Why “Normal” Blood Sugar Labs Are Lying to You
Episode 270
Dr. Nicole Rivera breaks down the real root causes behind the diabetes epidemic and why simply “managing numbers” isn’t enough. She exposes the hidden dangers of processed foods, the limitations of conventional bloodwork, and shares what it actually takes to heal pancreatic function and reclaim your energy, mind, and long-term health. This is a wake-up call for visionary families and leaders who want to create generational health—by getting proactive, not just reactive. #DiabetesPrevention #PancreaticHealth #IntegrativeMedicine #GenerationalHealth #RootCauseHealing #BloodSugarBalance #FunctionalMedicine #WellnessLeadership #RealFoodRevolution #LiveLimitless 3 Key Takeaways: Most “normal” bloodwork is missing the full picture.Glucose and even A1C aren’t enough—you need a comprehensive look at insulin, amylase, and lipase to truly assess pancreatic health and diabetes risk. Processed foods and chemical additives are sabotaging your pancreas. It’s not just about sugar; it’s about the hidden chemicals in your everyday foods that disrupt your body’s natural ability to regulate blood sugar. You can heal and even reverse blood sugar issues—if you address the root cause. Sustainable results come from real food, lifestyle shifts, and understanding your unique biology—not just popping a pill or chasing “magic” solutions. Quotes: “Don’t be the person that sits around saying, ‘My glucose has been great,’ but you feel like shit. If you relate to the energy crashes, the cravings, the brain fog—there’s an opportunity to actually do something about it.” “Are we just manipulating numbers so you feel better about the situation, or are we more interested in solving the root cause and expressing true health so that we don’t have to fear disease and dysfunction?” Find Integrative You Radio On: Website Youtube Apple Spotify 2 Doctors Committed to Innovating the Healthcare Experience. Integrative You Radio is hosted by husband-and-wife duo, Dr. Nicole Rivera and Dr. Nick Carruthers. With
Topics: sugar, blood, root, energy, health, pancreas, cause, unknown
Key takeaways from this episode
- ## Why “Normal” Blood Sugar Labs Are Lying to You
- Standard bloodwork often misses crucial indicators of metabolic dysfunction, making "normal" results potentially deceptive.
- Processed foods and chemical additives, not just sugar, are major culprits in sabotaging pancreas health.
- Achieving sustainable blood sugar balance and energy requires a root-cause approach focusing on real food and lifestyle, not just reactive measures.
- Symptoms like energy crashes, cravings, and brain fog are signals that your body needs deeper attention beyond typical lab values.
Pull quotes
I don't personally talk about weight loss because people are usually looking for something magical.
They're looking for something quick. **Unknown:** They're looking for a very simple solution.
This could be through food, this is through environment, it's personal products.
Transcript
**Unknown:** What's up, guys? Dr. Nicole here. I am rolling solo talking to you about diabetes, pancreatic function, and I'm doing this primarily because, one, we are in a serious, serious epidemic of diabetes and blood sugar issues.
**Unknown:** And then of course, we have these, you know, the media peddling all of this information about drugs like Ozempic, weight loss, et cetera. It's-- weight loss has always been a hot topic in general. I don't personally talk about weight loss because people are usually looking for something magical. They're looking for something quick.
**Unknown:** They're looking for a very simple solution. And in reality, it, it's not... In my mind, it's not how it works. I'm not saying that there aren't drugs out there or, or methodologies out there that can cause weight loss, but usually it's not sustainable.
**Unknown:** And part of the bigger picture behind why there is such a-an epidemic of obesity, you know, and weight gain and inflammation is because of the toxicity level that we're all being exposed to. This could be through food, this is through environment, it's personal products. It's honestly hitting all of us from every fucking angle since we are out of the womb. So there, there's a bigger, bigger picture here.
**Unknown:** But one of the other factors when we're, when we're looking at blood work and we're looking at the human body that is extremely, extremely problematic right now, driving, you know, being a driver of obesity, being a driver of inflammation, being a driver of, uh, neurological issues, mental health issues, is pancreatic function. You know, and for those of you that are like, "Where the hell is the pancreas? What is the pancreas?" So, you know, left pec, left breast, you know, if you're a man or a woman, if you go to right below your pec or your breast, you have your ribs right on your left side. And, you know, for, for sake of being hyper, hyper specific, you know, your pancreas is located in this side or in this area, and it does, uh, spread to the bottom of your sternum.
