CHEW YOUR FOOD! Grandma’s advice can make a difference in controlling your diabetes and your nutrition in general.
Photo by Samson Katt: https://www.pexels.com/photo/asian-man-eating-hot-dog-near-young-girlfriend-5225480/
Better chewing slows your meal down
The faster you eat, the more you tend to eat.
You know how it is. You fill your plate with food and before you know it, it’s gone!
By eating more slowly you give the stomach time to sense fullness. When it senses fullness it sends a message to the brain to stop eating.
Less food intake means less glucose absorption as more than a third of the average diet is carbs.
So, eating less because your stomach sensed fullness earlier can lead to lower blood sugars.
Better chewing can help with weight loss
Actually, spending more time chewing can help you feel full with less food as there is more time for your brain to sense fullness.
And since obesity is a major cause and perpetuator of diabetes, weight loss can help you control your blood sugar better.
Better chewing can help better macro combining
A balanced meal with carbs, protein, and fat helps to slow the absorption of glucose (the breakdown product of carbs) into your bloodstream.
Better chewing allows this to happen on a microscopic level by mixing the macros very well in each bite. The smaller the particles, the easier they mix and become digested together.
But, better chewing doesn’t help blood sugar by itself
As a study, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23138354/ points out, you have to be mindful of what better chewing is supposed to help you to do.
If you chew your food slowly, but eat the same amount of food that you normally eat, you will not lose an ounce.
And you will not affect your blood sugars one bit!
The idea of slowing your chewing is to let your body better decide how much food is enough.
You also get more nutrients from your food as it is more easily digested by the digestive chemicals in your gut.
Take advantage of your natural physiology. Let it help you make better choices.
You became diabetic and probably overweight by ignoring this signal and overeating.
You can change your response by being thoughtful and conscious about your eating.
What is “better” chewing or mastication?
Better chewing is nothing drastic.
Just chew your food into the smallest particles you can feel with your tongue.
That may mean chewing a forkful for 10 to 30 seconds depending on the density of the food and the size of the forkful.
The idea is to:
– help your body have the proper amount of time to sense the food in the stomach.
– slow your eating so you enjoy your food more gaining more satisfaction.
– help with your digestion by breaking down your food more before it gets to the stomach.
– eat less food but get more nutrition from the amount you eat.
Grandma was right.
– Don’t shovel your food.
– Don’t rush your meal.
– Chew your food.
You’ll get better nutrition and be more thoughtful about what and how much you’re eating.
This mindfulness about your diabetes at every meal and snack will go a long way to helping you get better control of your diabetes.