New diabetes risk for adults over 45

Studies of parents show that their behavior, even before their children are born, can influence their offspring’s health into adulthood and middle-age. Among these behaviors, there’s an important factor that affects children’s chances of having diabetes. Which means it can affect your chance of diabetes as an adult.

According to the study at the Department of Environmental Toxicology at the University of California, Davis, when female fetuses are exposed to toxins from cigarette smoke in the womb, they run a significantly increased chance of diabetes after they’re born that extends all the way through menopause.

These findings became apparent when researchers analyzed the health of more than 1,800 adult women who were born between 1959 and 1967, and who along with their parents were part of research called the Child Health and Development Studies.

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The studies were specifically created to focus on links between mothers’ and fathers’ prenatal lifestyle habits and their effects on children. The analysis took into account smoking during pregnancy, occupation, ethnicity, parental diabetes and parental body weight.

Results showed that if your mother smoked while you were in the womb, which is very possible for children who are now 45 years of age and older– like those in the study—that you should take extra care to reduce your risk of developing diabetes because you’re more prone to it.

So what to do if you’re over 45?

If you’re reading this, odds are you already know not to smoke. And you’ve read enough to know that exercise gives you the biggest bang for your buck against almost all diseases. But what you may not be aware of is that for diabetes, it’s not just the sweet foods that are the enemy.

The enemy of low blood sugar and low diabetes risk is grain-based food. Even sugar doesn’t cause blood-sugar spikes as high as processed grains do when you eat them.

Have you heard of the glycemic-index? It’s a chart that compares how a food raises your blood sugar compared to pure glucose (which has a GI rating of 100). Take a look at this chart from the Linus Pauling Institute.

The regular sugar you find in candy and sweetened drinks is only 68 on the glycemic index. That means it spikes your blood sugar 68% as fast as pure glucose. Not great, but now look at the foods that are the same or higher. Rice, pancakes, potatoes, donuts, white bread, corn flakes. That whole grain bread the “experts” keep telling you is so healthy? 85 on the GI.

If you want to lower your risk of diabetes, eat low-glycemic foods, and especially avoid those processed grains. My favorite resource is the University of Sydney’s www.glycemicindex.com. It allows you to look up almost any food you can think of.

Carl Lowe

By Carl Lowe

has written about health, fitness and nutrition for a wide range of publications including Prevention Magazine, Self Magazine and Time-Life Books. The author of more than a dozen books, he has been gluten-free since 2007.

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