**Unknown:** For those of you on YouTube, you see where I'm pointing right now. And-- But overall, that left rib cage area, more towards the front, even going to the center of your upper, upper abdomen, that's essentially the, the general location of your pancreas. And the reason why I'm sharing this with you guys is because there are a lot of times when I'm doing initial consultations and people are like, "Yeah, you know, I do get pain there a lot." You know, and they-- Sometimes it's random, sometimes it's with exercise, sometimes it's with food. Um, you know, a-and sometimes i-it's like they wake up in the middle of the night like, "Oh my gosh, what is that?" And a lot of times, of course, we're gonna say, "Oh, what did-- did I sleep wrong?
**Unknown:** Oh, did I strain my ribs? Oh, oh, you know, did I, uh, lift something too heavy?" And we have all the reasons why it happens because most of us have not been taught anatomy, so we don't-- we're not aware that some of our aches and pains can actually be associated with organs. And that is the case a lot of the time. So when it comes to, you know, the pancreas, the main function of this organ is to help regulate blood sugar.
**Unknown:** And so you go ahead and you eat sugar, you have carbohydrates, you have pasta, et cetera, and the pancreas has an entire mechanistic process in order to help make sure that just enough of that sugar goes into the blood to act as fuel, just enough of the sugar goes to your brain to act as fuel, and then the rest is going to get filtered out through your kidneys, and essentially you urine-- urinate it out. And so this process will work quite well. But you have to think about the idea of like the boy who cried wolf kind of thought process, is that when you have certain... If you have an abundance of sugar coming in, 'cause I'm gonna talk about this in two different ways.
**Unknown:** If you have an abundance of sugar coming in, like i-it's like an over overload of sugar because you drink soda every day, you put a ton of c- of sugar in your coffee, or you drink Starbucks with syrups in it, and then you eat a lot of bread, you eat a lot of pastas, you eat a lot of carbohydrates. You know, it gets to the point that the pancreas can't keep up. The pancreas and the kidneys can't keep up. They're kind of like, there's more-- It's coming in faster than we can get it out, and that is going to create a set of problems.
**Unknown:** Then there is the other side of the spectrum, which is that a lot of your high sugar foods, processed foods, it's not just sugar, it's a, it's an iteration of sugar, a highly processed iteration of sugar, like high fructose corn syrup. And then in addition to, say, high fructose corn syrup, which is manipulated and created in a lab, is there are other additives. There are other chemical compounds in processed foods. And so what happens is there's a signaling issue, and this is really comes back to this boy who cried wolf idea.
**Unknown:** It's like the, the chemical is shutting off the, the ability for the pancreas to produce what it needs to produce to say-Help the body metabolize and break down the sugar. Those chemicals, like high fructose corn syrup, like it, it pretty much shuts down certain signals. So now your pancreas can't really do its job. It, it's not even aware that what just came in is sugar because the chemical compromised the signaling pattern.
**Unknown:** And so now all of that sugar is floating around in your bloodstream. Remember, it's called blood sugar. Blood sugar. So it is sugar floating around in your blood.
**Unknown:** Think about your blood vessels. If you have a bunch of sugar floating around in your blood, it, it's creating damage, it's creating inflammation. It's also think about it's sticky in nature, and what is it doing? It's creating stickiness with your cells, your red blood cells, so your red blood cells are clumping.
**Unknown:** What do we call that? We call that blood clots. It also creates a stickiness with your cholesterol molecules. What do we call that?
**Unknown:** Oh, we call that high cholesterol. We call that atherosclerosis, which is when it clumps and creates damage in the s- in your blood vessels. So how much of our cardiovascular disease is actually associated with abnormal blood sugar levels, abnormal pancreatic function? Most of it.
**Unknown:** Because if you look, if you take-- if you zoom out and you wanna look at what's going on, especially like places like the US, people don't really eat food. The average kid doesn't eat fruits and vegetables. They eat things out of a box. They eat processed foods.
**Unknown:** Look at what they're serving in cafeterias at schools. Look at what they're serving at cafeterias at, you know, different corporate centers. Um, you know, if you really look at what they serve at schools, it looks exactly like what they serve in prisons. You know, you th- it, it's, it's wild.
**Unknown:** And if you wanna look at that tray, that tray is filled with processed foods. It's milk. Um, if you've ever seen the, one of the original TED Talks, uh, from when the TED Talks really started, Jamie Oliver is a very famous, uh, chef, and he became even more well-known when he did his TED Talk and he dumped a wheelbarrow of sugar onto the stage and said, "This is how much sugar your kids are getting in a year from just drinking milk." Had nothing to do with eating sweets, drinking soda, nothing. He said this is solely from drinking milk because milk is, you know, part of the food pyramid and it's supposed to be something to build strong bones, so kids are drinking an obscene amount of milk compared to what was normal in the past.
