When too much insulin sends Nicole’s blood sugar below 4.2mmol/L we reach for a 75ml shot of carrot juice. Why carrot juice and not a glucose tablet? Because it’s a healthy source of glucose and minerals. It won’t rob minerals from the body and teeth like taking refined corn-derived glucose tablets. It also won’t cause many of the side-effects corn sugar has on the nerves, tissue and liver.
But carrot juice has its problems:
1) It’s expensive. A 5lb bag of organic carrots from our local grocer costs $6.30. I’m not sure exactly how many cups we get from that, but I’d estimate around five. That’s the equivalent to about 15 glucose tablets.
2) It’s time-consuming. Our eight-year son, Jonah, does most of the juicing. I do the scrubbing, peeling and chopping. It’s a 20+ minute project.
3) The juicer uses electricity. It doesn’t say how much. But it does increase the cost of the production.
4) It’s loud! Not too loud, though. Compared to the blender it’s a cat purring on the windowsill.
5) The juice only lasts 24 hours before it’ll start going bad. So we freeze it in empty spring water bottles. When Nicole has a insulin reaction, I heat a saucepan up, cut open a bottle and melt down the orange ice. It takes about two minutes. But it’s not always possible. And the electricity used to freeze and reheat increases the cost.
6) It’s hard to carry around a freezer, frozen bottles of carrot juice and a camping stove. That’s about the only way to use this approach on the road.
7) We find that the carrots that are imported from California during the late winter and early spring are sweeter than the Ontario carrots available the rest of the year. This might effect how predictably one-third a cup of carrot juice can raise blood sugar.
Up until now, Nicole’s been using both carrot juice and glucose tablets – depending on the situation. After two years of following a low-carb diet, however, Nicole has an aversion to the taste of sugar. She finds the glucose tablets repulsive. Even the smell of them turns her stomach. She feels it’s not just a matter of taste but her body recognizing that they aren’t good for her.
We, of course, use Glucolifts, glucose tablets derived from non-GMO corn. The company doesn’t add any chemical additives. But they are still not organic. And they are still pure, refined corn sugar. A necessary poison, one might say, in the case of type-1 diabetes.
What we needed was something as portable, ready-to-go and inexpensive as glucose tablets, with all the health benefits of organic carrot juice. Sounds like a dream, doesn’t it?
Well, it looks like we’ve found such a product. I’m out of time this week, but I’ll give you all the details in the next e-letter.
For more details about how we use carrot juice to correct low blood sugars (still worth it, despite the above seven problems) you can read: 3 Natural Ways to Stop Type-1 Hypoglycaemic Episodes. On the subject of sugar, I’ve just ordered a copy of Dr. Richard Jacoby’s book, Sugar Crush: How to Reduce Inflammation, Stop Pain, and Reverse the Path to Diabetes. He appears to have done a fantastic job showing the relation between sugar (and starches) and nerve pain (and organ failure). It’s available from amazon.com, amazon.ca and amazon.co.uk (or your local bookstore).
