Taken off Metformin..now diet and exercise
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JaneKnoll1 wrote: »Now I eat every 3 hours and averaging 40 carbs per meal/snack. I am shocked that I can eat that amount and by the 3 hour mark (when I have to eat again) it's returned to 4.4-5.3 (79.4-95.6) it's a bit higher after dinner but I eat the snack and my average fasting for this week is 4.9 so that makes me happy. I think the trick must be to keep carbs very consistent through the day at each snack and meal. I never/barely snacked before this....I was too afraid my sugar would be driven up and not have time to return to normal. At the two hour post meal mark sometimes it's mid to high 6 but rapidly falls after that..not sure that is optimal...I have now stopped the Blood Sugar Diet at 6 weeks, rather than 8, so that I can give my body what it needs to fight cancer and recover from surgery. ...
So - once I get this pesky breast cancer taken care of - I'll do a second (full) 8 weeks to see if I can push it completely into remission.
Now there's some inspiration!
@JaneKnoll1 - Kudos - words can hardly convey the bounds of my envy! (Your numbers, with your diet and without the first gram of metformin, might be mine only in another life.)
@neohdiver - Congrats on your progress. What does your current diet consist of?
Keep us posted on your progress, eh?
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@RalfLott I'm still sorting that out.
Since I'd been low carb since October, in order to do the OGTT I needed to eat between 100 and 150 carbs a day since the last day of the diet and the test today.
Because of the upcoming surgery, I need to be eating somewhere between 1200 and 1500 calories a day (I don't know exactly what maintenance will be - my scale says it is around 2000 calories, but I know it is not that high).
My plan (until I'm healed from surgery is to eat a higher calorie version of the blood sugar diet (largely Mediterranean style - colorful veggies, healthy fats, avoid starchy & sweet carbohydrates, include non-starchy ones). Higher carbs than I was eating before the 6 weeks on the blood sugar diet, but still relatively low. How many will depend on what my meter tells me I can tolerate. Best guess, maximum of 30-40 net carbs in a 3 hour window (depending on the kind of carbs - more of pulses, fewer simple carbs).
I haven't worked out whether I'll continue the 16:8 fasting. The dietitian at my old doctor's office suggested I needed to be eating relatively constantly. I don't trust that she is expressing health concern, as opposed to an ADA propagated prejudice. On the other hand, what the last few days have shown me is that if I want to eat higher carbs (including more pulses), I may need to spread them out over more hours merely because I have to have time to back off of a higher BG level back to something below 80 - or the next thing I eat adds to the remaining glucose from the prior. (I was rigidly eating a fixed quantity of carbs every 3 hours in a 12 hour window to get ~120 carbs in, and my body never had a chance to recover.)
Can't wait to see what my A1C is tomorrow morning - based on the numbers I've been recording (and adding some for dawn phenomenon that I don't always catch), it should be 5.3-5.43 -
Your attitude is amazing and you are inspirational!!0
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My plan (until I'm healed from surgery is to eat a higher calorie version of the blood sugar diet (largely Mediterranean style - colorful veggies, healthy fats, avoid starchy & sweet carbohydrates, include non-starchy ones). Higher carbs than I was eating before the 6 weeks on the blood sugar diet, but still relatively low. How many will depend on what my meter tells me I can tolerate. Best guess, maximum of 30-40 net carbs in a 3 hour window (depending on the kind of carbs - more of pulses, fewer simple carbs).
I haven't worked out whether I'll continue the 16:8 fasting. The dietitian at my old doctor's office suggested I needed to be eating relatively constantly. I don't trust that she is expressing health concern, as opposed to an ADA propagated prejudice. On the other hand, what the last few days have shown me is that if I want to eat higher carbs (including more pulses), I may need to spread them out over more hours merely because I have to have time to back off of a higher BG level back to something below 80 - or the next thing I eat adds to the remaining glucose from the prior. (I was rigidly eating a fixed quantity of carbs every 3 hours in a 12 hour window to get ~120 carbs in, and my body never had a chance to recover.)
@neohdiver - Your coments have me wondering...