**Unknown:** So the point of what I'm, I'm saying right now is that there is a lot of assault on the pancreas based off of the normality of food consumption, processed foods, cereals, drinking milk, eating sweets, but it's really comes down to eating processed foods. I live in Italy right now, and my son is three and a half, and I let him eat cornettos, which are like croissants. I let him eat Italian pastries. I let him, I let him have sweets here.
**Unknown:** And the thing is, is that, one, none of the things that they produce here are that sweet. They're actually not sweet at all. And in addition to that is they just use sugar. They don't use chemical additives.
**Unknown:** You know, you're going to a pasticceria, which is a, it's a bakery, and you're getting... It's flour, it's a little sugar, you know, it's, it's baking powder. Like it, it's-- you're not getting a chemical compound. Food goes bad.
**Unknown:** It actually goes bad. You can't eat... Your, your bread has like a one to two day shelf life. Your pastry is one to two day shelf life.
**Unknown:** So you're not having stabilizers and additives and chemicals to make it fluffier or m- or, um, have these different iterations of sugar, like high fructose corn syrup, that are overly processed. Like it's just not a thing. It's not a thing in a lot of other countries compared to the US. Um, it's still like, I'm still getting used to it even being here over a year of you cannot buy too much food at the grocery store because the shelf life is extremely, extremely low because food is real food, and real food goes bad.
**Unknown:** Being able to, you know, have bread that can sit on your counter for a week is not normal, let alone longer. S-so the thing, th-the main driver that I wanted to talk about here is that you might be going and getting your blood work done, and they're telling you, "You're in the clear for diabetes. You don't have any issues with your glucose." So if you wanna talk about your basic blood work, you might get this through a physical, you might get this through your primary care once a year, twice a year, the, the marker that they're looking, they're using to measure pancreatic function is glucose. Glucose, not good enough.
**Unknown:** If you wanna go to a doctor that maybe is gonna run something a little bit more expanded, they might run your glucose in addition to something called your hemoglobin A1C. The thing about glucose is that it can changeMoment to moment. It can change day to day. You can have a normal glucose level, you can then have an abnormal g-glucose level depending on what you ate or drank.
**Unknown:** Hemoglobin A1C they say is better because it's looking at more of a comprehensive and longer term, uh, view of your pancreas. So it gives you more of like, the average over the course of a few weeks of, you know, how well are you metabolizing sugars? But the thing is, is that in my years, plenty of times I have, I have spoken to a person and there has been a huge red flag of they have some blood sugar issues, which I'm gonna talk about momentarily, and I run hemoglobin A1C and I run their glucose and they're completely normal. And so over the years I started to expand the labs that I would run and I started to really look at insulin as well as amylase as well as lipase.
**Unknown:** So I'm gonna say that again. I started looking at insulin, lipase and amylase. Amylase and lipase are pancreatic enzymes. So pancreatic enzymes give you an idea of how well these enzymes are being produced to help break down not just carbohydrates and sugars, but also fats.
**Unknown:** But also, uh, you know, conventionally if these pancreatic enzymes are elevated, this is a sign that there is pancreatic inflammation. Pancreatitis is what it is known as. Itis means inflammation. So there's pancreatic inflammation, which means that there is a dysfunction in pancreatic function.
**Unknown:** It's not working properly. And then insulin is the marker that really allows us to know, is your body getting signaled? W- i- is the sugar coming in actually signaling a response for your body to metabolize and break down and, and excrete excess sugar and, or, and, and also use sugar properly? Or if your insulin is abnormal it means like your pancreas doesn't really know how to process sugar, which means that sugar is now creating an inflammatory response in your brain as well as in your cardiovascular system.
**Unknown:** So the moral of the story is, is that if you really wanna know, do I have a risk of diabetes? Do I have blood sugar issues? Do I have a risk of Alzheimer's, which is-- or, or dementia, which they're actually calling type three diabetes, Alzheimer's and dementia. Do I have these risks?
**Unknown:** Do I have risk of atherosclerosis? Um, do I have risks of my coronary arteries getting clogged? Do I have risks of cholesterol issues? Do I have risks of all of these, you know, things that are oriented around heart disease?
**Unknown:** Do I have these risks? Well you need to be looking at the comprehensive labs for the pancreas. You need to look at glucose, you need to look at, look at hemoglobin A1C, you need to look at amylase, you need to look at lipase and you need to look at insulin. And if you have this collective view you can have a better understanding of, you know, is my pancreas functioning properly?
