I’ve been pretty active in the natural medicine, food-as-medicine, world for over a decade now. I read oh, so many books, listen to podcasts and stay as current as I can with what is going on in the gut-health related sphere. Check out my recommended reading list and my newest post on what I’m currently reading here. I love that this area is growing and that the knowledge of GAPS is growing. I love to see that people believe they can have some control over, heal and prevent chronic illness. This is a good thing!
One of the newer buzz phrases I’ve heard being thrown around is metabolic dysfunction. I’m hearing a lot of people use it online, on social media, on podcasts and even in my own personal circles like at church. Metabolic dysfunction is put simply: insulin resistance. They are essentially one and the same. So when you think of insulin resistance you likely think of something like diabetes.
A new trend we are seeing is kids presenting with metabolic dysfunction. This is really concerning. One of my biggest soap boxes as a mother is how often treats and junk food are offered to kids these days. It’s pretty unreal. If you don’t have kids let me shed some light here.
Kids who go to school are offered treats daily or multiple times a week. And by treats I mean highly processed junk foods and candy. Elementary kids often share birthdays with classmates and bring treats to share with the class. In a class of 20-30 that could be a birthday a week or maybe more.
I have a middle schooler and a high schooler. Both attend a school and are offered treats weekly, sometimes daily. Things like donuts in class, muffins, chic-fil-a, and candy. Both are encouraged to bring things to share often for various reasons.
At church there are donuts and juice every week. In Sunday School, depending on who is teaching, it is typical for candy to be given for answering questions. Mind you, this is at 10:30 AM.
At my kids’ youth group there is always a snack. Youth group is in the evening after dinner. They attempt to offer a “healthy” option of fruit or vegetables along with something sugary or junky like cookies, ice cream or chips. The majority of kids are arriving having eaten dinner. Truly, there is zero need to offer more food. Sometimes we should be able to gather without food being served.
I recognize that community is often celebrated with food. This isn’t a new concept. However, there has been a shift since I was growing up in the 80s and 90s. I also went to a youth group and we only ever had food served on special party occasions like the Super Bowl. The regular youth group night did not have food involved. We, as a society, have become one that feels the need to always be eating. It is not just the children, though we have certainly done them a disservice by putting these things into practice more than ever before. We have taught children they can’t go anywhere without a snack or without getting a treat. We have told them they should expect these things – always expect there to be food – and to indulge.
Now obviously it is not wrong to have a treat or even a snack but what I am getting at is the beast that has emerged from this idea of overindulgence. We were not meant to eat constantly. Our bodies need breaks between eating to digest and rest. We need longer periods of fasting (like sleeping) where our bodies can heal and restore. They cannot do this if they are always trying to digest. We should be able to go longer stretches of time between meals without crashing out or always needing a hit of sugar to get us to the next meal.
Constantly consuming sugary foods is putting our organs into overdrive trying to manage all of the sugar. This is what leads to metabolic dysfunction. When we go from sugar hit to sugar hit, without properly balancing it with healthy, saturated fats, we put a lot of stress and strain on our organs to process the sugar.
So metabolic dysfunction is just a new, fancy way of saying you’re knocking on the door of diabetes. But what we are learning is that there are many more chronic diseases that are based in metabolic dysfunction. It isn’t just diabetes anymore. When the liver can no longer handle the sugar we get metabolic dysfunction and it plays out in a variety of chronic conditions like pre diabetes, diabetes, fatty liver, PCOS, adrenal dysfunction, hyperglycemia, and hormone-related issues.
What Can Be Done?
Thankfully, all of these things, including diabetes, are fully reversible utilizing food as medicine. Food is the most important tool, but managing stress, getting enough sleep and exercising is also really important to reversing this issue.
GAPS is a great place to start but it’s not the only place. Focusing on eating a whole food diet is essential. A Paleo-style diet is a good transition for those who may not have severe metabolic dysfunction while a Keto approach may be better for those who are pre-diabetic or diabetic and need a more drastic approach. The GAPS diet has a keto version that is very helpful for those who need it. Setting up a consultation with a GAPS coach or practitioner can help you decide if it is the right starting point for you. These “diets” all have things in common that help support the body in healing and reversing metabolic dysfunction.
They focus on real food: animal foods, saturated animal fat, fresh fruit and vegetables and healthy carbohydrates like rice and sweet potatoes. They either fully eliminate or limit anything processed and sugary. This process fixes metabolic dysfunction and fixes hormones and regulates blood sugar.
How I Handle This With My Kids
Education is first. I have been working to educate them on real food nutrition since we began the GAPS diet back in 2017. With that education comes an understanding of the importance of making good choices with the foods presented to us. At home we eat along the Weston A Price guidelines which is very similar to GAPS. And since I do not want either of my children to have an eating disorder, I am allowing them certain freedoms in choice when they are age appropriate. We have to live in the world and that means there will be times we might make less than optimal choices on food for a variety of reasons. That is okay.
I also want my kids to know how different foods make them feel. This knowledge is vastly important in them making their own food decisions as they grow into adults. One day it will be fully up to them to decide what they will and won’t eat. If they have me always telling them no they may sneak things or have a lack of self control later on. I don’t want either of those things. I want them to try things and discover how they feel after they have them. By the time they reach adulthood I want them to know how to cook and make a nutritious meal, which foods agree with their bodies and which do not. This will enable them to make the best, most informed choice they can as adults.
For example, since coming off GAPS, Raleigh has been able to try a wide variety of things. Many of which have been treats in these multitudes of places. One of the valuable things he has learned in this process is that food dyes, which we do not eat at home, make his nose stuffy. This makes him really uncomfortable. Do I want him eating food dyes? Absolutely not, but he needs the chance to find out how his body responds. As uncomfortable as that is, it is a very valuable thing for him to know, and going forward he can better make a choice if he is willing to consume something with food dyes.
These are the sorts of things I want my kids to learn about their bodies when they eat things that we really were not designed to consume. It is far better for him to have the opportunity to make this correlation as a teenager, so that he can take this knowledge into adulthood, than it would be for me to keep everything away from him in these childhood learning years.
Where To Go From Here
Make small changes. Most people struggle to do an overhaul and, for most people, I don’t advise that. Small changes are best and most easily maintained. It is surprising how even small food changes can lead to significant health changes.
The easiest change is to start dialing back on processed foods and sugar. Eat unprocessed, real and whole foods as much as possible. Think meat and potatoes type meals: good protein, cooked in saturated animal fat, a healthy carbohydrate like rice or sweet potatoes and veggies also cooked in saturated animal fat. Real food.
I have a FREE 7-recipe download you can check out here. If you are wanting more or curious about how GAPS could help I have a 30 day full GAPS meal plan. The recipes are simple and an easy way to wade into the diet.
Food is medicine. It is very powerful against chronic illnesses of all kinds including metabolic dysfunction. Really what it comes down to is choosing your hard. It’s hard to be saddled with metabolic dysfunction. It is also hard to do a difficult healing diet every day. Which hard will you choose?
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