What I was thinking was that starch breaks down to the sugars maltose, maltotriose and glucose. In turn maltose and maltotriose also break down to glucose.
Scrap that thought. I went barking up the wrong tree and I think that you and PatJ have solved a 15 year old mystery for me.
I used to have pelvic pain, which resolved suddenly and I had no idea until now that it was in anyway connected to what I was eating. Before the pain eased, I was following the sort of diet that most nutritionists would have been fairly happy with. High in complex carbohydrates, quite low in fat, adequate protein, five portions of fruit or veg most days, food freshly cooked, no ready meals etc etc. But I was overweight and couldn't lose it. So I started a diet that was low carb (no more than 60g per day) but with fat and protein totally unrestricted. My pelvic pain went away. I had assumed that the pain was related to being overweight and I never thought about it again until now. Having read the link that PatJ gave here...........
.................it's quite probable that the pain resolved because my blood sugar and insulin levels weren't spiking any longer.
60g carbohydrate is reasonably easy to achieve if you're able to eat animal protein but I don't think it would be possible for a vegan. However there are other ways to limit sugar spikes and insulin. Obviously, a low glycaemic index diet is one way, as PatJ suggested. But you already indicated that you avoid beetroots and should probably limit carrots so I'm guessing that you're already wise to low glycaemic index foods.
Another way to avoid the spikes seems to be by eating resistant starches. The thread The Resistant Starch Challenge: Is It The Key We've Been Looking For? is currently stretching to 174 pages but the opening post is full of good information. This may be a way to get a similar effect as a low carb diet and take care of your gut bacteria at the same time. A word of warning though - some posters have advised starting slowly with resistant starch. Sorry for taking your thread of topic - it isn't exactly what you asked for but I hope the RS thread is useful.
Yes, I'm familiar with the rollercoaster from years back but, as you know, it isn't just sugar that causes the rollercoaster. The question was about adding a small amount of dried fruit to seeds, not about eating the dried fruit on it's own.
As an adult, I've never eaten a lot of sugar and I'm not big on refined carbs generally but until I adopted that 60g carb diet, I had terrible reactive hypoglycaemia. In other words, even relatively low glycaemic foods weren't working for me. Even though I'm less restrictive with the carbs now, I almost always skip breakfast and often lunch and my blood sugar couldn't be more stable. Unfortunately, when I do eat, I'm a feaster. No full up button. Appetite hormones not right, probably.
