5 Easy Ways To Balance Your Blood Sugar After Overeating

We all do it from time to time - we really let ‘er rip when it comes to indulging.

A big night out - maybe a celebration or just a regular Friday night after a stressful week - can mean stuffing ALL the things in our mouths with reckless abandon…

If you want to know exactly what to do to stabilize your blood sugar afterwards so you don’t feel like garbage, I wrote this for you.

Picture this:

You head to your favourite Mexican restaurant where you tuck into a big ol’ margarita, chow down on chips and guacamole before dinner, treat yourself to the WHOLE enchilada (ya, girrrrl)…

Plus, you top it off with a delectable dessert! And why shouldn’t you? We ALL indulge sometimes - myself included. Exhibit A below: my birthday this year. :)

I love a good indulge sesh. (Thought bubble: “Don’t even think of touching my f-ing cake, Bryan.”)

Anyhoo, the moment you take a sip of that margarita or crunch into those chips, you experience a rush of dopamine, the “feel-good” hormone that’s often linked to cravings and addictive habits. Suddenly, indulging seems justified.

As sugar enters your bloodstream, your pancreas releases insulin to bring down the glucose spike.

While doing so, it suppresses leptin, the hormone responsible for telling your brain you’re full, which only eggs you on! “KEEP EATING!”, it says!

The insulin surge causes glucose to be absorbed quickly from your blood stream into your cells, and so BOTH your blood sugar and your dopamine levels crash, anywhere from 15 minutes up to several hours later.

What follows is usually that familiar wave of regret and discomfort: these sharp swings in blood sugar disrupt your body’s chemistry, mood, and energy in rapid-fire succession...

BUT, it doesn’t have to be this way if you can use some of the following handy-dandy tools!

How to stabilize your blood sugar as quickly as possible so you can stop the crazy rollercoaster before it gets out of control!

1. Get Moving: Take a Walk or Use the Stairs

Instead of chilling after a heavy meal, move your body! Physical activity encourages your muscles to use the glucose you’ve just eaten rather than letting it be stored in your liver or turned into fat. Research shows the sweet spot is somewhere between 15-30 minutes (more like 30 if overindulging) to blunt blood sugar spikes after meals. Take a brisk walk or climb stairs for about 10 minutes. This is HUGE for preventing weight gain and controlling sugars.

2. Prioritize eating protein first (avoid carbs on an empty stomach).

Have some fat, protein or fibre to slow blood sugar release before or with your carbs to slow the release of sugars from them. This helps balance blood sugar and improves leptin signalling so you feel full faster. So in our example, before tucking into the marg, you’d prioritize getting some of that guacamole in your system, or have have a few bites of something protein/fat-rich before you arrive at dinner: olives, jerky, cheese, etc.

3. Hydrate - water with lemon

Drinking water won’t directly flush out sugar, but it helps flush glucose more quickly through your kidneys. Lemon is a mild diuretic, so helps the process. Hydration can also give you a better sense of fullness and help counteract low levels of leptin. (Leptin is an important “hunger hormone” that informs your brain of stored energy levels - if it's low, we stay hungry even when we're full, leading to overeating. My next newsletter will be about how to have healthy leptin levels! Stay tuned.)

4. Try Apple Cider Vinegar Before or After Meals

Taking about 1oz of apple cider vinegar (ACV) 5 minutes before or up to 20 minutes after a meal has been shown to help soften blood sugar spikes. Research also suggests that daily use of ACV (1-2 tbsp) can help with weight management when paired with a conscious diet.
ACV also contains beneficial bacteria (in the “mother”, the unappetizing goo at the bottom), which may help lower cholesterol, improve insulin sensitivity and stabilize blood sugar as well. PLUS, additional ACV benefits include supporting gut health by reducing harmful bacteria, minimizing liver fat accumulation, metabolizing fat before it circulates in the bloodstream, and providing antioxidants to combat inflammation. No wonder this O.G. folk medicine is so popular!

5. Support with Herbal Supplements

Several natural herbs are have been demonstrated to support more stable blood sugar levels:

• Berberine Extract: Can lower blood sugar by ~25% by decreasing sugar production in the liver and boosting insulin’s efficacy. (A 2021 meta-analysis of 46 randomized controlled trials showed that berberine lowered blood sugar levels to a similar degree as metformin(!), a well-established type 2 diabetes drug!)

• Cinnamon Extract: Contains chromium, a mineral that aids insulin’s function and helps control glucose.

• Ginseng, Fenugreek, Kudzu, and Gymnema Extracts: These herbs may enhance blood sugar management and promote healthy fat levels by facilitating glucose uptake in muscle cells and supporting overall metabolic health.

Wrapping this up, these 5 methods can help you take charge of your blood sugar after overeating and help you stay balanced, even after larger or carb-heavy meals. I hope this article was useful for you!