For most of us T2Ds, there must be formulas for balancing the dietary what-and-when variables that affect BG - carb- and protein-abstinence and fasting (leaving aside non-dietary factors like weight loss, sleep, meditation, meds, nutritional needs of other medical conditions, etc.) - that will keep our BG under control and allow us to avoid the complications of T2D.
I feel pretty sure that if I ate only fat, my BG wouldn't spike, and if I ate only a teaspoon of maple syrup every two days or a drop every two hours, the long-term effect on my BG probably won't be conspicuous. But those aren't very useful formulas....
Did you make inroads toward finding a formula that let you eat as many carbs as possible without pushing your BG too high? (Or did the recipe you've described here pretty much fit the bill?)
Let us know how your A1c turns out.
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My plan (until I'm healed from surgery is to eat a higher calorie version of the blood sugar diet (largely Mediterranean style - colorful veggies, healthy fats, avoid starchy & sweet carbohydrates, include non-starchy ones). Higher carbs than I was eating before the 6 weeks on the blood sugar diet, but still relatively low. How many will depend on what my meter tells me I can tolerate. Best guess, maximum of 30-40 net carbs in a 3 hour window (depending on the kind of carbs - more of pulses, fewer simple carbs).
I haven't worked out whether I'll continue the 16:8 fasting. The dietitian at my old doctor's office suggested I needed to be eating relatively constantly. I don't trust that she is expressing health concern, as opposed to an ADA propagated prejudice. On the other hand, what the last few days have shown me is that if I want to eat higher carbs (including more pulses), I may need to spread them out over more hours merely because I have to have time to back off of a higher BG level back to something below 80 - or the next thing I eat adds to the remaining glucose from the prior. (I was rigidly eating a fixed quantity of carbs every 3 hours in a 12 hour window to get ~120 carbs in, and my body never had a chance to recover.)
@neohdiver - Your coments have me wondering...
For most of us T2Ds, there must be formulas for balancing the dietary what-and-when variables that affect BG - carb- and protein-abstinence and fasting (leaving aside non-dietary factors like weight loss, sleep, meditation, meds, nutritional needs of other medical conditions, etc.) - that will keep our BG under control and allow us to avoid the complications of T2D.
I feel pretty sure that if I ate only fat, my BG wouldn't spike, and if I ate only a teaspoon of maple syrup every two days or a drop every two hours, the long-term effect on my BG probably won't be conspicuous. But those aren't very useful formulas....
Did you make inroads toward finding a formula that let you eat as many carbs as possible without pushing your BG too high? (Or did the recipe you've described here pretty much fit the bill?)
Let us know how your A1c turns out.
I am making a distinction between dietary management and remission.
For dietary management, it is a matter of continuously testing new items to see how I react. From October through late March, I could pretty much tolerate up to 20 net carbs in any 3 hour window. I set my tolerance for BG elevation (140), and if anything bumped it over that limit I either cut the quantity or didn't eat it again. Once I'd tested something, it went in my predictable foods so I didn't need to test every time I ate it. Protein and fat don't seem to directly impact my blood glucose (aside from the ability to buffer slightly higher carbs - or to drop a higher blood glucose down if I need to.) Alcohol, on the other hand, gives me about a 30 gram gain in carb tolerance during the period when my liver is processing the alcohol.
(So, for a special occasion, I could have a glass of wine that would give me the ability to also eat a piece of bread without bumping my blood glucose up.)
What I'm working on now is remission - on a daily basis being able to eat whatever I feel like eating without elevating my blood glucose. I appear to be halfway there (from diabetes down to prediabetes). Now that I'm convinced I have made progress, I am hopeful I can make it the rest of the way. The ability to eat whatever I feel like doesn't mean I will. Just like remission for any other disease, if I achieve it I expect to always be on the verge of tipping back over into active disease - so I would exercise my ability to eat what I feel like only occasionally.
As to the other factors - sleep deprivation and stress definitely have a negative impact on my blood glucose. Sleep deprivation I can't do much about at the moment (I started the semester with a 30% increase in work over what was already impossible to manage. I calculated it would take me 80 hours a week just for grading - and that turns out to be an underestimate. Then I started down the cancer diagnosis path, which has eaten up more than 20 hours a week for the past month and a half. Grades are due in 2 days - I have no option but to be sleep deprived.) Stress, on the other hand, I dramatically reduced by firing my doctor (I would have loved to keep her and fire her administrative staff - but that was not an option.)0 -
Let us know how your A1c turns out.
