The Blood Sugar Solution is the latest New York Times best selling book from Dr. Mark Hyman. This book is Mark’s fifth NYT bestseller. Curiously, I read a lot in the health and wellness area, but had not yet heard of Dr. Hyman.
After reading this book, I am blown away by the content and have begun to implement much of his advice into my daily routine. I have even bought several copies and given them to family members.
Why is the book so good? This is a great question because much of what he has to say about diet, exercise and nutritional supplements isn’t really new information. In one form or another, I have read a lot of it elsewhere.
However, Dr. Hyman does two things better than the vast majority of health gurus. Let’s get into the review and see that these two things are.
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PART I – UNDERSTANDING THE MODERN PLAGUE
The above heading is Part 1 of the Blood Sugar Solution. The statistical tidbits that Dr. Hyman uses in this section are so powerful, they may make you angry. This is the first thing he does better than most diabetes authors (or any health and wellness author).
Dr. Hyman paints a grim picture of how we have come to the point where 10 percent of Americans have diabetes and this number is scheduled to rise to 30 percent within the decade. He also tackles the overweight or obesity problem (often but not always the precursor to developing diabetes). He coins the term “diabesity” to describe the rise in diabetes and increasing waistline of America and the world.
However, even more disturbingly in Part 1, Dr. Hyman goes on to describe the current corruption of the food industry and the government’s role in fostering and advancing this problem. Here are but just a few examples he provides:
- $13 billion a year spent on marketing junk food to children.
- Annually, the average child watches 10,000 junk food commercials
- 2010 Farm Bill spends $42 billion on subsidizing sugar and fat foods. Money spent on developing healthy food choices? $0
- USA taxpayers spend $4 billion a year on soda for poor Americans through the USDA food stamp program
PART II – THE SEVEN STEPS TO TREATING DIABESITY
Once you are sufficiently horrified with the rise of diabetes and obesity, he then presents the 7 step solution to the problem. The Seven Steps are:
- Step One: Boost Your Nutrition
- Step Two: Regulate Your Hormones
- Step Three: Reduce Inflammation
- Step Four: Improve Your Digestion
- Step Five: Maximize Detoxification
- Step Six: Enhance Energy Metabolism
- Step Seven: Soothe Your Mind
Each step is presented with an example of someone who benefited from implementing the solution he advocates and a healthy dose of data supporting his conclusions. The presentation of the steps was easy to follow and worth reading.
THE REMAINING BOOK COMPONENTS
After reading extensively on the problem and solutions presented in the first two sections of the book, the rest of the Blood Sugar Solution was a little more difficult to follow.
Part III discusses the need for developing a community-based approach to implementing better health. I did not find this section particularly helpful. I understand that if people work together, then they can often accomplish more than an individual. However, this just doesn’t seem feasible for most people.
Part IV discusses his 6 Week Action Plan to starting his health transformation. This section goes into even more detail of the seen steps outlined above. Quite frankly, Part II and Part IV should have been combined.
The problem is that Part II is a lot of theory and Part IV is part theory and part implementation. Unfortunately, the implementation components are still not a clear road map of what to do. He almost lost me in this section, because implementation was little difficult to follow.
However, then comes Chapter 26. Chapter 26 is where you get weekly checklists for what to do, step-by-step, day-by-day. These checklists are EXCELLENT. Now, you can use the checklist to implement the information previously provided.
SUMMATION
While the book gets a little bogged down in the middle, I think that the information is excellent if you persevere through to the end. I have already noticed a difference in my energy levels and overall feeling of well being just by implementing a few of the suggestions made in the book, and I am just getting started. Do yourself a favor and get the book.