Hi Chris,
I admit , these things can get confusing.

Most systems in your body are redundant and rely on heavy feedback , like any
robust system. Meaning : if you knock-out one system , like as much of sorbitol
or glucose you can , than an other system will take over and you will stay
alive. There is a small group of eskimo's living on very high fat. If you lower
one compound , like sorbitol or glucose , your body will signal it and the
feedback will cause to counteract it.

The problem , as I see it , is that by 10 - 20 years ( yes , that long , amazed
me too) too high glucose in our bloodstream and the accompanying high amount of
sorbitol the nerve cells eventually gave up , got damaged.

To formulate it very short : I eated too much , I weighted 117 kg at some point
. Still for me this does not prove that food is poison. I just need to eat much
less.

So the solution is not to avoid all sorbitol (the amount you eat is small
compared to the amount your body makes and your body will replenish it). The
solution might be to block the conversion of glucose to sorbitol by an aldose
reductase inhibitor. Then there will be much less sorbitol in your nerves. Your
body copes with this sutiation by swithching to other systems than sorbitol. It
is now under investigation if this works :

1) does the pain get less
2) can your body overcome it by switching to other systems or what are the side
effects of preventing your body to make sorbitol.

We will soon know. Several late phase clinical trials are underway.

One other thing
Sorbitol is a small solulable molecule
There are no transport systems known in mamals
If the amount of sorbitol gets to high the nerve cell will swell up
Like your skin when you sit in the bath too long
This seems to cause the pain
The same thing hapens when you eat too much salt
For me when I ingest too much salt my feet get swollen
The pain gets worse

hth
Gys

The immediate problem with ingesting sorbitol is
in not absorbed in the intestine as fast.  It goes
lower where the critters love it and create
upset.   This is a problem with many things
that slow absorption of sugar like items from the
th intestine,  A messy situation.

Some diabetic drugs have a like effect.

The issue of detailed mechanism in the body is there
is a lot of assumptions.  We do see changes in the
theories over the years.

The best demonstrated i item to prevent the bad effects is to
control the blood sugars to near normal.  Today that is
control of food input.

I do have eye damage and nerve damage. I have see blurbs
but have never seen an effective treatment to offset the effects
of high blood glucose.

I read the "grabs for research money" and see time go by and
nothing.

It takes a lot of acumu;ated knowledge to get any advance,

Today we do have a way to deal with diabetes.  We need to
break our excess eating habits.  

I write this because I have ben let down by so much  of the
PR  releases.  I suffered from nerve damage.  Saw a new
miracle every year but in the end I find a way to get
my blood sugars under control was the only thing
that worked.

"Some day but not now"
                                         Guy.