maybe sitting and watching hours of TV is something that, helped give me type two diabetes. I can't say that factually, but that might be true. So giving up 30 minutes of TV a day. To get in a good walk. Now, when I walk, I tend to walk for an hour. I enjoy walking. I love it, and I get my heart rate up a little bit. And, for me it's absolutely fabulous. I feel good, mentally and physically after a nice walk. And if I get three miles, I'm pretty happy. But if I get four or sometimes five, I just love it. it's great for me. So plan a time where you could find. Time in your daily routine to get in your exercise. The other thing is they're suggesting that during their exercise, you monitor your blood sugar, especially if you're taking medications. Certainly, especially if you are taking insulin as part of your doctor. Prescribed plan, for managing your type two diabetes, so be wary of extreme fatigue, lightheadedness, dizziness, shaking this, difficulty concentrating, anything that might indicate that your blood sugar is going too low now. Things like walking, that'll generally speaking not cause those effects unless you're taking, fairly strong medications that, are meant to reduce your blood sugar because the combination of those two exercise you're not used to, if it's overly strenuous, if it's for a long period of time. Or maybe you didn't eat. and then you take those medications, that can set you up for problems. So make sure you monitor that blood sugar, especially when you're starting out. And please consult your doctor and maybe get a good idea of how you should handle exercise. And if you're in that case, you might wanna have some carbs on hand. some folks who are taking insulin keep a little bit of, glucose with them, either in the form of a tablet. Or a small bottle of maybe some juice or something like that. But you know how to manage that if you're taking insulin. I'm sure you are much more knowledgeable about that than I am. Of course, for everyone. They recommend starting out slowly. And that's what I say too. I said, get outside, put the shoes on. don't set a goal right away. Just see where your feet take you. If it's, a hundred yards away from your door, you turn. Hey, so be it. That again is better than sitting on the couch. find the right activity for you that you're actually gonna do. So something that'll motivate you, something that you enjoy for me. I think, it's walking. for others it could be, running or swimming or dancing. you might like CrossFit. I love CrossFit. it's fabulous. I feel challenged, and yet I feel like I'm getting a whole lot out of it when I'm able to do that. obviously they're saying drink water and things like that, and it's a very good article on exercise and getting a plan and getting consistent, and I think you might find that a good read. And finally, this last article, it's entitled 13 Foods That Help with Diabetes From Raspberries and Blueberries to Tuna and brussels sprouts your blood sugar will. Thank you. What they're saying here is that there's some foods that help and there's some foods that don't. So she lists out 13, even though we're gonna find out later on, she actually repeats them. So lemme just go quickly through this here. You can read the whole article and the wheres and the what fours of why each one is recommended. But it's things like sweet potatoes and black beans, mostly for fiber and antioxidants, so that's great. Obviously, green leafy vegetables and tons of fiber. They have very few digestible carbohydrates and they don't really affect your blood sugar levels at all. Things like brussel sprouts. And then, the berri. The raspberries, the blackberries, the blueberries, they're very high in fiber and they really don't impact, if you're eating a serving, they really don't impact your blood sugar at all. now if you eat a quart or a bucket of them or whatever, then yes, obviously they're gonna impact your sugar levels in your blood. But, them by themselves in a, Half cup serving, they're really not gonna hurt you at all. At least that's what I find in my personal experience. Your experience obviously can be different. She recommends extra virgins olive oil, simply for its anti-inflammatory effects because, one of the issues with type two diabetes is inflammation. So she says that if you stick a little bit of fruit in your water or your sparkling water, she says fruit infused. Be careful the sugar in there. she says that'll help you drink more water. Things like tuna and salmon are fabulous. Obviously they have no carbohydrates, no animal product. no meat, has carbohydrates. milk does, heavy cream does not. It's the lactose in milk that has the carbohydrates. So I, for dairy, I choose, heavy cream in my. And I gotta watch the quantity because it is, it's, lots and lots of fat, but it, it really helps me. She recommends things like walnuts, pistachios, almonds, things like that. And, as being good for you and, other, high fiber sources like chickpeas and chickpeas have a lot of protein as well. So this is a great article. 13 examples I would think of foods that she finds, to be helpful for managing type two diabetes. There's obviously many more foods than 13. I think, the eating. Guidelines that I like to stick to. I can't take credit for it. It comes from CrossFit. Coach Glassman is the person who coined this, but it's meat and veg, Nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch, but no added sugar, and that is what I try to stick to, and I find that is very helpful. He wrote that for CrossFit athletes, but for me, it really helps in managing my type two diabetes as. So those are the three news articles, and you will find, of course, those links over in the show notes. And, if you don't know how to get to those, simply go to solving type two diabetes.com. And every episode has show notes, and every episode also has a full transcript where you can actually go back and read If you want to go back and check out, certain sections after you've listened to the podcast. You don't have to worry about it. It's always there for you SolvingType2Diabetes.com Why I don't care about losing weight --- All right, so let's get to the main topic this week. The main topic is not Hurricane Nicole, and the main topic is not the wine and dying half marathon. The main topic is why I don't care about losing weight. Now that might sound strange. Why? Why Tom? Don't you care about losing weight? Doesn't everyone care about losing weight? . I think a scale fails us when we talk about weighing ourselves or weighing in at the doctor's office or getting on that scale in the morning. I think a standard scale fails us because it says you weigh a certain amount, let's say 200 pounds, you weigh 200 pounds. 