Newly diagnosed with diabetes and need help with diabetic exchange diet

@KnitterNotAQuitter - so many things running through my head right now.

So, as someone stated already (I am going to 100% enthusiastically agree) if there is a chronic disease to have then I would pick diabetes.

Can it be deadly? Absolutely. Can it wreak havoc on the human body? You, bet! But, of all the diseases "available", I feel that this is one of the few where MY DECISIONS | ACTIONS can greatly impact how this experience plays out.

I mean, I have a high A1C (it has been 6.4 for a decade) . Not to go down this path too long, I was a very high performance athlete in high school and college and very active until I was about 35. Then I moved to Roanoke, VA and got married and had kids and got really fat (from a lean and mean 190 to a very pudgy 250). My nutrition was HORRIBLE (I mean, a balanced diet is three different kind of burritos from Taco Bell, right? And that was just lunch....let's talk about the other four meals....). Anyway, there was a five year time span in my life where opening the top of the 15 Mountain Dews I consumed a day was the only exercise I got. That all changed. I started running - a lot. Nutrition was still a mess, but a lot better. I lost 60 pounds and was strong as an ox and could run and run and run. Still, A1C was high. I am getting my nutrition in order now. And training is going well. I went to the Doctor for the first time in a decade to have a cyst on my back removed. I do not trust Doctors. Just going to be 100% upfront about that. In my experience, all they want you to do is to take one pill for your issue and then four more pills to 'control' the side effects. No thank you! I can find the real solution (nutritionally speaking and exercisely speaking....yes, that is a word...I just used it! LOL).

Now, my prejudice against doctors notwithstanding, I would honestly suggest that you take any "nutritional advice" that a Doctor gives you with a grain of salt. Again, generally speaking. Most Doctors have little to no clue about this topic. So, they are generally ignorant regarding nutrition. I would absolutely recommend that you get with a nutritionist (or, is that a registered dietitian - I can never remember the difference) and get with one that has experience with your condition. It can literally be the game changer for you.

Exercise (what I call 'training') will really help as well.

Losing 10% of your current body weight can do - generally speaking - a world of difference. Please keep in mind that this comment is super general in nature and not specific to your situation.

This is actually a really great opportunity for you to change life styles and to get really healthy. That is how I am (finally) looking at my situation.

Don't look at this as a death sentence. I mean, just to be blunt, we are all going to die anyway, right? No one really knows when or how, but that moment will come for all of us. It is what we do while we are here that defines us. So, take this as an opportunity to make some simple (but not easy) changes and kick *kitten*!

I agree that your doctor is woefully outdated. A CDE could help. Look up some books too. I found DrBernstein's DiabetesSolution to be a great book. He's a doctor with T1D who basically invented home testing and eating to your metre.

I completely disagree with not getting a blood glucose metre and testing at home. It is very intimidating the first few times you do it but the amount of information you get from it is invaluable. You may discover that you are fine with bread but noodles raise your blood glucose (BG) too much. You may discover that you can eat most fruits and be fine, or that bananas raise you BG a lot and so you can not eat more than half a small banana at a time.

Consider getting a metre. Then test when you wake up, before a meal, and then every 30-60 minutes after until your BG goes back down to pre-meal levels (usually two hours in diabetics).


You want your BG to stay as steady as possible. No big spikes. Spikes are made the worst by sugars and refined grains (flour - bread, cereal, muffins, noodles). Most whole grains will raise BG a lot too (corn, oats,rice, pearl barley). Fruit is also a source of carbs and sugar, but dried fruit (raisins, dates) and tropical fruit (bananas, mangos, grapes, etc) tend to raise BG more than fruit grown in North America (apples, oranges, nectarines, berries, some melon).

Meats, seafood, eggs, full fat dairy (cheese, 14% sour cream, butter, whipped cream) will not raise your BG. Foods like olives, avocados, plain yogurt, some nuts and seeds, and non-starchy vegetables (not root vegetables like potatoes or turnips) will raise your BG some but usually not like grains, sugars and highly refined and processed foods often do.

But, the only way to know how those foods affect you is to test.

I feel so bad for you. It IS scary. My doctor told me I had pre-diabetes a year and a half ago. I was so depressed and terrified. But you know what? It shocked me into doing something - immediately. Flash forward to today and I'm down 70 lbs and feel great. You'll figure the exchange thing out, with the help with people here. This will take time so don't be hard on yourself if you're not an expert the day after getting your diagnosis. I'm positive you'll look back on this a couple of months from now and be thrilled with how far you've come and how much better your numbers are next time you see your doctor. One of my goals was to shock the *kitten* out of my doctor on the next visit - and I did. It was so satisfying! Best of luck to you!

Your MFP name implies strength so get it together!
Your mom was wrong by what she said about thanksgiving but it stems from ignorance!
Remember..."knowledge is power"!
Everyone here has given you that so use it to your advantage

KnitterNotAQuitter wrote: »

OP here. Thank you, everyone, for the great advice. I feel better now. I talked with my mom, and we’ve worked out *some* Thanksgiving stuff. (Most ridiculous moment: I suggested a tossed salad, and her exact words were “You don’t have tossed salad on Thanksgiving!” Seriously. I asked if that was an unwritten rule in the Thanksgiving Bible and apparently, it is! But we’re having a salad.) I’m going to look into testing, but I have to travel cross-country for Thanksgiving, and flying gives me anxiety attacks (it was keeping me up at night before I got the diagnoses, so I haven’t been sleeping a lot at all for the past couple weeks) so not until I return home.

A couple people asked about my weight loss goals. I am obese at 349 pounds. My goal is to lose 15-17 pounds before my follow-up appointment in four weeks. I know that’s a lot, but that’s how much I *should* lose mathematically, given my size, current activity level (zero), the number of calories I burn being alive, the number of calories I’m eating, plus the exercise (30 minutes 3x a week) I’ve been prescribed — if I stick to it.

There was another thread going in another area about a study showing doctors/medical professionals treating obese patients differently, and after reading that, I kinda feel like that’s at play here. Granted, I didn’t get this way overnight; I’ve had plenty of time/opportunity to do something about my weight, and over the years I’ve made efforts, some more serious than others. But now I’m ready to play ball, and I feel like I only got half the rules to the game because they already think I’ll want to stick to the bench. It is a fair assessment, given my history. So I’m just going to take this four weeks, and prove I’m worth their time.

Thanks again everyone!

.......and you read like an intelligent woman....walk in the park for you!

2snakeswoman wrote: »

I almost always have tossed salad on Tgiving. It's a great thing to help you fill up so you aren't as hungry for the high calorie desserts.

We always have a salad with our Thanksgiving meal, also. Growing up, my Mom actually would make a salad with dinner every night.