When our blood sugar is out of whack it can cause fatigue, irritability, anxiety, sugar cravings, acne, weight gain and more. Balancing our blood sugar is essential to optimising our health and our hormones.
Signs of imbalanced blood sugar include:
- Fatigue, especially after eating
- Energy dips at 11am or 3pm
- Anxiety
- Irritability
- Sugar cravings
- Carbohydrate cravings
- Difficulty losing weight
- Frequent urination
- Excessive thirst
- Headaches
- Heart palpitations
- Blurred vision
- Tingling hands and feet
- Recurrent infections
- Insomnia; waking through the night
- Polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS)
- Acne and skin inflammation
- Weight gain, especially abdominal weight gain
- Unwanted facial hair growth
There are many tricks to help balance your blood sugar, but here are three simple steps to get you started…
- Eat breakfast, as this sets your blood sugar levels up for the day. Ditch the high refined carbohydrate breads and cereals and opt for eggs or a protein smoothie. I like the @sunwarrior collagen protein powder
- Eat protein with each and every meal. Think organic eggs, small oily fish (salmon, mackerel, sardines), chicken, turkey, lamb, beef, tofu, tempeh, nuts and seeds.
- Eat fibre with each meal. Stems, stalks and seeds! Leave the skin on your veggies, they are packed full of fibre. Fibre helps to slow the glucose release in the gut and leads to more steady blood sugar levels.
- Drink 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar (ACV) in a small amount of water before each meal. ACV contains acetic acid which has been shown to considerably improve the blood sugar spike after eating
- Exercise after you’ve eaten. Moving your muscles helps the muscles to uptake the sugar out of your blood to be used by your muscles, thus lowering your blood sugar levels.
- Avoid coffee on an empty stomach, as it spikes blood sugar more than having it after food does.