Is Yoga Good for Diabetes

For a type 2 diabetic, one thing is for sure. Exercise has to be part of your day to day routine. There are numerous health benefits associated with exercises but that doesn’t mean that you should limit your exercise to jogging, biking or calisthenics. You should also try out yoga. This practice has been there since the ancient period and has been proved to reduce high blood pressure as well as improve blood sugar levels for a diabetic.

In the first place, type-2 diabetes is caused by either failure of the body to produce enough insulin or inefficient use of the hormone insulin in the body. This causes blood sugar levels to build up in the body cells and this in return causes serious health complications. To manage these levels you should adopt a healthy lifestyle that includes regular exercising.

According to Lisa B who is the director of the medical education for a yoga center, yoga should be inclusive of both strength training and aerobics. The main benefits include reducing levels of stress by reducing cortisol which is a stress hormone that also lowers blood glucose levels.

Janet Zappe the clinical programmer at Ohio State University for outpatient diabetes education, recommends yoga primary if you want to manage your stress levels. When you are stressed, this will cause a spike in your blood sugar levels which in return results into further complications. By doing yoga we are able to focus on ourselves and this helps inspire calmness in the process control blood sugar levels.

Effects of yoga on your body and mind

Other than reducing stress levels, yoga is also known to increase mindfulness that involves living and staying in the moment. Lifestyle change when you are diabetic is not an option, doing yoga plays an important role in helping your make healthful and lasting behavioral changes. This is all according to Dr. Nelson a diabetic health expert.

Studies have actually found out that people who score highly when it comes to mindfulness stood higher chances of having healthy blood sugar levels, the opposite is true for people who score low in mindful tests. It has not yet been established how mindfulness is related to the reduction of blood sugar levels but based on the findings of a study published in 2016, mindful people rarely became overweight and obese.

When you do yoga you will also benefit from a reduction in weight, reduction in blood sugar levels as well as a reduction in levels of bad cholesterol. When you get diagnosed with diabetes chances of contracting chronic diseases related to the heart and blood pressure increases, you also stand high chances of having elevated stress levels and levels of bad cholesterol.

In a review that involved 33 studies on the effects of yoga on the body, it was found that if you regularly do yoga you stand high chances of lowering your blood sugar levels, reducing levels of bad cholesterol in the body and losing excess weight. Yoga was also found to enhance sleep, good moods, regulate blood pressure and the general quality of your current life. All this finding are based on a research published in 2013 on a diabetes journal.

According to Nelson, some effects are felt immediately after a yoga session, whereas others like weight reduction and regulation of blood pressure take time to reflect.

How yoga is useful

If you have always wanted to try our yoga or simply on the early stages, with me I boast of an experience ranging to 30 years when it comes to yoga. I know everything on the benefits first hand and will be glad to share it with you.

It’s clear to everyone that stress is always an onset of illness and other health complications. Yoga focuses on taking the brain off your usual worrisome thoughts. This brings the brain to a state of composure and peace where you forget about anything that was bothering you before.

Diabetes is among a few diseases that have no known scientific cure. You have to live with it for the rest of your life taking the very expensive meds.

On a personal experience, yoga time is the only time when I can have my smartphone on silent mode. During this time, my blood sugar fluctuates but its always for the better.

As part of an ongoing experience, I had a gadget that would monitor my blood sugar levels every time fitted on me. In particular, the person conducting the experiment was very excited after seeing how my blood glucose levels responded to my yoga sessions.

With each deep concentration and breath, the gadget monitored an improvement in my blood sugar levels that were always on the high given the fact that I was diabetic.

The bottom-line

Living with diabetes is not easy and most of my friends used to ask me how I managed to live with diabetes, a disease that had no know scientific cure. I always answer them that I approach it like a yoga session. It takes a lot of determination to master everything but with patients, the results will be evident for everyone to see.

My determination enabled me to master rather challenging postures and get into a deep state of mental concentration. There have been incidences when I got off balance and almost fell. Regardless of the hardship, I never failed to push myself to the limit and with the current results, I’m glad I never gave up.