Episode 10 – Blood Sugar Balance and Fatigue

Shownotes In this episode Anna explains why blood sugar regulation is essential for anyone who is experiencing and looking to recover from fatigue. She discusses the importance of blood sugar control for nervous system regulation. She highlights discerning signs that blood sugar imbalances could be a problem for you and how to use glucose monitoring and dietary changes to bring blood sugar into better balance.  Useful links: Website: https://annamarsh.co.uk/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anna_marsh_nutrition/ Fatigue Recovery Quiz: https://app.annamarsh.co.uk/quiz Blood Sugar Balance and Fatigue Welcome back to another episode of the chronic fatigue and burnout recovery podcast. I am your host Anna Marsh, functional medicine and trauma-informed nutritional therapist and chronic fatigue syndrome, recoverer or survivor; not quite sure, which is the best one to say survivor sounds very dramatic, and recoverer doesn’t sound quite slick. So, either way, I have recovered from chronic fatigue syndrome, and I’m here today with you to talk about blood sugar and fatigue. In today’s episode, I’d like to cover what blood sugar got to do with chronic fatigue. Why is it so important? Here’s a bit of a spoiler alert; it is very important. Then I also want to cover signs of imbalanced blood sugar, how to begin to balance your blood sugar, and factors that will influence your blood sugar control. So let’s dive straight in. We can talk about what blood sugar has to do with chronic fatigue. Ultimately, fatigue results from the inability to produce enough ATP or energy to meet the body’s needs. As the body’s energy currency, there are various mechanisms by which our ATP production can be influenced. Blood sugar dysregulation is one of them. So if you are experiencing changes in your blood sugar, if you think that blood sugar could be a problem for you, I always check with all of my clients, even if I think their blood sugar is absolutely fine. Let’s check because it’s low-hanging fruit. It’s something really practical and actionable that you can address. If it’s a problem for you, we want to nip it in the bud because it is something that will impact your body’s ability to produce energy. The reason is that food is fuel, and we get food or fuel from the proteins, fats, and carbohydrates in our diet. The brain needs glucose. A lot of fatigue is brain fatigue. The brain feels tired, and this has low brain energy. Yes, sometimes the muscles or the metabolic system can feel tired and lacking in energy, but I know when I was experiencing chronic fatigue syndrome, there were days when my muscles and my body felt like they were okay; they could do stuff. But my brain just felt tired and didn’t want to do anything. Of course, there were also days when I just had heavy, tired muscles and a heavy brain and didn’t want to do anything. But brain energy and good and healthy brain function are important for our