10 diet myths wearing a CGM bust for me

Blood glucose is a metric highly correlated with lifespan, and more importantly with healthspan conceptualized by Dr. Peter Attia.

What’s interesting is that each of us can have very different blood glucose reactions to the exact same diet, and wearing a CGM can provide personalized insights to optimize your nutrition profile.

I wore the Ultrahuman CGM for 2 weeks and was blown away by how it helped debunk some of these diet principles I used to follow:

1.??????Avoid carbs for dinner

2.??????Pure carb dishes are fine as long as they are had only for breakfast

3.??????Protein shake with any fruit is fine

4.??????Protein shake should only be had on days you work out

5.??????Ensuring some nonveg in a meal is good enough to meet our daily protein requirements

6.??????The only thing that matters in a meal is ensuring it has a balance mix of macronutrients

7.??????White rice is the enemy

8.??????A little packaged snack or juice can hardly do much harm

9.??????Coffee to break the fast in the morning is bad for the gut

10.??Intermittent fasting is the best

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1.??????Avoid carbs for dinner

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“Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like prince and dinner like a pauper” – Adelle Davis. I then stretched that ‘dinner like a pauper’ bit to completely weed out those waist-enhancing carbs.

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Turns out, that zero carb dinners cause nocturnal glycemia, where the blood glucose levels drops below the recommended band of 70 mg/dL and 100 mg/dL ?which has a cascading effect the next day where the blood glucose shoots up too high as a manner of over compensation, which causes oxidative stress, and which ultimately impacts longevity/healthspan.

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The experiments I did were to include carb in varying manners to my dinner and noticed that if I have just a little carb, paired with sufficient proteins and/or veggies, and eaten before 7pm, my nocturnal glucose levels are a lot more stable and within the recommended bandwidth throughout the night.

However, any excesses, like experiments with biryani one night and ice cream on another, shoots up glucose levels, and this spike at the end of the day is worse than daytime spikes, because the latter is unavoidable as I will explain further in below points, and the only chance at having a straight-line glucose trend at night is lost with that carb over-dose.

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Newfound truth: Eat some, but not nothing, and certainly not too much of carb for dinner.

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2.??????Pure carb dishes are fine as long as they are had only for breakfast

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Most Indian breakfast dishes are guilty of being pure carb. It’s dosa with potato, upma with veggies you can barely count, or puttu with banana where I come from in Kerala. I used to think it’s fine to have these pure carb breakfast dishes thanks to that Adelle Davis quote and because it’s compensating for those zero carb dinners.

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Turns out, pure carb breakfasts cause the highest glucose spikes in a day, because by breakfast time, glucose levels are at its lowest, having steadily fallen through the night, and then this first meal of the day kickstarts the glycogenolysis from such a low base that the glucose spikes up real high.

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Newfound truth: Include some protein with the breakfast dish. Either a protein shake, or simply an egg topped on that dosa or upma.

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3.??????Protein shake with any fruit is fine

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Protein shake with a banana and protein shake with strawberries have huge differences. It’s true bananas are more nutrient dense than strawberries, however, the excess carbs that bananas have doesn’t compensate for the protein in the shake, which ends up shooting up the glucose levels.

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Newfound truth: Protein shakes should be prepared with lower carb fruits

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4.??????Protein shake should only be had on days you work out

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I believed protein shakes must only be had when I work out to rebuild and repair those inflamed muscle fibers. Otherwise, the protein may be in excess which could damage the kidney.

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Turns out, we need a LOT of protein to really damage the kidney. Above 3.3g of protein per kilo of body weight per day, which even for a 60-kilo tiny Indian male like me, is something like 6 chicken breasts, which is impossible to eat over the course of an entire day. And even if the protein is higher than what I require for muscle repair (probably in the range of 2-3.3g of protein per kilo of body weight per day), being water soluble, the protein comes out quite easily with sweat and urination.

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The experiments I did were to include protein in as many dishes throughout the day, including the protein shake, to meet my protein intake. This was irrespective of whether I’ve worked out or not. And I noticed a far stabler glucose trendline.

