Eating Right with Diabetes

[wlathe]

So, I was diagnosed 2 weeks ago and have been focused like a laser on my diet. I saw someone on the boards here kid someone because they were eating like a hobbit, and realized today... I am a Hobbit, or at least I eat on a Hobbit schedule (minus their pies and potatoes .

From the books:

First Breakfast:

Second Breakfast
Elevensies

Luncheon

Afternoon Tea

Dinner

Supper

I had exactly this yesterday! LOL. I'm going to list it below with my weightwatchers points (becaus I'm on weightwatchers and carbs, and my BG readings. This is not perfect, it wil take tweaking over the weeks, months, but I'm learning...

(5:30 wakeup 142)

First Breakfast: 5:30am, slice of homemade whole wheat bread & butter, drizzled with tsp honey, 1/2 pear & cup unsweetened herb tea (24g carbs, 4pts)

(then 30 minute swim at gym, which I walk to and from to 10min each way).

(7am 108)

Second Breakfast: 7:30am, vegetable omelet (mushrooms, peppers, spinach, 1 egg, 1/4 cup egg whites, 1/4 cup part-skim mozzerella) and cup black tea w/ cream and sweetener (5g carbs, 6pts)

(walked 20 minutes)

(10am 113)
Elevensies: 10:30am, vegetables (brocolli, celery, peppers) w/ hummus dip (2tbsp), water. (6g carbs, 2pts)

(12pm 107)

Luncheon: 12:30pm, pizza (half english muffin toasted, pizza sauce, cheese, turkey pepperoni, mushrooms, onions, part-skim mozzerella) & half banana with a cup of coffee with cream (22g carbs, 8pts)

(walked 40 minutes)

(2pm 109)

Afternoon Tea: 3:00pm, tuna salad (mixed greens, tuna, cucumbers, oil/vinegar dressing, kidney beans), 1 oz walnuts, unsweetened herb tea,  (11g carbs, 8pts)

(6pm 83)

Dinner: 6:30pm "quick" Korean feast (I used to live in Korea many years, we do this for simplified Korean dinner every couple months... kids love it.. and if I don't eat the rice, very low carb):
Pulkogi (marinated beef.. minus usual honey), kimchi and other "panchan" (side dishes), herbed spinach, marinated cucumbers, spiced bean sprouts, roasted tofu, roasted seaweed, brown rice. Water. (14g carbs, 10pts)

(walked 30 minutes)

(8pm 98)

Supper: 9:00pm, 2 rye crackers with light cream cheese and sliced tomatoes (salt & pepper), unsweetened herb tea (10g carbs, 3pts)

(10pm bedtime 101)

Totaled 41 WW pts. I'm alloted 46 currently, that will go down as I lose weight, so I'll have to be rearranging my diet a bit , but I have some leeway.

My diabetes meds that day were 1/2 5mg tablet glipizide before breakfast, 1000 mg of medformin at dinner)


A "hobbit schedule" seems to work for me, at least I don't fluctuate a lot. I'm going to experimenta  bit, but I think I can live with this schedule. Other's have such a hobbit-like meal schedule? 

[lizzylou Diabetes Brain Trust]

Another word for what we call your way of eating is grazing, not sure if that's better than hobbit style or not.   Many people here eat that way, it's a good way to keep numbers more even.

There will be some who will question your "peak" at breakfast, but your number one and a half hours later is good, probably because of the exercise. 

So my question is what will you do after you lose the weight?  This is for life and not just a diet that begins and ends.

There's also the fact that your fasting number is still pretty high, it might be that the doctor will increase the metformin amount if it's still high in a few more weeks.  Increased metformin shouldn't affect the meal numbers much but might bring the fasting numbers down.

Overall you're doing very well.

Lizzy 

[wlathe]

**Hmm, like hobbit better, grazing sounds like I'm a cow LOL. 

**I'm not sure what you mean? My peak at breakfast? the 142 is my wakeup, after teh first breakfast (and swimming/walking) it was 108. This has been happening every day, starts out high at wake up, goes down to normal the rest of the day.

**My plan after losing weight is pretty much this meal plan right here. My weight goal is <185, the maintenance points for that is 36pts I think, before activity. A bit of tweaking and I'll get this meal plan down to about that.  I like the food and I rarely feel at all hungry.

This was my issue 2 years ago. I was on WW for a year, lost 70lbs, got down to 190 (for my 6' 1" frame, 180 is better, but I was happy at 190). I maintained that almost with no tracking for about a year. I had gotten into a habit of eating a lot like I ate yesterday (only a lot more fruit and grains because I was near vegetarian.. ate meat 2-5x a week at most) and exercising (walk or swim every day). 

