Insulin

The pancreas, when not overwhelmed by excess carbohydrate, performs what Aajonus described as the essential architectural work of the entire digestive system. From the moment food enters the mouth, the pancreas begins receiving chemical signals about what is in that food. Even two tomatoes from the same vine, or two cups of milk from the same animal, will carry different nutrient concentrations and different molecular structures, and the pancreas registers each one individually and responds accordingly. It decides what bacteria to propagate in the intestines to break down that particular food, how much hydrochloric acid and other digestive fluids will be needed, what enzymes must be supplied, and how the resulting components must be restructured into human cellular material specific to that person's body.

This is not insulin work. This is the function that insulin production has displaced or crowded out as carbohydrate consumption expanded. When the pancreas is constantly occupied with manufacturing insulin to handle excessive sugar loads, it is pulled away from this primary architectural and coordinating role, and the downstream consequences affect every system the pancreas was designed to support.

Endogenous insulin, when produced by a functioning pancreas in response to appropriate dietary signals, binds with sugars and converts them into glycogen, which is a storable, carbohydrate-based sugar that the body can use later to run the brain and nervous system. Glycogen produced through this process is the form the nervous system draws on for fuel under the conditions of a high-carbohydrate diet.

Aajonus distinguished sharply between this endogenously produced glycogen and what happens when glycogen is manufactured from pyruvate, which is a sugar derived from protein metabolism. When the body produces glycogen from pyruvate, there is no significant harmful byproduct. When the body produces glycogen from dietary carbohydrates, including raw fruit and raw vegetables, the byproduct is what Columbia University researchers identified as an advanced glycation end product, abbreviated as AGE. Aajonus cited research from Columbia University in New York State, attributed to a laboratory at Millhouse, establishing that healthy bodies store 70 percent of these advanced glycation end products indefinitely, and unhealthy bodies store up to 90 percent of them. These compounds accumulate in the body for a lifetime and contribute to arterial sclerosis by attaching to venous and arterial walls, feed cancerous processes, cause yeast infections, fungal conditions, athlete's foot, gangrene, and a wide range of other degenerative outcomes. The conclusion he drew from this was that the mere fact of insulin being produced in abundance, even when the pancreas is functioning well, does not make carbohydrate consumption safe or appropriate.

Aajonus described his own personal medical testing experience in detail to illustrate what healthy endogenous insulin production looks like. He underwent glucose tolerance testing for the first time since approximately 1972 or 1973, having been a type 1 juvenile diabetic and having reversed that condition entirely through a raw food diet. The glucose tolerance test measures how the body handles an administered sugar load over a period of hours, with blood drawn every 30 minutes.

He reported that in healthy individuals, the blood sugar level is brought down and stabilizes around 104, which is the point at which insulin production normally stops. His own blood sugar was taken all the way down to 54, a level the examining physicians said they had never observed. More significantly, the physicians found that he was producing not only the standard forms of insulin but all four recognized varieties of endogenous insulin, plus at least one variety they had not previously encountered. The physicians stated he had the healthiest pancreas they had ever examined, with the additional detail that it was smaller than any pancreas they had seen in their testing pool. This was particularly remarkable given his documented history as a juvenile diabetic who had been told he would never have a functioning pancreas. The smaller size of the pancreas, combined with its superior function, confirmed his framework claim: a pancreas not burdened by carbohydrate processing returns to a more compact, more efficient state, producing richer and more complete insulin when it does produce it.

Because glycogen is required to fuel the brain and nervous system, and because the advanced glycation end product byproduct of carbohydrate-derived glycogen accumulates at such high rates in the body, Aajonus emphasized that the body has an alternative route. When protein is metabolized, pyruvate is formed, and pyruvate can be used to construct a glycogen-equivalent substance that runs the brain and nervous system without producing significant harmful residue. This is how the Maasai, eating exclusively meat and fat with no carbohydrates, maintained functioning brains and nervous systems without requiring substantial insulin production at all. The implication is that endogenous insulin, in its historically appropriate role, was a minor and occasional tool for handling the small amounts of sugar encountered in a meat-and-fat diet, not the constant high-volume production the modern pancreas is forced into.

