Today on the podcast:
Cyrus and Robby are the co-authors of the New York Times bestselling book Mastering Diabetes: The Revolutionary Method to Reverse Insulin Resistance Permanently in Type 1, Type 1.5, Type 2, Prediabetes, and Gestational Diabetes.
They are also the team behind MasteringDiabetes.org, an online coaching platform for people living with all forms of diabetes that focuses on low-fat plant-based whole-food nutrition.
Cyrus has a PhD in nutritional biochemistry from UC Berkeley and has been living with type 1 diabetes since 2002.
Robby has a master’s degree in public health and has been living with type 1 diabetes since 2000.
Current medical wisdom advises that anyone suffering from diabetes or prediabetes should eat a low-carbohydrate, high-fat diet. But in this paradigm shifting book, they go through a century of research to reveal how that advice is misguided.
If you fall anywhere on the diabetes spectrum, this is a must listen.
Episode Outline
- 06:33 The different types of diabetes and prediabetes
- 16:04 How the conventional wisdom of a low-carb, high-fat diet is misguided
- 28:24 Why food is medicine and what they recommend for reversing insulin resistance
- 43:20 The green, yellow, and red food choice list for reversing insulin resistance
Key Points
- The common understanding is that there are two types of diabetes—type 1 and type 2. In truth, there are six types today: type 1, type 1.5, prediabetes, type 2, gestational, and type 3 (Alzheimer’s disease). To simplify things, we can think of these six types as being in one of two buckets: autoimmune (types 1 and 1.5) and non-autoimmune (prediabetes, type 2, gestational, and type 3 or Alzheimer’s disease).
- Insulin resistance is the number one connecting puzzle piece between prediabetes, type 2 diabetes, gestational diabetes, and type 3 diabetes. And insulin resistance is the thing that will make your life with type 1 and 1.5 diabetes very complicated. So, if you can get a handle on what insulin resistance is and reverse it using food as medicine, your symptomology can practically disappear in the non-autoimmune bucket; but, in addition to that, it can make your life with type 1 and 1.5 diabetes way easier.
- Whether you are injecting insulin or are trying to get the insulin you are producing endogenously to work more efficiently, subscribe to a low-fat, plant-based, whole-food diet which is low in trans-fat, low in saturated fat, low in advanced glycation end products (AGEs), low-heme iron, and low in excess sodium. If you put this all together, you will basically reverse insulin resistance by minimizing excess dietary fat.
Powerful Quotes by Cyrus and Robby
- In the first six-to-12 months of eating a low-carbohydrate diet, all of these positive benefits come around. But if you fast-forward and move one, two, five, or ten years into the future, the picture changes in a very negative way. ~Cyrus
- We’re unifying everybody who is living with any form of diabetes to focus on one thing: What lifestyle choices can you make to allow insulin to work more efficiently? ~Robby
- The easiest way to shut doors to energy is to block insulin from working. Insulin is the most powerful anabolic hormone in your body. ~Cyrus
Guest Info
Cyrus Khambatta
Robby Barbaro