**Unknown:** Is my pancreas inflamed? Am I pre-diabetic? Am I diabetic? And what the fuck can I do about it?
**Unknown:** Don't get me wrong, figuring out what to do about it, usually you do need to speak to someone who has a bigger knowledge base outside of pharmacology, medication and surgery, because the natural recommendation would be using different drugs like metformin or Ozempic, et cetera, which be my guest, go ahead, look those drugs up, look at the side effects. Also one of the ways that you can get more accurate understanding of how these drugs work and their black box warnings is if you type in the drug name and you type in package insert. Do this on Google. It will give you the exact pa- the insert that's in the box of the medication that will give you all of the associated side effects, the common ones, the rare ones, the black box warnings, et cetera.
**Unknown:** Very, very, very helpful. But the thing is about this conversation is that a lot of people are walking around with symptoms of blood sugar dysregulation, and if you've listened to me you've heard me say this many, many, many, many times and I will take full accountability that this was me for a very long time in my life, and I will preface with this, is that I worked in the restaurant industry. Um, one, it's fast-paced, it's high stress, you run on adrenaline for a couple of hours and then you usually have a cocktail or some type of drink at the end of the night intuitively as a downer to bring your adrenaline down. And when you're running around in h- in that fast-paced environment you're not eating.
**Unknown:** So you're running solely on adrenaline, and that's where all of your energy is coming from and then at the end of the night if you consume a glass of wine or a cocktail to, you know, bring down your adrenaline, those drinks are sugar. They-- a-and, and if you're like, "No, I just have like a vodka martini," it breaks down to sugar. That's what alcohol does. So that was a, a big part of, of some of the issues that I had with my blood sugar.
**Unknown:** But I wanna explain kind of how the, the blood sugar looks because this isn't that you're having, um, you know, different attacks or anything like that.You can, which we'll talk about as well. But the most typical, the most typical, um, presentation is going to be people that wake up in the morning, they are not hungry. There are some people that wake up in the morning, which indicates ex- more extreme blood sugar issues, that they're nauseous. They're like, "I can't even look at food.
**Unknown:** I can't smell food." That is an indicator that you have more pancreatic dysfunction. But if you wake up not hungry, you still have some level of pancreatic dysfunction. So you wake up, a lot of times people still need something to dust the cobwebs off their brain, so they're going for coffee or some type of caffeinated beverage, and then this is something that will further suppress their appetite, mainly because it's driving up more stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline, and now they get to the afternoon before they're going for food. And some people, this could be eleven o'clock, some people it's noon, some people it's even l- as late as two, three PM.
**Unknown:** The later-- The longer you can go, the more compromised your blood sugar is, the more com-compromised your pancreas is. And the thing is, is that intuitively, your blood sugar is so bottomed out at that point in the afternoon that you are craving carbohydrates. Some people are going for the healthier carbohydrates, not thinking that it's carbohydrates. So a lot of times we think like, "Oh, if I sit down and have a big bowl of pasta, or if I have a pizza or a burger with a bun," that's, you know, that's the, the more processed shit versions of, um, carbohydrate and fat-rich meal.
**Unknown:** But if you think about sushi, if you think about a rice bowl, if you think about a smoothie bowl, all of those are actually packed with sugar as well. Rice is gonna break down into sugar. It's a carbohydrate. So you're intuitively-- It doesn't matter if you're going healthy route or not, you're intuitively craving carbs.
**Unknown:** But you eat, and it spikes your sugar, and then it falls pretty quickly. So post-lunch, you're getting a little sleepy. You need some type of pick-me-up. Some people go, you know, they go to the Starbucks, they get themselves a coffee.
**Unknown:** Some people are grabbing a, a soda or a tea with caffeine, or some people are grabbing themselves a chocolate bar from the vending machine with, which also will have caffeine and sugar. And then, you know, we, we have somewhat of a repeat of the process, is that, you know, we get to dinner time, and we realize, "Oh my gosh, I'm starving again." We might be snacking on crackers, and then we have our dinner, and then by the later evening hours, we are looking for something sweet. Could be a piece of chocolate. It could be an ice cream.
**Unknown:** This is the very, very typical and very, very common blood sugar crisis/blood sugar cycle. And so the longer this goes on, you can start to have some, quote-unquote, "episodes," as I described. Um, for myself, what started happening to me is I started, um, getting really lightheaded and dizzy, and then it would pass. No big deal.
**Unknown:** Move on. Keep going. And then it actually started to affect my vision sometimes. And so I would get so lightheaded, dizzy, I would actually get, like, very fuzzy vision, almost like the fuzzy screen on the TV.