200 pounds of what? See, this is what I don't get. You weigh 200 pounds. I actually had a doctor tell me, Tom, you need to lose weight. I said, what do you mean I need to lose weight? What is weight? Weight is a measurement. Weight isn't something that your body has. It's a measurement of your body, but it doesn't say what's healthy, what's helpful, and what's not. For example, if I, between doctor visits would gain three or four pounds of. And let's say I did not lose anything else and I gained three or four pounds of muscle, over the course of six months, my scale would go up, the reading would go up and the doctor would say, Tom, you've gained weight. yes, but I've gained something that's incredibly helpful. What I think the doctor is really saying is, Tom, you need to lose fat, which is true. Your body only needs a certain amount of. We'll get into this a little bit later in a minute here, but there's amounts of fat that your body needs to be healthy and live. things that, I didn't know before, but I've learned that your nerves are actually coated in fat and it's like an insulator, like your wiring in your house, your plug for your hair dryer or whatever. Those wires aren't exposed, they're covered in plastic, to keep you from getting shocked. the same thing with your nerves. Your nerves in your body are actually covered in fat to insulate them. So the signals just go where they're supposed to in your nervous system and not are just dissipated throughout your body randomly. So you do need a certain amount of fat. The trick is, It's to limiting your fat to only what you need, because otherwise, think about it, you're just carrying around excess energy. Now, I don't know about you, if you think about your car, if you had a 200 gallon gas tank in your car, that would weigh about 1200 pounds. Because gas is, Yeah, it's a little bit over six pounds a gallon, so do some simple math, and that's about 1200 pounds. Now you're gonna burn gas, carrying around 200 gallons of gas. It'd be much more efficient. To do what most cars do and have about, I don't know, 10, 20, 25 gallon gas tank, and that's enough for several hours of driving and, filling up after driving four or 500 miles. It's not too much of a burden. That's what our body is actually most healthy doing. Have enough fat get you through any possible physical need that you might have, but then that's enough. There's no sense carrying around this extra gas. fat is energy, so there's no sense carrying around this extra. That you can't possibly need or use in even the most intense activity. if you're 10 pounds overweight, just 10 pounds of excess fat, that's 35,000 calories about, and it would take you weeks. weeks to burn that off and not taking in anything else. So you just don't need that. So that's what I'm trying to say is that while I understand it's important to not have excess fat, just stepping on a scale and measuring your weight is not telling you the whole story. So that's why I don't care about those standard weight measurements. to me, I don't know. I almost think they should get rid of those things. But what I do measure. Is the body fat. Now I have a scale, and it's not an expensive scale. I don't know, it was 40 maybe nowadays it's 50 bucks, but I've had it for years and it uses just a small amount of electricity to measure the body fat percentage because, just like, anything, fat in your body has a certain amount of resistance that's known. it's measurable and so does bone and water and muscle, things like that. So these scales, Know how much you weigh overall, and then you enter in on the scale. I only had to do this once, but you enter in your, date of birth, you enter in your, So I can calculate your age. You enter in your gender, you enter in your height, and then of course it knows your weight. And then through all that, When it calculates that resistance of sending that small little tiny trickle, through your body that you don't even feel, it can calculate basically what your body fat percentage is. Now, body fat percentage is just a little bit of math. It's saying of the total amount that you weigh, what percentage or how much is. So for me right now I weigh about 218 pounds and my body fat percentage, the last time I stepped on the scale was 27.2. So 27% of that 218 pounds is from fat. So if I were to do quick math, I'm doing this in my head. I have about, I'm gonna. Is 50, right? Yeah. I have about 55 pounds of body fat on me. So how much? Is healthy. And I'm pulling up an article here from WebMD, and I'll put the link to this in the show notes as well. But it's saying that, typical body fat percentage is. For people age 20 to 39, they're saying women should aim for 21 to 32%. Men should have eight. To 19 and it goes up 40 to 59 words where I am. And they're saying women, 23% to 33% men, 11 to 21%. So at 27%, I'm higher than the recommended range for men. So 11 to 21%, that's a pretty big range for a person who's 200 pounds, that's 20 pounds of fat between the 11% and the 21%. I know this is a lot of math here. I hope I'm not losing you. The point is that by measuring your body fat percentage, you're more accurately describing your health condition because there is absolutely no medical reason to be carrying around fat above these ranges. It's just, I don't know, work. It's extra work on your joints. It's extra work on your heart. Everything has to work harder because it's living tissue. this, these fattest living tissue and. , it's contained inside cells just like everything else is contained. So it needs blood flow, it needs oxygen, everything else like that to store this ex excess fat. And so you're working everything harder. that's why I think I am trying to lose body fat. I have said that my goal, would be about 18% and I wanna see how that feels. I'm currently at 27%. And to get from 27% down to 18%, if you do that math, that's 9%, which is about 20 pounds of fat that I would have to burn off in order to get down to that body fat percentage goal. And that is my