Sugar, Sugar: The Carbohydrate Story

Alright, I am going to admit something that nowadays is akin to sacrilege, I LOVE carbs.  Perhaps no other aspect of nutrition has been so systematically dissected and disparaged as have carbohydrates.  So what is the deal with carbohydrates?  And why have they become almost the dirty word of modern nutrition and diets?  This post will explore first what carbohydrates are, and how to properly utilize them in a healthy diet.

Carbohydrates are sugar, sugar, sugar.  There is no more simple means of stating that fact.  However, there a variety of different compositions that the sugar molecule can be transformed into.

The easiest means of categorizing the different types of carbohydrates is to split them all into two broad groups, simple and complex.

SIMPLE CARBOHYDRATES:

In order to put carbohydrates into perspective, we are going to build a carbohydrate train.  Each cab of the train represents one molecule of a sugar.  These molecules are of various structures, each with a different formation and name, and include glucose, lactose, galactose, fructose….basically anything that ends in –ose. In a simple carbohydrate there are only two cabs on the train, which makes for a VERY small train.

Why would the body require a small train such as a simple carbohydrate?  The answer is the central theme to the entire carbohydrate dilemma…THE BODY CAN ABSORB SMALL AND SIMPLE CARBOHYDRATES MUCH FASTER THAN LARGE COMPLEX CARBOHYDRATES.

Basically whenever the tissues of your body need a fast energy boost it craves the energy cargo stored in these small carbohydrate trains.  The energy is easily accessible and readily utilized by the body, and most importantly by the brain.  The brain is a sugar junkie, and requires sugar to efficiently run the body.  In fact, one of the most powerful tools to assess and research the brain, Positron Emission Tomography (PET), is a scanner which measures the uptake of glucose sugar into the brain to discern which areas of the brain are more active at a given period of time.

COMPLEX CARBOHYDRATES:

The category of complex carbohydrates is, well, complex.  It encompasses any carbohydrate train with three cars or more…all the way up to trains with thousands of cars.  Complex carbohydrates run the gamut from vegetables to whole grain breads to indigestible fibre and cellulose.

Complex carbohydrates are useful to our bodies because they are relatively difficult to digest and are slowly absorbed into our tissues.  If simple carbohydrates give us a shot like an afterburner then complex carbohydrates are the slow-burning rockets that really get us where we want to go.

HOW CARBOHYDRATES ARE DIGESTED:

After we eat carbohydrates they are transported to our stomachs where they are dissolved and through to our intestines, and this is where the action occurs.  The intestines act like a train depot, breaking off the carbohydrate train cars and unloading them into our bloodstream to be used by our body as sugar.  When the carbohydrates are broken apart, they are referred to as sugar again.  Thus it makes perfect sense that larger complex carbohydrates will be absorbed more slowly, as they take a longer period of time to break apart. The sugar in our bloodstream must be kept at an acceptable level, and this process is monitored by two hormones, GLUCAGON and INSULIN.

Glucagon and insulin are hormones, which are secreted or released by the pancreas.  When blood sugar is low, glucagons is released to tell the body to free up more sugar.  When blood sugar is too high, insulin is released to tell the body to lock the sugar up in our cells.  The body’s method for storing excess sugar is to place them in adipose tissue, which is another term for fat.

CARBOHYDRATES IN OUR DIET:

Carbohydrates have been deemed, rather unjustly, as the culprits for weight gain and obesity over the past decade.  The truth is that while carbohydrates are not necessarily bad for us, the means by which we get our carbohydrates is bad.  There is a vast gulf between getting our carbohydrate intake from green vegetables and getting our carbohydrate intake from donuts.

Given the opportunity one should ALWAYS choose to obtain a carbohydrate intake from whole foods.  Fruits, vegetables, whole breads are all quality choices, which provide carbohydrates while also providing a wealth of vitamins and fibre.  The fibre in such foods allows our bodies to slowly and efficiently manage our sugar intake and to avoid spikes in blood sugar.

Further posts will examine the problems that may arise due to imbalances in carbohydrate intake, from Type II Diabetes to childhood obesity.

References:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12761365

www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/carbohydrates.html

 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18258623

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15531663

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002469.htm

http://www.livestrong.com/article/40294-list-carbohydrate-foods-energy/