**Unknown:** And again, didn't last. It would go away. So this is usually when the, you know, your pancreas is more and more compromised, more and more inflamed, and you're having such highs and lows with your blood sugar, and then tagging along with that is highs and lows in your stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. So very often, this isn't really just about the repair and restoration of your pancreatic function.
**Unknown:** Yes, that is extremely important, but it's also about, in tandem, balancing your stress hormones because they, they work together. And so when I work with people, very often we're doing what we need to do in order to figure out, well, one, is this solely dietary, or are there actually things that are stressing the physical pancreas? The physical pancreas is part of your digestive system. There are many people that I work with that have toxins inside of the pancreatic tissue or even parasites.
**Unknown:** So are we working on that? Is that a, is that a part of the puzzle for that person? How am I also helping them with not necessarily just what they eat, but how they eat in order to create more stabilization of the blood sugar? How am I also helping them with lifestyle as well as s-stress levels in their life, even their schedule?
**Unknown:** How am I helping them with different things that are contributing to cortisol and adrenaline imbalances, hormonal imbalances? So if you can bring all of that together, you can actually heal the pancreas quite quickly, you can stabilize the blood sugar quickly, and you can prevent diabetes, or you can even reverse diabetes. But again, this isn't just don't eat sugar, just don't eat pasta, just take Ozempic, just take metformin, and you're done. You could do those things.
**Unknown:** Um, one, having a, a, a long peri- long periods of time of elimination diet or restrictive diets is not fun. Um, you know, there's a whole mental component that comes with deprivation. And then, you know, theThere is a lot of things that are coming out now about the long-term use of some of these drugs. Definitely Ozempic is in the spotlight a bit now because so many people took it and had these amazing weight loss experiences, but now they have osteopenia and osteoporosis and they're losing their teeth and they have gut issues and they have thyroid cancer, et cetera.
**Unknown:** So there's definitely some serious side effects to be considered. And the last thing that I'll really say with more of the old school drugs like metformin for diabetes and pancreatic blood sugar regulation, I had a client many, many years ago and I remember he was very fear-based and he worked with us, but if he would go to his more conventional doctor because he needed something, some type of paperwork or whatnot, there was always fear that came out of those sessions. And he said to him, oh, your blood sugar, your hemoglobin A1c is more elevated and you're going to be a diabetic soon if you don't do something about it. And that, for this gentleman, that's all he had to hear and it was complete fear mode.
**Unknown:** His dad had diabetes. His dad lost a limb. So it was just like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, I can't go down that road. I need to control this.
**Unknown:** And so he went on the metformin medication and he came to me and he told me what he was doing and this and that. And I just said to him, I go, listen, if you come off of the metformin tomorrow and we wait three days and we retest your hemoglobin A1c, it's going to be high again. I go, so you have to really think about what you're doing here. This is a psychosomatic pill you're taking.
**Unknown:** You're taking a pill that is lowering a level without resolving the actual root cause, the pancreatic dysfunction, the pancreatic inflammation. But you feel better knowing that that number is lower on your blood work. But in reality, if you come off of this pill, that number goes right back up because the problem still exists. So you're technically still a diabetic, even though this level looks better.
**Unknown:** So how much of this is about your psychosomatic relief and how much of this is about you truly wanting to get to the bottom of your health or resolving your health issues? And so I really invite you to think about that is, you know, are we just manipulating numbers so that you feel better about the situation? Or are we more interested in solving the root cause and expressing true health so that we don't have to fear disease and dysfunction? So the point is, is that you potentially need better data because if you're just getting your glucose checked, you're not getting enough information.
**Unknown:** You need better data so that you have better understanding of what's going on in your body. And then you have better options in order to resolve it, which yields better outcomes. Don't be the person that sits around saying my glucose has been great, but you know you feel like shit. You know you're related to what I just said about not having an appetite, you know, getting super hungry mid-afternoon, getting really tired, needing a coffee.
**Unknown:** Like if you relate to that, you have an opportunity to do something about it. It's not about just saying the number looks good, so I don't have to worry about it until I have to worry about it. It's shifting from the idea of being reactive to proactive. So I hope this was helpful.
**Unknown:** I hope you wrote down all of those markers. Take them to your doctor. Get them tested. Start from there.
**Unknown:** And, you know, revisit this if you're looking for ways to empower yourself in order to help improve your blood sugar function.
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About Integrative You Radio
Integrative You Radio is a root cause medicine and integrative medicine podcast hosted by Dr. Nicole Rivera and Dr. Nick Carruthers — two integrative doctors who build personalized wellness protocols from your DNA, minerals, hormones, gut, and nervous system rather than from a population template. Looking for an integrative doctor who reads your labs together instead of in isolation? This is the show.
Further reading
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