Fructose

[Centsmom]

Anyone use powdered fructose in place of sugar ?

 

[johnsmith]

I was wondering the same, NOW brand has a 100% pure fuctose product.

I definitely seem to have some hypoglycemic symptoms, and my last insulin test came pretty close to the pre-diabetic range.

 

[Centsmom]

That would be very interesting to hear people weigh in on this .

 

[johnsmith]

Yes, I don't hear it talked about much on this forum, I know Benedicte M. Lerche of Biochemnordic recommends this product for conditions such as diabetes and hypoglycemia and said taking some pure fructose when you eat starch helps the body handle the starch better.

 

[Centsmom]

Very interesting . I did not know this.

 

[johnsmith]

I'm just going to go ahead and try it out.

 

[Centsmom]

Let me know how it works out for you :)

 

[shepherdgirl]

any updates?

 

[ecstatichamster]

I don't use much sugar. I use honey (filtered cheaper honey that I hope/believe is real), and orange juice and eat ripe fruit. When winter sets in, I'll cook fruit in sugar again if I can't get ripe fruit. Otherwise I don't use straight sugar much.

 

[johnsmith]

any updates?

I ordered another two bags of the stuff a while ago. It seems fine. I take a table spoon of the stuff right before I eat potatoes.

 

[shepherdgirl]

I ordered another two bags of the stuff a while ago. It seems fine. I take a table spoon of the stuff right before I eat potatoes.

Did you notice any benefits?

 

[hotte]

Fructose supports building of advanced glycation endproducts! Not really a good choice.

 

[DrJ]

I've experimented quite a bit with the powdered fructose with good results. I'll pass along my subjective observations.

First fructose can very rapidly restore liver glycogen through fructolysis. If you've perhaps done some heavy drinking in your younger years, you might consider trying it to improve glycogen storage. When I first started taking it, I would take about a tablespoon of the powder at a time. What would happen is I would keep getting hungrier and hungrier after each spoonful, so would be taking about a spoonful every 30 minutes or so until I felt satisfied. I suspect this was turning off any stress hormones in play and the liver was saying "hey! Sugar I can use is coming in, so bring more until my glycogen is full." Very scientific, i know, but several hours afterward I would enjoy the calm happiness I associate with stable blood sugar. Even now, if I'm not hungry, and I know I should be, I'll take a spoonful of fructose powder and pretty soon I'll feel quite hungry, so I think it's good at suppressing the stress hormones by restoring liver glycogen.

If you look at the ratio of fructose to glucose in most fruits - and especially the more 'peat-ish' fruits - you'll notice they generally (not all) have a bit more fructose than glucose and fruits are not very insulin stimulating because fructose tends to blunt the insulin response (and also because of their potassium content). Based on this, I wondered if I could take fructose with a starchy meal (I like to have a thin crust pizza on occasion) to help mitigate hyperglycemia. Typically eating a whole pizza will put me to sleep (hyperglycemia symptom) and diabetes and the diagnosis of pre-diabetes runs strongly on both sides of my family, so I am probably facing some of that. Taking several tablespoons of fructose while I ate the pizza avoided the sleepiness, and I have done this several times with the same result.

Anecdotally, I think fructose helps my digestion by turning off the sympathetic nervous system (restoring liver glycogen). I notice it moves pretty well when I take fructose. I also stumbled across some articles seeming to say that the cells that line the intestine could run directly off fructose that comes through, but I was not able to further verify. At the same time, I came across some article indicating that the testes cells can run off fructose, so maybe could help with testosterone production or libido. I noticed a bit of an increase in libido, but would not know if that was from direct action of fructose on the testes or because it was just inhibiting stress hormones.

Basically, if you suspect you might have low glycogen stores or if you suffer some pre-diabetes/hyperglycemia symptoms, you might want to experiment with fructose. However, it will obviously be missing minerals and vitamins that would come with fruits. If you determine by isolated use of fructose powder that it helps you, that's a good clue as to what is going on, and then you could switch to increasing fruit in the diet rather than supplementing fructose.

 

[johnsmith]

Did you notice any benefits?

I may have noticed subtle things like being less tired after eating potatoes, and I think my blood sugar stability has improved over time, but who knows what from. I also started supplementing glycine around the same time.

I've experimented quite a bit with the powdered fructose with good results. I'll pass along my subjective observations.

First fructose can very rapidly restore liver glycogen through fructolysis. If you've perhaps done some heavy drinking in your younger years, you might consider trying it to improve glycogen storage. When I first started taking it, I would take about a tablespoon of the powder at a time. What would happen is I would keep getting hungrier and hungrier after each spoonful, so would be taking about a spoonful every 30 minutes or so until I felt satisfied. I suspect this was turning off any stress hormones in play and the liver was saying "hey! Sugar I can use is coming in, so bring more until my glycogen is full." Very scientific, i know, but several hours afterward I would enjoy the calm happiness I associate with stable blood sugar. Even now, if I'm not hungry, and I know I should be, I'll take a spoonful of fructose powder and pretty soon I'll feel quite hungry, so I think it's good at suppressing the stress hormones by restoring liver glycogen.

If you look at the ratio of fructose to glucose in most fruits - and especially the more 'peat-ish' fruits - you'll notice they generally (not all) have a bit more fructose than glucose and fruits are not very insulin stimulating because fructose tends to blunt the insulin response (and also because of their potassium content). Based on this, I wondered if I could take fructose with a starchy meal (I like to have a thin crust pizza on occasion) to help mitigate hyperglycemia. Typically eating a whole pizza will put me to sleep (hyperglycemia symptom) and diabetes and the diagnosis of pre-diabetes runs strongly on both sides of my family, so I am probably facing some of that. Taking several tablespoons of fructose while I ate the pizza avoided the sleepiness, and I have done this several times with the same result.

Anecdotally, I think fructose helps my digestion by turning off the sympathetic nervous system (restoring liver glycogen). I notice it moves pretty well when I take fructose. I also stumbled across some articles seeming to say that the cells that line the intestine could run directly off fructose that comes through, but I was not able to further verify. At the same time, I came across some article indicating that the testes cells can run off fructose, so maybe could help with testosterone production or libido. I noticed a bit of an increase in libido, but would not know if that was from direct action of fructose on the testes or because it was just inhibiting stress hormones.

Basically, if you suspect you might have low glycogen stores or if you suffer some pre-diabetes/hyperglycemia symptoms, you might want to experiment with fructose. However, it will obviously be missing minerals and vitamins that would come with fruits. If you determine by isolated use of fructose powder that it helps you, that's a good clue as to what is going on, and then you could switch to increasing fruit in the diet rather than supplementing fructose.

Great post! Im pretty sure Benedicte M. Lerche sometimes recommends pure fructose for the same reasons you mentioned here.

 

[shepherdgirl]

@johnsmith
Thanks so much for your post! Very helpful for me, as I am considering taking more fructose.