When dietary sugar and starch loads are consistently high, the pancreas must manufacture insulin in quantities it was not designed to sustain. The consequences move in two directions depending on individual constitution and production capacity. For individuals who produce enough insulin to convert the sugar loads into glycogen, the result is significant fat accumulation, because glycogen is a storable substance and the body deposits it. For individuals who do not produce sufficient insulin to keep up with the sugar load, the excess sugar circulates in the blood and drives overactivity of the nervous system and brain, manifesting as hyperactivity, ADHD, manic-depression, and extreme mood swings. There is no middle ground, Aajonus stated; high carbohydrate consumption produces one outcome or the other.

When refined sugars specifically are consumed, the situation worsens in a distinct way. Refined sugars are mutations, and they enter the blood too rapidly for the body to process them correctly. The pancreas overproduces insulin even when blood sugar is not actually high, because the mutant sugar signals provoke an exaggerated response. This over-secretion binds with sugars and pulls blood sugar too low, producing hypoglycemia. Sustained hypoglycemia of this kind exhausts the pancreas over time and is, in Aajonus's framework, a direct precursor to diabetes, not a separate condition. The liver is also over-stimulated in this process.

Hypoglycemia, meaning chronically low blood sugar, is very often a condition where the pancreas is over-secreting insulin rather than under-producing it. The excess endogenous insulin binds with available sugars and converts them into glycogen too aggressively, leaving the blood depleted of sugar and producing the characteristic symptoms of hypoglycemia. Over time, this overproduction exhausts the pancreas, and exhaustion of the pancreas is what leads to diabetic conditions. The pancreas moves from overproduction to underproduction as the organ deteriorates from the sustained demand.

Aajonus described this in practical terms by noting that someone who eats large amounts of candy or refined sugar will paradoxically develop low blood sugar, because the sugar load stimulates an exaggerated insulin response that drives blood sugar below normal. The protocol he recommended for absorbing excess endogenous insulin in this situation was a specific combination: cooked starch, raw fat, and fresh fruit, taken together. The cooked starch searches for and binds with the excess insulin in the system. The raw fat then binds with that complex and transports it to the bowels for elimination, preventing the bound insulin from being re-stored as glycogen. The raw fruit sugar, being mixed with the fat and starch, is time-released into the blood rather than spiking all at once, allowing blood sugar to stabilize at a balanced level.

Aajonus categorized the pancreas as both an organ and a gland, and he acknowledged that it functions partially as an endocrine gland under present conditions because endogenous insulin is secreted directly into the bloodstream. This direct secretion into the blood is what defines endocrine function, bypassing the digestive canal entirely. However, he was careful to distinguish this from the pancreas's primary identity. Its main role involves secreting enzymes and hormones into the intestines, directing digestion and nutrient restructuring. The insulin-into-blood function is secondary, recent in evolutionary terms, and a product of dietary pressure rather than original design.

He also noted that the pancreas produces thousands of different substances analogous to or related to insulin, and that insulin is only one among many. These other pancreatic hormones are released throughout the body and allow nutrients to be utilized at distributed sites rather than having everything processed centrally. With raw food specifically, the pancreas can realign enzymes in liquid form throughout the body because raw food proteins arrive in a state requiring minimal digestion, only molecular realignment, which the proper pancreatic insulin hormones alongside other pancreatic secretions can accomplish at any location in the body rather than only at the digestive center.

Separate from endogenous insulin production by the pancreas, Aajonus described a natural substance called inulin, found in Jerusalem artichokes, yams, and certain other foods, that acts in the body like an insulin-like substance. He distinguished this from pharmaceutical insulin entirely. When a person's pancreas is producing insufficient or non-functional insulin, foods containing natural inulin help process sugars and provide the insulin-like activity the pancreas is failing to provide. He recommended juicing Jerusalem artichokes and yams and mixing them with carrot and other juices for individuals whose pancreas appeared inactive or severely compromised, noting that juiced forms were considerably more effective for someone in poor pancreatic condition than whole foods. He also noted that this natural inulin has a connection to emotional function, stating that insulin-like activity has a role in the connection to the heart and to feeling, and that without it people become emotionally detached and operate without the capacity for normal emotional response.

He also described unheated honey as acting like an insulin-like substance in the body. When diabetics begin consuming unheated honey, he observed that they are typically able to reduce their insulin intake by approximately half almost immediately, because the honey performs the functional equivalent of insulin in processing sugars. He recommended approximately three-quarters of a cup of unheated honey distributed throughout the day for diabetic conditions, with the best type being partially crystallized completely unheated honey, noting that unheated honey crystallizes naturally within a year unless exposed to heat or hot weather, and that refrigerating it speeds crystallization.