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Newfound truth: Never restrict protein, and have as much of it in as many meals possible through the day

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5.??????Ensuring some non-veg in a meal is good enough to meet our daily protein requirements

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For the same reasons mentioned in the previous point, just ensuring the presence of non-veg in a dish is insufficient. We would need to increase that quantity of protein as well. Be it a protein shake daily, or 2 eggs instead of 1 with that upma.

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Newfound truth: Ensure protein takes center stage (or center plate) in every meal

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6.??????The only thing that matters in a meal is ensuring it has a balance mix of macronutrients

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A balance of macronutrients is paramount in every meal. Companies like Uba create utensils to remind you to include all 3 macronutrients of carbs, proteins and fats in every meal.

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Turns out, just ensuring the good mix of macronutrients by itself isn’t sufficient. The order in which you eat them and the time of day you eat them also matter.

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The experiments I did was having something like a soup before a heavy carb main course like a pizza, and that helped temper the glucose spike. The exact same meal, if had carb first, would cause a much higher glucose spike.

Time of day also matters. Having a meal slightly later than your usual time causes a higher glucose spike, since your glucose levels would have started dropping at the usual time it is expecting the food.

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Newfound truth: A balance of macronutrients should be had at the same time everyday in an order that the carb is eaten last

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7.??????White rice is the enemy

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Any kind of processed carb is bad. However, different types of processed carbs have different degrees of glucose spikes.

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Turns out, bread and including the glorified brown bread, cause a much higher glucose spike than rice for me. I wondered if this had to do with growing up in India on a rice-rich diet, but there is no literature to support this. It just seems my gut tolerates rice better than bread.

Having said this though, brown rice is still better than white rice. From a glucose stability point of view as well as other health benefits, as it happens to be less processed than white rice.

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Newfound truth: White rice is not all bad especially if the alternate is bread

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8.??????A little packaged snack or juice can hardly do much harm

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Packaged snacks and juices are another form of processed carb like white rice, and while I thought a tiny snack would hardly do much harm, it turns out that even a little bit causes a wild spike.

What’s worse, every steep spike leaves a reverberation through the rest of the day, like the aftershocks following an earthquake. So, the little snack and juice has caused far worse oxidative stress than a white rice meal or even the pure carb breakfast.

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Newfound truth: If you need to indulge in a packaged snack, might as well go all in.

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9.??????Coffee to break the fast in the morning is bad for the gut

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Coffee on an empty stomach is a bad idea. It is better to have some other beverage, even simple hot lemon water as the first drink the morning before coffee. I used to delay drinking coffee all the way to post breakfast.

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Turns out, coffee just before breakfast helps ease the glucose spike as you’ve tempered your gut with the milk protein.

So, from a glucose spike point of view, coffee before breakfast turns out better than coffee after breakfast. And if you are still having that other warm beverage first thing in the morning, and coffee a little later along with breakfast, you are still getting the best of both worlds.

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Newfound truth: Enjoy coffee before breakfast and/or after breakfast

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10.??Intermittent Fasting is the best

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Intermittent Fasting offers a ton of benefits but there’s increasing evidence that its true impact can only be seen when it follows a 16 hour plus fasted state. And such long hours in a fasted state directly conflicts with the amount of protein you need to consume in a day as written in points 3 and 4 above.

Therefore, in a battle between the benefits of Intermittent Fasting and protein consumption, the latter wins, especially as you grow older when the body starts to lose muscle mass.

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Newfound truth: F* Intermittent Fasting

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In conclusion, and in the words of Dr. Peter Attia himself, rather than over intellectualizing on diet and reading loads of literature, including this article, simply go out an exercise.

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No amount of diet management can compensate for a good work out, as long as it is consistent, volumetric and enjoyable. The last criteria is the most important as it enables the first two.

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And only if you wish to optimize further to supplement your exercise and recovery, then a CGM to get those personalized insights is recommended.

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