Not as well as I'd hoped - it was 5.6 (only .1 below last time). I'm surprised, since I thought I'd done a better job of catching representative dawn phenomenon samples so my meter average would be closer to the A1c. Oh well - it is normal, at any rate.0 -
Protein and fat don't seem to directly impact my blood glucose (aside from the ability to buffer slightly higher carbs - or to drop a higher blood glucose down if I need to.)
@neohdiver - Thanks.
I was not aware of any food one can eat to lower BG. How does this work?0 -
Protein and fat don't seem to directly impact my blood glucose (aside from the ability to buffer slightly higher carbs - or to drop a higher blood glucose down if I need to.)
@neohdiver - Thanks.
I was not aware of any food one can eat to lower BG. How does this work?
Not everyone reacts the same way, but nuts - particularly almonds - drive my BG down. If I want to be sure I'm safe to eat a large salad, and my BG is over 100, I'll eat 15 oz or so of almonds and it will drop about 20 points within 30 minutes or so.
I can also sometimes buffer higher carb things by combining them (or preceding them) with cheese. It is not as reliable - but works maybe half the time.
Alcohol temporarily turns off the glucose factory in my liver, so taken alone it will drop my blood glucose. Taken with a meal, it drops about 30 carbs worth of glucose out of the picture - so the meal-time elevation is only from the carbohydrates I'm consuming - not the background level of glucose my liver is pumping out all the time to keep me from going hypo.
Those 3 things work the same way for quite a few (but not all) people with diabetes - I found them on my own by experimenting and then I started comparing my experience with others' (especially with the alcohol, since it had the opposite effect I expected when I drank a relatively sweet white wine).
I'm not sure what is going on with the nuts (combination of fat, carb, and protein - and purely a drop in BG). With the fat it spreads out the glucose processing so it occurs over a longer period of time but doesn't get as high.1 -
You are a sourceProtein and fat don't seem to directly impact my blood glucose (aside from the ability to buffer slightly higher carbs - or to drop a higher blood glucose down if I need to.)
@neohdiver - Thanks.
I was not aware of any food one can eat to lower BG. How does this work?
Not everyone reacts the same way, but nuts - particularly almonds - drive my BG down. If I want to be sure I'm safe to eat a large salad, and my BG is over 100, I'll eat 15 oz or so of almonds and it will drop about 20 points within 30 minutes or so.
I can also sometimes buffer higher carb things by combining them (or preceding them) with cheese. It is not as reliable - but works maybe half the time.
Alcohol temporarily turns off the glucose factory in my liver, so taken alone it will drop my blood glucose. Taken with a meal, it drops about 30 carbs worth of glucose out of the picture - so the meal-time elevation is only from the carbohydrates I'm consuming - not the background level of glucose my liver is pumping out all the time to keep me from going hypo.
Those 3 things work the same way for quite a few (but not all) people with diabetes - I found them on my own by experimenting and then I started comparing my experience with others' (especially with the alcohol, since it had the opposite effect I expected when I drank a relatively sweet white wine).
Well, that is pretty interesting! I understand lowering the glycemic content of a meal by thinning out the carbs with fats, fiber, and protein. But the idea that nuts could drive down your BG is a new one. Could you eat some almonds after fasting for, say, 4-6 hours, and have your BG drop?
Also, how much alcohol do you need to do the trick?
Thx again!
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Almonds keep my BS stable...I don't think it drives it down but it keeps it lower than if I don't eat them. 1 oz daily...it's about 24 almonds!!You are a sourceProtein and fat don't seem to directly impact my blood glucose (aside from the ability to buffer slightly higher carbs - or to drop a higher blood glucose down if I need to.)
@neohdiver - Thanks.
I was not aware of any food one can eat to lower BG. How does this work?
Not everyone reacts the same way, but nuts - particularly almonds - drive my BG down. If I want to be sure I'm safe to eat a large salad, and my BG is over 100, I'll eat 15 oz or so of almonds and it will drop about 20 points within 30 minutes or so.
