As the saying goes, "When you are full, you have the strength to work."
However, when we finish touching the fish in the morning and thinking, "I'll work well after lunch and afternoon", the state of the meal is like this-
Image source: Network
Lunch is simply a bedtime preparation activity. Do not sleep at noon, and collapse directly in the afternoon.
Many people wonder - why do you feel that Europeans and Americans never take a nap, and they can be resurrected with blood in the afternoon? Do they have any superpowers?
Image source: Zhihu
There's a guess that it has something to do with our eating habits —
A diet with high GI
It can be difficult after a meal
In our diet, carbohydrate is the protagonist and is called a "staple food".
Carbohydrate intake increases the concentration of tryptophan in the blood, which is a "sleep inducer"
Once tryptophan enters the brain, it is converted into serotonin, which is necessary for normal sleep in mammals.
Image source: Stand Cool Helo
And many of our common staple foods are high GI carbohydrates, which further promote the entry of tryptophan into the brain.
What is GI (Glycemic Index)? Simply put, it reflects the ability of a certain food to raise our blood sugar levels.
GI ≤ 55, which is a low GI food
55
GI > 70, is a high GI food
Eating foods with high GI tends to spike our blood sugar levels after meals, which stimulates a lot of insulin secretion.
A study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition suggests that insulin may "escort" tryptophan into the brain.
Insulin indirectly increases the concentration of tryptophan in the blood by making other amino acids that compete with tryptophan and try to enter the brain "U-turn" from the bloodstream to muscle cells.
Image source: Lilac Life Research Institute
In general, high GI carbs can directly and indirectly increase tryptophan in the brain, which may cause us to be "sleepy".
Those in the office who can be resurrected with blood without taking a nap may have a different choice for lunch than others
Of course, this is just one of the reasons for the after-meal sleepiness. There are also studies that believe that there may be a relationship between sleepiness after meals and the total amount of food eaten, the structure of food, the differences in each human body, and so on.
However, in addition to the possibility of making you "sleepy", the high-GI diet has more things to be wary of -
Long-term high-GI diet
There are many health risks
People with a high GI diet are more likely to be fat
An experiment in 12 obese male adolescents showed that foods with high GI made people hungry faster and eat more.
When they ate high, medium, and low GI foods with the same calories for breakfast, and then ate freely again 5 hours later, people who ate high GI foods at breakfast ate 53 percent more than people who ate medium GI foods and 81 percent more than people who ate low GI foods.
This is because high-GI foods are easily digested and absorbed by us, and glucose can quickly enter the bloodstream, causing blood sugar to spike.
But at the same time, blood sugar drops very quickly, like a roller coaster. Soon we will feel hungry again and want to eat again.
Image source: Reference 6
A high-GI diet makes blood vessels vulnerable
A long-term diet with high GI can make the blood goggy and slimy, causing our blood vessels to soak in "sugar water."
In such an environment, the blood vessels may become more fragile and even promote thrombosis.
The next step in the blood clot may be "cardiovascular disease".
Young people feel that the word "cardiovascular disease" is far away from them. However, a large number of studies have shown that high-GI eating habits are a strong risk factor for "coronary heart disease".
A high-GI diet has a 1.26-fold higher risk of death from cardiovascular disease than a low-GI diet.
Image source: Reference 8
People with a high GI diet are closer to diabetes
A study of 42,000 men who followed them for 6 years found that people with a high GI diet had a 37 percent increased risk of developing type II diabetes compared with those with a low GI diet.
There's an important reason for this – the long-term high-GI diet has dulled insulin.
As we all know, insulin is an important hormone that regulates blood sugar. When blood sugar rises after a meal, it stimulates insulin secretion to help blood sugar return to normal levels.
However, long-term consumption of high-GI foods may produce insulin resistance effects, making insulin regulation worse.
Insulin resistance is generally divided into two types:
Decreased sensitivity: The same effect requires a higher concentration of insulin to be achieved.
Decreased responsiveness: the optimal modulation of insulin, much lower than normal.
Image source: Reference 9
Insulin resistance, on the other hand, is the most important risk marker for developing type II diabetes.
Overall, low-GI diets perform well in the prevention and control of chronic diseases such as diabetes, coronary heart disease, and obesity.
After reading so much, I believe that everyone already knows the benefits of a low GI diet.
Maybe you also want to know -
How should I eat my daily diet to be low in GI?
Which foods are high GI and which are low GI?
On these issues, the Lilac Life Institute has compiled a "low-GI diet."
Teach you easily, come and collect it!