If you've been diagnosed with type 1 or 2 diabetes and have decided to get fit and tackle the illness with exercise, including weight training, then you need to get good advice. Consult your doctor first, then perhaps a specialist diabetes educator or nutritionist, or even an exercise physiologist who specializes in exercise for diabetics.
If you're in the early phases of type 2 diabetes and don't take insulin, then you have less to be concerned about. If you are type 1 or 2 and need to inject insulin, then getting the timing and dose right can be important when it comes to maintaining blood sugar during and after exercise. You may need to adjust your insulin dose and routine.
Diabetics who don't produce enough of their own insulin need insulin injections to keep blood sugar levels in the normal range. Exercise is recommended for diabetics because it promotes weight loss, heart health and other important health-related measures. Exercise also improves insulin sensitivity -- the ability of insulin to store glucose and of the muscles to use it. Because exercise makes glucose use more efficient, you may not need as much injected insulin to achieve the same result as you would if you did not exercise. This could lead to low blood sugar (hypoglycemia) and the usual consequences of that -- weakness, nervousness, rapid heartbeat, extreme hunger, and at worst, loss of consciousness. Most diabetics know the symptoms of a "hypo." Consuming sugary food or drink quickly is a remedy. Read more about diabetes and hypoglycemia at the About.com Diabetes site.
If you're an insulin user, you need to get advice before starting an exercise program or changing the intensity or volume of exercise. This could also apply to type 2 diabetics who control their diabetes with drugs.
Really good work about this website was done. Keep trying more – thanks!
“the ability of insulin to store glucose” is poorly phrased. Insulin does not store glucose, it is the instrument of carrying the glucose from the bloodstream into the body cells.
Bob, I admit to a less than perfect explanation.
However, your explanation is worse than mine. Insulin opens the insulin receptor on the cell surface and this activates the GLUT4 glucose transporter that shuttles glucose in for utilization or storage as glycogen.
That’s for muscle; liver and brain are somewhat different – no GLUT4.
Either way, insulin does not “carry’ anything.
I drew a diagram of how this works for a course I wrote.
Thanks.