Most diabetics get remarkable results from juicing. If you have had diabetes for 10 years of more, however, it may be a good idea to take digestive enzyme supplements before you start juicing for your diabetes.
The reason some diabetics need enzymes is a complication of diabetes known as gastroparesis. This relatively common condition is caused by damage to the vagus nerve. Just as years of uncontrolled high blood sugar levels can cause neuropathy, or nerve damage, in the hands and feet, they can also cause neuropathy in the nerves that control the muscles that help grind food in the stomach and push it down to the small intestine. Uncontrolled high blood sugar levels can also cause damage in the nerves that stimulate the release of digestive enzymes.
The major problem in gastroparesis is that the sphincter at the top of the stomach, where it connects with the stomach, tends to stay open. This lets stomach acid up into your throat. The sphincter at the bottom of your stomach, the pyloric valve, tends to stay shut. This keeps food from passing into your small intestine where nutrients can be absorbed. If you have to use insulin, its effects become unpredictable because you don't know how soon your body will begin to absorb glucose after you eat, so you don't know when to take your insulin shot.
If you are a type 2 diabetic, you may notice symptoms only occasionally at first. You might have heartburn after a big meal, and you might become constipated. You might suffer so much bloating that you lose your appetite, and the nerves that ordinarily can't keep your muscles active enough to prevent irregularity suddenly work so well that you get diarrhea. Burping, belching, hiccups, and flatulence may also complicate your life. Alcohol, caffeine, and fat make symptoms even worse.
Since one of the most important objectives of juicing for your diabetes is keeping your digestion moving, you may need to some help from digestive enzymes to get started. The kinds of enzymes that will do you the most good are proteolytic or protein-digesting enzymes. These break up the proteins from meat and milk that can settle in your stomach.
Enzyme therapy to get you started on your juicing program doesn't have to complicated or expensive. Chewable tablets of the fruit enzymes papain and bromelain help break up the proteins in food in your stomach so it can pass further down. Take several tablets with every meal. It also helps to take pepsin, which also breaks down proteins, with betaine, which releases hydrochloric acid into your stomach. Take pepsin with betaine before a meal, but don't use betaine if you have acid reflux, gastroesophageal reflux disease, or heartburn. A number of other enzymes are also helpful in addition to bromelain, papain, pepsin, and betaine, but don't leave these key ingredients out.
Prescription medications for this problem try to stimulate damaged nerves. That just won't work if the nerves are seriously damaged. Enzymes for treating diabetic gastroparesis act directly on digested food, and sometimes are the kick start diabetics need for success with juicing to reverse diabetes.