I can also sometimes buffer higher carb things by combining them (or preceding them) with cheese. It is not as reliable - but works maybe half the time.
Alcohol temporarily turns off the glucose factory in my liver, so taken alone it will drop my blood glucose. Taken with a meal, it drops about 30 carbs worth of glucose out of the picture - so the meal-time elevation is only from the carbohydrates I'm consuming - not the background level of glucose my liver is pumping out all the time to keep me from going hypo.
Those 3 things work the same way for quite a few (but not all) people with diabetes - I found them on my own by experimenting and then I started comparing my experience with others' (especially with the alcohol, since it had the opposite effect I expected when I drank a relatively sweet white wine).
Well, that is pretty interesting! I understand lowering the glycemic content of a meal by thinning out the carbs with fats, fiber, and protein. But the idea that nuts could drive down your BG is a new one. Could you eat some almonds after fasting for, say, 4-6 hours, and have your BG drop?
Also, how much alcohol do you need to do the trick?
Thx again!
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But the idea that nuts could drive down your BG is a new one. Could you eat some almonds after fasting for, say, 4-6 hours, and have your BG drop?
Also, how much alcohol do you need to do the trick?
Thx again!
The nut trick works for me to cut the dawn phenomenon - which is a several hour fast. If I've had a relatively high number of carbs for a few days, dawn phenomenon often lasts until early afternoon. I typically don't eat before noon, but If I want to eat something with any carb content at all at lunch time and it hasn't dropped below 100, an ounce or so will typically drop it.
5 oz of alcohol is all I've tried. I log everything and noticed that after a glass of wine at Thanksgiving (moderately sweet), my BG barely budged with the meal. My doctor commented on it (he seemed a bit surprised). Then I hit a rough patch and decided I'd like to have a bit of wine to wind down - and got a moscato (pretty sweet). I was braced for pretty high blood glucose and, instead, it went down significantly. Double-checked the carb content - it should have been barely tolerable based on content.
I spread the bottle out over 3-4 days - 5 oz at a time. I was able to have a reasonable sized slice of bread with my wine, still without elevation. So I started searching for why.
My normal M.O. with new, unfamiliar things, is to figure out everything I can about whatever it is so my life is as predictable as I can make it. (My family specializes in unpredictable - so I create stability where I can find it).
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[quote="JaneKnoll1
Almonds keep my BS stable...I don't think it drives it down but it keeps it lower than if I don't eat them. 1 oz daily...it's about 24 almonds!!
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I don't know that they help with stability for me (I've have very little for the last few weeks & the lowest most stable blood glucose yet). It is a 30-60 minute direct response time when I eat .5-1 oz of almonds.
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It's going quite well eating every 3 hours. My blood sugar results with no meds for 30 days.
Example: yesterday's readings
Fasting: 5.0
PC breakfast 5.4
AC snack 5.3
PC snack 6.8
AC lunch 4.7
PC lunch 6.9
AC snack 4.9
PC snack 5.4
AC dinner 4.3
PC dinner 4.8
AC bedtime snack 5.4
PC bedtime snack 7.6
This morning fasting 4.4
So some are higher than I like (bedtime snack) but most are ok.
It's eating 40-45g carbs at each 3 hour "meal" along with all the other stuff and about 50g fibre per day. Included are always 1 oz almonds and avocados. Eating 1950 calories +/- 60 calories
Chewing up my test strips but I had to keep track for the dietician tomorrow!!
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The PC are at the 2 hour mark and the AC are at the 3 hour mark when I have to eat again!!0
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those figures look great except the one before bed way to go i would be feeling ill on some of them if i go under 4.5 to 5 i feel sick0
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Over June, my diet was increased to 2055 by the dietician as I had trouble maintaining my weight. Kept losing and losing. Now it's more or less stable but have to eat as much as I can. My blood sugar has crept up a little..it's now low 5s...5-5.3 before meals ( 90-93) approx and the same post meals...i don't check all the time but I am sure my A1C is gonna be a bit higher. I don't know if he will opt to put me back on the metformin or what...I honestly think the 3 month trial he wanted me to try is good considering that I eat healthy but like that of a non diabetic person...I am such a worrywart.0
