City Driving & the life of your car (Sugar III)

City Driving  & The Life of Your Car - Sugar III.

You remember your dad… or maybe your grandfather… the guy who taught you a little about cars? 

One thing they all agreed on:

City driving is hard on an engine. Start. Stop. Idle. Brake. Accelerate.

The engine never settles into a steady rhythm.

Highway miles are easy. City miles wear things out.

And whether you like it or not…your metabolism works the same way.

In this week’s blog, you’ll meet Bob and Tina — above-average Americans trying to live well while keeping up with the fast pace of life.

Their lives are a case study in why our engine — the metabolism — doesn’t last as long as it should.

Not because of one big binge fest of cake and ice cream at a Pizza party –

But because of constant exposure to sugar.  The insulin engine turning on… off… on… off… all day long.

…………Or, as my grandfather would have said:  Too much city driving.

A Quick Reset

For new readers — and even long-term customers - I know it can be hard to keep up with my stream-of-consciousness writing. But at the core, these blogs keep circling the same idea: 

Eat better if you want to live longer.

Taken together, they make three consistent points:

1. The Western diet is unhealthy by default.
Left unchecked, it overloads us with carbohydrates, sugars (real and artificial), unhealthy oils, and additives. Staying healthy today requires paying attention.

2. Excess sugar — obvious and hidden — sits at the center of chronic disease in the United States.
Ignore intake long enough and eventually you become a statistic.

3. You can’t wait for authority to act.
It often takes 20–25 years for population-level health data to surface. By then the damage is done. Read. Study. Make a choice.

This story builds on point #2. Because the real issue isn’t birthday cake or pizza night.

It’s constant exposure. Never letting the engine rest.

Meet Bob and Tina

Bob and Tina are in their early 40s with two kids. Dual income. Busy. Educated. Trying.

Tina works and still cooks. She reads labels, shops carefully, and loves feeding her family a good meal. It takes effort — real effort — but it matters to her.

Bob works in construction management. Time and productivity matter. He listens to Tina, avoids soda most days, skips dessert when he can, and considers himself health-conscious.

They are not outliers. They are exactly who food companies market to.

First, Some Basic Science

Before we walk through Bob’s day, two grounding principles:

1. Carbohydrates — sugar or starch — break down into glucose.

2. Carbs become glucose your body must process.

So if a label shows 40 grams of carbs, that eventually becomes glucose your metabolism must handle.

Yes, absorption speed varies. Fiber slows things. Glycemic index matters.

But those factors change timing — not total load. And total load is what wears the engine down.

Bob’s Day

Let’s look at a typical weekday.

Breakfast

Coffee with cream and sugar.
Egg sandwich with cheese on whole wheat.

Running total: ~27g glucose

Mid-Morning Snack

Honey roasted peanuts in the truck.

+12g → Total: 39g

Lunch

6-inch tuna sub on whole wheat.
Chips.
Regular Coke.

Bob skips the cookie.

+75g → Total: 114g

Afternoon Snack

Peanut butter crackers.

+18g → Total: 132g

Dinner — Fried Chicken Night

Family tradition. Sometimes Tina cooks it. Sometimes it’s KFC on the way home.

Bob’s plate:

• Fried chicken pieces (carbs from breading)
• Mashed potatoes and gravy
• Coleslaw
• Two dinner rolls
• Diet Coke

Dinner load: ~103g

Grand Total:

~235 grams of carbs converted to glucose.

Bob didn’t binge.
Bob skipped dessert.
Bob chose whole wheat.

Still… 235 grams.

Some say, “Bob’s killing himself.”  Others say, “Kevin, relax. The body burns 150–200 grams of glucose a day anyway.” Bobs doing fine.  

Not really  -  here’s what folks sometimes miss:

• The body will make glucose if needed. If intake is low, it pulls from stored fuel — fat.

• Insulin response comes first. Burning calories comes later.... that's important.  

So, the problem isn’t indulgence………. the problem is Bob’s pancreas works all day. Start. Stop. Start. Stop. City driving.

What Insulin Actually Does

A useful analogy: insulin acts like a vacuum cleaner.

Sugar enters the bloodstream, and insulin runs around sucking it up and storing it — mostly as fat.

“Better Save this for later. Never know when we might need it.”

But over years, belts wear out, hoses crack - The vacuum struggles.

Eventually it stops working. That’s Type 2 diabetes.

What Happens When Sugar Intake Drops?

If glucose isn’t constantly coming in, the body switches fuel sources. Like a hybrid engine.

It pulls stored fat and converts it into ketones — excellent fuel for steady running.

Highway driving.

The Quiet Problem

Insulin resistance develops quietly, very quietly…. Until one day…you hear the engine start knocking.... what's that ? 

And by then… the damage is already in motion.

The Real Takeaway

Bob’s engine isn’t failing because he eats more glucose than he burns. It fails because it never gets a break from processing it.

Not excess in one moment. But overload spread across every day. 

Why This Matters

The biological progression of metabolic disease is well documented:

Insulin resistance → Fatty liver → Type 2 diabetes → cardiovascular disease → Stroke or heart attack.

And that doesn’t include inflammation-driven conditions like obesity, dementia risk, autoimmune issues, arthritis, sleep disruption, hormone imbalance and cancer.

And here’s the kicker:

Modern diets are pushing these problems 10–20 years earlier than previous generations.

Typical Timeline Progression (Chat GPT Provided)

Moral of the Story

Nobody plans to end up sick. It happens quietly, Slowly. One normal day at a time.

So don’t wait…. Make a decision and don’t look back.