Are There Natural Treatments for Type 2 Diabetes?
If you receive a type 2 diabetes diagnosis, medication may be prescribed. There are known medications which are effective for suppressing your appetite, cranking up your metabolism, lowering your blood sugar and jump-starting other processes that can help you reverse diabetes. If you have type 2 diabetes long enough, insulin injections may become a part of your life.
If the thought of taking costly medications with possible side-effects and sticking yourself with needles doesn’t float your boat, you are not alone. There are millions of diabetes sufferers who choose to treat their condition naturally. The following natural treatments for type 2 diabetes have proven effective in some cases for reducing symptoms and reversing diabetes entirely.
Diet – An Effective Natural Type 2 Diabetes Treatment
The principal cause of a type 2 diabetes prognosis is carrying around too much body weight. When you persistently overeat unhealthy foods, you damage the ability of your cells to respond to insulin. Insulin spikes to take care of the over-consumption of carbohydrates, your cells don’t respond as they have become resistant to insulin, and carbohydrates are converted to glucose and stored as fat.
Diabetes specialists and nutritionists will tell you that eating the “right” foods and avoiding the “wrong” foods is a simple way to say goodbye to diabetes. When you enjoy a low-carb, low to medium-calorie, healthy food diet, your cellular ability to respond to insulin is returned. Eat fewer calories than you burn naturally, eat more protein and less carbs (especially simple carbs), add regular exercise, and you begin to lose weight. You begin to feel more naturally energetic, which leads to even more physical activity.
When you are active as opposed to sedentary, and avoid junk food, fried food, fast food and processed food, you can quickly reach and maintain a healthy body weight. Just such a change in diet, especially when regular exercise accompanies smart nutrition, has proven effective for reversing diabetes in men, women and children of all ages.
Sports – 7 minutes 3 times per week – most effectice
Natural Herbs for Type 2 Diabetes
Some herbs and spices naturally lower elevated blood sugar levels. They also do things like speed up your metabolism and lessen your appetite. These and other properties in certain herbs are effective for treating, and in some cases reversing, type 2 diabetes. Add more of the following herbs and spices to the foods you eat and you can improve your blood glucose control.
- Cinnamon
- Curcuma
- Cognacroot
- Fenugreek
- Ginger
- Aloe vera
- Bilberry extract
- Bitter lemon
More research is needed to scientifically prove if the following herbs and spices can help lower high blood sugar levels, however, in Ayurvedic and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), these spices are touted for their ability to reduce diabetes symptoms.
- Allium
- Coccinia indica (the ivy gourd)
- Ginseng
- Bauhinia forficata
- Gymnema sylvestre
- Ficus carica
Acupuncture as a Type 2 Diabetes Treatment
TCM treatment of diabetes has long included acupuncture. This ancient Eastern healing practice involves sticking tiny needles in various parts of the body.
This helps clear up blocked energy channels that lead to a host of physical and mental health problems, including diabetes. This is a common practice for treating diabetes in China, and as Traditional Chinese Medicine has become more accepted in the West, this natural treatment has grown more popular worldwide.
Meditation and Diabetes – Can You “Think Away” Your Type 2 Diagnosis?
Some report that regular meditation can be used for a multitude of physical benefits. While meditating may not directly slow down or reverse your diabetes symptoms, it can help you control your body weight. Several studies link a regular meditation practice to weight loss when the individual is overweight or obese. Since obesity and carrying around a few extra pounds are both risk factors for diabetes, meditation might be able to keep diabetes from developing the first place, and helping reverse it once a diagnosis has been made.
Supplements as Treatment
Chromium is necessary for your body to produce the glucose tolerance factor that helps insulin work better. Some studies show a chromium supplement taken daily may improve diabetes control. The same has been set for a daily ginseng supplement, though as mentioned earlier, there is more research needed in this area.
There is significant research that shows a magnesium supplement can prevent the development of type 2 diabetes, and reverse that condition as well. Vanadium and CoQ10 are two other supplements that some studies show might be effective in preventing and treating diabetes.
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