Then we adopted a 4 year old. The time, stress and effort it took to help her adjust (she came from a, shall we say, traumatic childhood) threw our lives into chaos for a while. It's not really an excuse, but my exercise time disappeared and my eating habits due to the stress and lack of time change (I still ate good healthy food, just way too much of them). I gained 60lbs back .

HOpefully, and for my life's sake, I will make this stick. It will have to be my focus even when life throws us curve balls. I'm bracing myself. 

** Yeah . Every day. Today was no different, started out at 150, had my 1st and 2nd breakfasts and a walk, it was 111. Just tested again, it was 101. My medformin schedule had me upping it to 1500mg/day as of last night (but I forgot and only did 1000mg, will rectify that today).  Hopefully, as you say, that will help those morning numbers.

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lizzylou wrote:

Another word for what we call your way of eating is grazing, not sure if that's better than hobbit style or not.   Many people here eat that way, it's a good way to keep numbers more even.

There will be some who will question your "peak" at breakfast, but your number one and a half hours later is good, probably because of the exercise. 

So my question is what will you do after you lose the weight?  This is for life and not just a diet that begins and ends.

There's also the fact that your fasting number is still pretty high, it might be that the doctor will increase the metformin amount if it's still high in a few more weeks.  Increased metformin shouldn't affect the meal numbers much but might bring the fasting numbers down.

Overall you're doing very well.

Lizzy 

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[lizzylou Diabetes Brain Trust]

**I'm not sure what you mean? My peak at breakfast? the 142 is my wakeup, after teh first breakfast (and swimming/walking) it was 108. This has been happening every day, starts out high at wake up, goes down to normal the rest of the day.

The amount of carbs you eat for breakfast is much more than most of us can handle.  You are taking an insulin stimulating drug and you also exercise right after.  If you didn't exercise I'm wondering what your "peak" - the highest number you reach after eating - would be.  It's no problem as long as you keep exercising and taking the medication, but if either/both stop you could have a much higher number.

Lizzy

[wlathe]

Oh, I see.

Yeah, so far I've found I can have up to 30 carbs on my swimming days (usually M/W/F, but did extra swim yesterday). Today, without glipizide in the morning, I had small portion oatmeal/yogurt/blueberries (21g) for 1st breakfast, my numbers were 156 (wakeup), 113 (after 1stbreakfast/swim) and 111 (after 2nd breakfast). 

I could probably switch those around . I guess I was worried I'd not have enough carbs if I swam 30min so I eat the higher carb breakfast before swim (maybe my high morning numbers are enough? no need for carbs?). On non-swim days I eat about half of that or less in carbs.

Might be a good experiment, flip those and see if my number goes down more and stays down. Thank you, learning a lot. 

[alan_s Honored Contributor]

As Lizzy mentioned, some of us call that grazing; although I think I may have been the one to mention hobbits and second breakfasts

Your numbers and routine are good enough to consider discussing reducing your Glip with your doctor. That may, as Lizzy implied, lead to a review of first breakfast.

[wlathe]

Yep, just checked. It was you that mentioned hobbits . Since my eldest daughter absolutely loves hobbits (and LOTR and HP....), i'm sticking with hobbit eating.

My doctor (well, through the nurse) eliminated glipizide yesterday (morning was last time). Unfortunately, I'm not have a great BG number day . 154 wake up, 111 after 2nd breakfast, 120 before lunch, 141 after lunch (low-carb lunch and 40 min walk). I'll do the sans-glipizide the rest of the day, but if my numbers are still in the 120-150 range, I'll see what my doctor says. might have to go back to it I guess. Whatever it takes to stay healthy.

[lizzylou Diabetes Brain Trust]

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Wlathe wrote:

Yep, just checked. It was you that mentioned hobbits . Since my eldest daughter absolutely loves hobbits (and LOTR and HP....), i'm sticking with hobbit eating.

My doctor (well, through the nurse) eliminated glipizide yesterday (morning was last time). Unfortunately, I'm not have a great BG number day . 154 wake up, 111 after 2nd breakfast, 120 before lunch, 141 after lunch (low-carb lunch and 40 min walk). I'll do the sans-glipizide the rest of the day, but if my numbers are still in the 120-150 range, I'll see what my doctor says. might have to go back to it I guess. Whatever it takes to stay healthy.

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I have to admit that I was shocked when I read on T2 that the glip was eliminated after only two weeks.  I think that's about the fastest I've ever seen that happen.

I took that med for several months and I have to tell you that it sort of "wakes up" the pancreas but about 4 or so months after I stopped taking it my pancreas went back to sleep again.  So the effects are not as quick as you were led to believe by some, but there's also a chance that the lowering effects might not last for very long either.

Lizzy