The real truth behind insulin resistance 🩸
Mar 15, 2026
Hi Friends🙋♂️,
I hope you had an amazing week.
First of all, I want to apologize for the delay. Some very interesting things have been happening recently, which is why I could only sit down to write this newsletter now. Thank you for your patience.
Today we’re going to talk about something that affects millions of people, yet is still widely misunderstood.
That is insulin resistance.
The carbohydrate confusion
This week, while having lunch with one of my brothers, I realized something surprising.
There is a topic I haven’t yet discussed with you – even though it’s one of the most common health problems today.
Insulin resistance.
In my opinion, it’s also one of the most misunderstood topics in modern medicine.
When someone receives blood test results showing:
elevated blood sugar🔺
signs of insulin resistance🩸
or a high HbA1c (a key marker for diabetes)🔺
very often the advice they receive is:
“Reduce carbohydrates.”🍞
At first glance, this sounds logical. If blood sugar is high, eat less sugar. But the human body is much more complex than that.
Let me explain why.
How glucose enters our cells
When we eat carbohydrates, they are broken down into glucose.
Glucose then enters our bloodstream and waits to enter our cells.
But it cannot enter on its own.
It needs a key.
That key is insulin.
Insulin attaches to receptors on the surface of our cells and triggers a cascade of reactions that eventually opens the door, allowing glucose to enter the cell and be used for energy.
You can see this process in this short animation:
Source: https://nutritionfacts.org/video/flashback-friday-what-causes-insulin-resistance-diabetes/
Pretty awesome, right?
When they key is missing
Now imagine there is no insulin at all.
In that case, glucose molecules accumulate in the bloodstream but cannot enter the cells.
This is what happens in Type 1 diabetes.
Take a look:
Source: https://nutritionfacts.org/video/flashback-friday-what-causes-insulin-resistance-diabetes/
The glucose molecules are essentially knocking on the door, but no one opens it.
When the key does not open the door
But there is another situation.
What happens when insulin is present, but the cells don’t respond to it properly?
This is called insulin resistance.
Let’s look at the final animation.
Source: https://nutritionfacts.org/video/flashback-friday-what-causes-insulin-resistance-diabetes/
As you can see, insulin is present – but the door doesn't open efficiently.
Why?
One of the key reasons is the accumulation of intramyocellular lipids – in simple terms, fat inside our muscle cells.
These fat particles interfere with the signaling cascade that insulin normally triggers. As a result, the message from insulin gets blocked. And when the message is blocked, glucose cannot enter the cells efficiently.
PMIDs: 10027589, 8675698, 23122836
What causes this fat buildup?
Research suggests that excess saturated fat can accumulate inside muscle and liver cells, interfering with insulin signaling. Not only the enormous amount of fat we eat on a daily basis can form atherosclerotic plaque in our arteries, but as you can see, it also causes insulin resistance.
What’s fascinating is how quickly this can happen.
In some studies, insulin resistance can appear within 3 hours after a high-fat meal. (!)
PMID: 10334314
But here is the encouraging part:
The process is reversible.😅
When the body is no longer constantly exposed to excess saturated fats, these fat particles can be cleared from the cells and insulin sensitivity can improve again.🔺
PMID: 10480616
This also explains an interesting phenomenon often seen in clinical nutrition.
People following a whole-food plant-based diet can sometimes eat very high amounts of carbohydrates while maintaining excellent blood sugar control.🩸
At the same time, individuals following very high-fat diets, such as ketogenic diets, sometimes require significantly more insulin despite consuming far fewer carbohydrates.🔻
I heard a story, where somebody on a whole food plant based diet ate around 500 carbohydrates, and he used 30 international unit of insulin per day. In contrary of that, one of his patients, before coming to see him was on a ketogenic diet, and he required 28 international unit of insulin while eating only 50 grams of carbohydrates per day!
That's insane! That's the real power of insulin sensitivity.
In other words:
The problem is not simply how many carbohydrates we eat, but how sensitive our cells are to insulin.
How can we improve insulin sensitivity?
Fortunately, there are several powerful lifestyle tools that can help restore insulin sensitivity.
Some of the most important ones include:
prioritizing whole carbohydrate foods such as whole grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables🥗
limiting foods rich in saturated fats and cholesterol, commonly found in meat🥩, eggs🥚 and dairy🥛
staying physically active, since exercise helps muscles use glucose more efficiently 🏃♂️ (even 10 minutes of walking after a meal can help)
As you can see in this video as well, the more fat somebody eats, the worse his ability to handle blood sugar.
Source: https://nutritionfacts.org/video/flashback-friday-what-causes-insulin-resistance-diabetes/
These people ate same amount of calories, but different ratios of carbohydrates and fat.
PMID: 10365986
So next time when you eat and prioritize eating more legumes and fruits, rather than meat or dairy to help your body be more sensitive to insulin and have more energy during the day!
Thank you for reading, and see you in the next newsletter!
If you find this valuable, please, share with one of your friends or relatives!
Knowledge is best when it's shared.
Bests,
Bazil