goal. So how do you know your body fat percentage now? There's a lot of ways to do it. using one of these smart scales like I have is just one way. There's also, a very old standard, a dunk tank, and that is where you go to either like a university hospital or a college or sports physiology place that might have one of these dunk tanks. There's commercial enterprises also, I'm sure, but basically they dunk you completely under. And then looking at the, amount of water that was displaced by your body being under the water. They can figure out the density of your body and similar to the scale they, Just figure out that, well, you're gonna have so much bones, so much muscle, things like that. Therefore, the remaining is fat and they can give you a body fat percentage. similar to that, instead of using water, which I've never done personally, but I have done the BOD Pod, and this is a small capsule that you sit inside, it's sealed and they use air. and it's very easy. You just sit there for about a minute and they use air pressure to determine the amount of volume that you are taking up sitting inside there, and therefore that'll give you your body density. And then just like the dunk tank, they'll do some math and figure out your body fat percentage by how. Your body is, they, they do measure your weight outside and then, they can use your density to determine how much of that is fat, because body fat is much less dense than bone or muscle. They also have what's called the pinch test. They use calibers, I call 'em little pinchers. They don't hurt, but they take a pinch from your back. They take it from under your arm, things like that. And they determine by the amount of skin and fat that they can grab with these pinchers and they can determine with. how much body fat you have, and then one that you can easily do at home yourself. And, there's absolutely nothing wrong with this method is waist measurement. Now this probably won't tell you your body fat percentage exactly, but by measuring your waist when your you're waste measurement goes up or down, it's almost always an increase or decrease in body fat. So waste measurement, just simply measuring around your waist. and then doing that maybe once a month, once every two months. You can certainly track whether your body fat percentage is going up, if your waist measurement goes up, or if it's going down when your waist measurement goes down. You might not know the exact number, but that's really not important. What's important is are your efforts being successful? If not, then maybe you need to change your effort. Questions --- So let's talk about your questions. We actually got a question in this week. Yay. We got a question from Cliff and he, first of all said that he was listening to the podcast, which I greatly appreciate, and I sent him a link and for some helpful information that he asked about, some of the apps and tools that I use. But a question that he had was, The impact of stress, and I did a short minute on this week and they'll find that on the social media, but he wanted to know, how does stress impact, What do I do for stress? And stress does impact your type two diabetes. They have shown that the hormone cortisol, which is often released, in times of stress, actually does hamper. Your cells and your pancreas that produce. . So one of the things, and there's other in interactions as well, but one of the things that the stress situation does is reduce the effectiveness of your pancreas to produce insulin. So there could be times that your body needs insulin to store some of this blood glucose. and because your cortisol levels are high, you're not really producing the amount of insulin that you need. So that's something that directly, shows that high stress or unmanaged stress can, in fact, Increase the risk or the, levels of blood sugar in your system because you're simply not able to produce the insulin, also a hormone that you are needing at that time. So thank you Cliff for that question. and if you would like to ask a question or if you would like to leave me some feedback on the podcast, there's a couple of ways. First thing you can do, and it's what Cliff did, is just simply send me an email directly, that my email address is Tom at solving type two diabetes.com. Tom at solving type two diabetes.com. Send me an email. Feel free to leave me feedback. Let me know what you think. Ask me a question. I'd be happy to do my best to answer it or at least point you towards some resources to help answer it. And also leave, feedback on the show. I'd greatly appreciate hearing that. The other way to do it is to use your web browser and hop on over to solving type two diabetes.com. And there's a feedback on there that you can click on and you can write anything you want. ask me a question, leave me show feedback. Anything would be greatly appreciated. . What's Next? --- Okay, so on the next episode I'm gonna talk about traveling with type two diabetes. As you can tell, if you've been listening, I do quite a bit of traveling and it does produce its own, challenges and some of its own opportunities as well. So I'm gonna be focusing on traveling. With type two diabetes and, I'm not always traveling, but I am traveling quite a bit. So I have been doing this and I do have some experience in that area. In fact, when I record next week's episode, we'll be out in San Diego, California, for a wedding, and that'll be a fun time. And we're gonna be out there for about a week. So I'll need to recorded episode out there. So the next time you hear from me, I'll be coming from San Diego, California. Thanks! --- Well, that wraps up another episode of the solving type two diabetes podcast. I hope you found it valuable. Please follow and leave a five star review, as it helps other people find the podcast. By subscribing you ensure you won't miss the next episode. You can always get a full transcript of the episode at SolvingType2Diabetes.com there you also find the links to leave feedback and links to follow on social media. I'm very interested in hearing from you with comments and suggestions. Thanks very much for listening. Please remember that everything I share is just from my own personal experience and should not be taken as medical or health advice. Please consult your own medical professionals. This podcast is intended for entertainment purposes only.