Dextrose/ Glucose is Not the True Enemy

Cookies, cakes, snack foods, breakfast lunch and dinner items (packaged or canned or bottled of course), and of course that yummy Halloween candy coming around has what is commonly called 'glucose' a single sugar but technically known as 'dextrose', as one of the major and minor ingredients, in it. In consumption today, it is the most popular carbohydrate abused and obesity is no longer on the rise but an epidemic.

This single sugar is formed during digestion when complex foods are bombarded with hydrochloric acid and other enzymes the stomach acids operate on. Whatever food you eat, will eventually decrease to just a single molecule. It is formed from starch where disaccharides and polysaccharides break down after melding molecularly, together for awhile. Serving the purpose of energizing and feeding the body at a cellular level, what it needs to stay homeostatic (in balance), is why glucose is important.

The etymology of the term originates in Greece where this word 'gleukos' means sweet. As it is sweet the compound is dangerous to some. Body type and blood type affect the proper distribution at the cellular level, this most important carbohydrate serves the metabolic process quite exclusively.

The organs involved in processing glucose from complex foods that also possess fat, proteins, and other essential nutrients include the liver, the pancreas, and the intestines. These all work in favor of breaking down all nutrition properties. The true enemy lies in how well the body can break down that single sugar. The portal vein carries glucose from the intestines where it all starts. The excess is then run through a conversion process. That becomes glycogen and the process is called glycogenesis.

Blood sugar levels are very important to maintaining homeostatic conditions because too much or too little can be fatal. The condition where too much excess glucose is in the blood NOT properly metabolized or converted is called hyperglycemia-- blood sugar level raises over norm 200 mg or higher. Best concentration for a homeostatic existence is the 100 mg or 0.1% being maintained at a very constant level using insulin from the islets of Langerhans of the organ, the pancreas. The opposite condition in which blood glucose levels are lower than 100 mg is called Hypoglycemia-- an overproduction of the insulin used reduces the blood sugar and often addresses the sufferer with lethargy, dizziness, and even coma at the extreme. If ketone bodies form due to this over-production of un-converted glucose, it is because fat storage areas are being metabolized instead. This is a dangerous condition from ingesting dextrose, glucose or the same D-glucose.

Glucose is an important carbohydrate necessary for fat production to keep us warm, energy conversion to get us out of bed skipping and jumping rather than sloth-like and most importantly to keep us balanced. Our bodies are over 75% water so if we are sweaters that loose in perspiration ½ of our inner moisture we need glucose to replenish. I know it sounds like one has nothing to do with the other but let me indicate with this fact:

"In 2006, an ovarian cyst burst that landed me in the hospital. The cause was use of synthetic birth control back in the 90's and consuming regular white processed, bleached, chlorinated sugar from a variety of junk to natural healthy foods. Thinking this staple found in every food was okay for me to ingest, my body taught me a valuable lesson. The destabilization of glucose was interrupted and this action attacked my mind and being the strong-willed, I ignored the signs. Over production of estrogen became my problem when simple glucose was converted in yes, glycogen, but also the feeding frenzy an ovarian cyst LOVES to engage in. The extra 'glycogen' was causing abnormal growth, the solution, eat a sugar that my body can actually convert properly without any damage to anything nearby. It boils down to No refined white sugar is good for this body AB+ blood type and endomorph body type."

In sweating from the estrogen dominance, a result of too much non-converted glucose being mismanaged, a body can suffer but again it is the body as the enemy not the glucose itself. My suggestion is test your tolerance of refined sugar versus raw cane sugar versus sweeteners derived from other tropical or indigenous plants.

In conclusion, glucose is present as a single sugar when complex carbohydrates are ingested and there is no way to get around them unless you live on just water. Therefore what your body does with glucose more than what it is has been the sweet part of this article and I hope it has helped in some way.