The Adapting Body

 

The human body is an amazing machine, and like all machines, they require the correct components for basic function, i.e. glucose for basic cellular respiration. Unlike machines though, the human body tends to find a way to work regardless of the lack of correct components, such as through gluconeogenesis.

                Our bodies have very intricate metabolic pathways that allow us to do extraordinary things. As most people know, glucose is the main fuel source for basic metabolic function but what happens when there is no more glucose to use. Thankfully, the body finds a way to make glucose so that it can continue to thrive and grow. It does this by breaking down glycogen stores first and then it begins to create new sugars that can be used for cellular respiration. This process is known as gluconeogenesis. Gluco being glucose neo being new and genesis being creation. Creating “new” glucose for the purpose of cellular respiration.

                This is just one example of the intricacy that our bodies naturally possess to allow us to grow, reproduce and be evolutionarily successful. This process shows the end product of thousands of years of evolution that have solved the question. What if there is not enough glucose in the environment to consume to sustain life? The body has figured out a way to create new glucose so that in times of famine there is still enough to go around.

                The evolution that is required for these kinds of answers takes time though. I think that because we have so many new problems that arise so quickly then our bodies are not able to adjust and fix the problems itself. If we slowly adapted to eating a highly refined sugar diet then maybe our bodies would have learned to better control the excess sugars and things like diabetes would be less of an abundant issue. However, because we have switched to eating a more refined diet over a generation or two, instead of a millennium or two, we are not able to adequately deal with such a sudden shift. This is not only apparent with glucose-related disease, but look at what is happening with the sudden shift to an over-exposure to artificial light. This has happened even faster than a generation it has happened in as short as 20 to 30 years. We are seeing that an increase in artificial light exposure can lead to things like sleeping disorders, mood disorders, and a whole host of psychological problems.

                 We see these kinds of problems day more and more commonly and one great explanation as to why is an increase in light affects our sleep patterns is Ayurveda. Ayurveda is the traditional Hindu system of medicine, which is based on the idea of balance in bodily systems. This means that when something like light exposure is increased, it not only affects our eyes at the moment of exposure but it will continue to affect other parts of our body that relies on light for signals for biochemical reactions and then on to anything that is affected by those biochemical reactions.

                A great example of these reactions getting out of hand is diabetes. Diabetes is a disease that occurs when there is an incorrect balance of glucose in the bloodstream and not in the cell. When this occurs over long periods of time it's common to see problems like heart disease, stroke, kidney damage, blindness, and nerve damage. I find it fascinating that an imbalance of glucose in the bloodstream can cause you to lose your sight. This shows that Ayurveda is a real concern and that our bodies have very intricate pathways that are all interconnected. It is not that excess blood sugar attacks the eyes resulting in blindness, it’s a far more complicated chain of events that over time affects vision and other aspects of the body that are not directly associated with cellular respiration or blood glucose.

                But we as humans are designed to overcome challenges like this. It is called adaptation and evolution. If we started off slowly “learning” how to handle excess blood sugar then over generations and several thousands of years, it is likely that diabetes would not be a problem, similar to the way that decreased glucose in the bloodstream is not a problem.