Aajonus described a method of assessing pancreatic insulin status through examination of the hand, reading it similarly to palmistry. The zone of the hand corresponding to the pancreas is the area just above the ball of the thumb in the fatty region. If that area is puffy, he interpreted it as edemic, meaning the pancreas is swollen. If it is red, he read it as inflamed. Both puffiness and redness indicate an overactive pancreas secreting excess insulin, which produces hypoglycemia. If the area appears like a chicken's or turkey's cowl with folded, ridged skin, he interpreted that as a sign of a pancreas that is largely inactive, corresponding to a diabetic state with insufficient insulin production. In such cases he recommended foods with natural inulin, eating sugars only with accompanying fats, and consuming substantial amounts of unheated honey as a functional insulin substitute.

The core of Aajonus's position on injected pharmaceutical insulin was that it cannot replicate what the body's own endogenous insulin does. Even porcine insulin, derived from pigs, is processed in ways that render it chemically different from biologically produced human insulin. Synthetic insulin is entirely removed from any biological equivalence. When either form of exogenous insulin converts sugar into glycogen, the resulting glycogen is chemically acrid, meaning highly acidic, in a way that endogenously produced glycogen is not. This acrid glycogen stores in the extremities and over years and decades eats into connective tissue and surrounding tissue, producing the gangrene and amputations characteristic of long-term insulin-using diabetics. He observed that diabetics who have been on pharmaceutical insulin for 27 to 30 years begin losing toes, then feet, then lower limbs in sequence, and attributed this specifically to the acrid quality of the inadequately processed glycogen produced by pharmaceutical insulin.

He further noted that modern pharmaceutical insulin formulations contain additives that create dependency and dehydration effects so severe that withdrawal from them resembles withdrawal from heroin. He described a case of a 12-year-old boy who began vomiting profusely for 24 hours, and whose mother gave him insulin assuming diabetic crisis, but whose actual condition was severe dehydration. The insulin made no difference because the blood sugar elevation was a dehydration artifact, not a pancreatic failure. Aajonus ordered samples of the two insulin formulations the child was using to examine what had been added to them to produce such severe withdrawal-like effects.

The contrast he drew was total: endogenous insulin produced by a healthy, appropriately fed pancreas creates a fully workable, biologically complete conversion of sugar into glycogen, free of the acrid residue that pharmaceutical insulin produces. The body's own production, when supported by correct diet, raw fat, raw protein, and unheated honey, performs the function cleanly and without the progressive tissue destruction that injectable insulin causes.

Aajonus's position was that the pancreas can recover its capacity to produce proper endogenous insulin when given the correct nutritional environment. He reported having worked with over 120 diabetic clients and stated that none of them remained diabetic after working with him. The general framework for recovery involved removing cooked sugars and all pasteurized juices from the diet entirely, ensuring raw fat was consumed with every sweet food, eating substantial raw protein particularly fish and beef to rebuild pancreatic nerve tissue, and using unheated honey as a functional insulin substitute throughout the healing period.

For individuals who had been on pharmaceutical insulin for at least two years, he recommended a slow weaning process rather than abrupt discontinuation, because the pancreas typically required up to two years to rebuild sufficient function. One observable indicator for when to decrease pharmaceutical insulin dosage was the onset of skin itching, which he described as a signal that the pancreas had recovered enough function to begin handling more of the load on its own.

He cited Hippocrates as having cured juvenile diabetes 100 percent of the time using only a raw milk diet for six to ten weeks, with no other intervention. He acknowledged that the quality of modern raw milk, even when genuinely raw, does not match what was available when milk was consumed warm directly from the udder without refrigeration, because dropping milk below 76 degrees alters growth hormones and other components. Despite this, he stated that raw goat's milk specifically causes diabetes to disappear, describing it as addressing what is fundamentally an energy and digestive problem rather than an insulin deficiency in most cases. He estimated that 85 to 90 percent of all individuals he had seen diagnosed as diabetic were not actually diabetic at all, that their pancreases were producing insulin but that a momentary or circumstantial test result had led to a pharmaceutical insulin prescription that then persisted for decades unnecessarily.