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Hello from Bristol

Status
This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
Grace1961

Grace1961

Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
Hi there, just introducing myself. I should have done this a long time ago when I was told I had type 2 diabetes in 2020.
Thought it would all be alright, it was for a while, lost 10kg, got fitter, started cycling.
The dreaded time that followed, things fell apart a bit.
So tomorrow I have an appointment with a diabetic nurse. My weight has gone up 8kg and sure my sugar levels are up.
Not wanting sympathy, I do want to know how everyone manages this, what you eat on a daily basis and hopefully pick up some helpful tips.
 
Hi Grace, welcome to the forum. I'm also a T2 on metformin, but I'm a vegetarian, so I'm not sure my diet and eating advice is what you might be looking for.
What sort of foods do you eat at the moment?
Could you do a day where you only have 800 calories each week to get your calories down for that day? That way, you wouldn't have to drastically change what you eat every day, just the day you're on the 800 calories.
 
Hello, and welcome,

Breakfast: usually Greek yoghurt (100-150g or less if I mix it with peanut butter) and berries (Usually around 50g of either strawberries or raspberries.) Sprinkle cinnamon on top and sometimes have it with a bit of nutty/seed granola I make. An omelette every now and then.
Lunch: Home made bread of low-carb bread salad sandwich; home made Chile; home made vegetable soup (Basically a load of veg cooked in stock) Sometimes a Subway Salad box or a Pret-a-manger Italian salad if I have nothing to take in. Or occasionally just a few oat cakes and cottage cheese and an egg.
Dinner: meat/fish and steamed/roasted veg, plus some cauliflower rice. Occasionally a stir fry with onions/peppers/garlic and prawns and konjac noodles. We make a daal that is pretty nice and very filling.

Sometimes we have a chicken dish from a supermarket that's pre-prepared (Usually stuffed with Feta.)
Eating out is normally Nandos, or sometimes somewhere like Prezzo where I can have fish.

We occasionally make a large chicken curry and I have that with cauliflower rice and mushrooms cooked in spices. My wife has proper rice. (I haven't tried any proper rice since being diagnosed, too scared of what might happen!) For a side dish I air fry celeriac or swede to make chips (Marinated in smoked Paprika first!)

I sometimes make cakes out of almond flour and berries or pancakes from banana and peanut butter. There's a nice tahini cake I make from almond flour, but it's quite heavy on the calories.

Eat a lot of Almonds, pure peanut butter and treat myself to the odd square of 85%+ chocolate.
 
Windy said:
Hi Grace, welcome to the forum. I'm also a T2 on metformin, but I'm a vegetarian, so I'm not sure my diet and eating advice is what you might be looking for.
What sort of foods do you eat at the moment?
Could you do a day where you only have 800 calories each week to get your calories down for that day? That way, you wouldn't have to drastically change what you eat every day, just the day you're on the 800 calories.
Click to expand...
Hi Windy
Thank you.
Yes I am sure I could do one day per week. I cannot do the fasting thing very well. On the whole I eat very healthily, brown rice, brown pasta, more vegetables than meat, I love fish and do not eat any cake or chocolate.
Are you trying this?
 
harbottle said:
Hello, and welcome,

Breakfast: usually Greek yoghurt (100-150g or less if I mix it with peanut butter) and berries (Usually around 50g of either strawberries or raspberries.) Sprinkle cinnamon on top and sometimes have it with a bit of nutty/seed granola I make. An omelette every now and then.
Lunch: Home made bread of low-carb bread salad sandwich; home made Chile; home made vegetable soup (Basically a load of veg cooked in stock) Sometimes a Subway Salad box or a Pret-a-manger Italian salad if I have nothing to take in. Or occasionally just a few oat cakes and cottage cheese and an egg.
Dinner: meat/fish and steamed/roasted veg, plus some cauliflower rice. Occasionally a stir fry with onions/peppers/garlic and prawns and konjac noodles. We make a daal that is pretty nice and very filling.

Sometimes we have a chicken dish from a supermarket that's pre-prepared (Usually stuffed with Feta.)
Eating out is normally Nandos, or sometimes somewhere like Prezzo where I can have fish.

We occasionally make a large chicken curry and I have that with cauliflower rice and mushrooms cooked in spices. My wife has proper rice. (I haven't tried any proper rice since being diagnosed, too scared of what might happen!) For a side dish I air fry celeriac or swede to make chips (Marinated in smoked Paprika first!)

I sometimes make cakes out of almond flour and berries or pancakes from banana and peanut butter. There's a nice tahini cake I make from almond flour, but it's quite heavy on the calories.

Eat a lot of Almonds, pure peanut butter and treat myself to the odd square of 85%+ chocolate.
Click to expand...
Hi Harbottle
Wow, thats so kind of you to give me all those ideas.
I know having porridge and berries for breakfast, boiled egg and toast for lunch and chicken curry and brown rice isn't doing it.
If it isn't 80g grams of brown rice dried weight then its 80 grams of brown spaghetti. I avoid potatoes, I like sweet potato chips in the air fryer. I make my own cotswold grain, dark mix of wholewheat/ rye bread.
Treats are digestive biscuits and ryvita thins and some cheese or olives. Only fruit I eat are berries really with Greek yoghurt.
I think your food is less carbohydrates?
Maybe this is where I am going wrong - its a minefield.
I really appreciate your long helpful reply.
 
Yes, I avoid carb heavy foods like pasta, rice, bread and potatoes.

I also avoid Oats as they cause my BG to spike, but some people don't seem to have a problem with them. The bread I make doesn't have grains in them, just almond flour, flaxseed and psyllium husk (Recipe came from a book I bought).

I love Olives! I could eat a whole bottle of them in one go, and I think they are good for us and won't raise blood sugar.
 
Grace1961 said:
Hi Windy
Thank you.
Yes I am sure I could do one day per week. I cannot do the fasting thing very well. On the whole I eat very healthily, brown rice, brown pasta, more vegetables than meat, I love fish and do not eat any cake or chocolate.
Are you trying this?
Click to expand...
I did intermittent fasting (which is the one day a week restricted calories) before and got on ok with it. It's much less disruptive than being on a diet all the time. So I've tried it before and I think I managed 3 months, but I was having 500 calories on the fasting days, and it wasn't enough calories for me.
However, since diagnosis of T2 in October, I've been on a low calorie diet of 800 calories a day, as I'm trying to lose a couple of stone/15Kg.
I have mushroom and cheese omelette for breakfast, soup and blueberries for lunch, and something like veggie chilli with cauliflower rice for my dinner. Everythings weighed and measured, 20g of cheese, 100g of mushrooms etc...
I move to 1500 calories per day in a week, and that'll challenge my limited self control with food, but I've bought a recipe book on diabetic weight loss, and am planning to do recipes from that.
 
Grace1961 said:
Hi Harbottle
Wow, thats so kind of you to give me all those ideas.
I know having porridge and berries for breakfast, boiled egg and toast for lunch and chicken curry and brown rice isn't doing it.
If it isn't 80g grams of brown rice dried weight then its 80 grams of brown spaghetti. I avoid potatoes, I like sweet potato chips in the air fryer. I make my own cotswold grain, dark mix of wholewheat/ rye bread.
Treats are digestive biscuits and ryvita thins and some cheese or olives. Only fruit I eat are berries really with Greek yoghurt.
I think your food is less carbohydrates?
Maybe this is where I am going wrong - its a minefield.
I really appreciate your long helpful reply.
Click to expand...
If you are having 80g dry weight of pasta then that is a lot of carbs as even wholewheat pasta is 62g carb /100g so 50g carb for that meal without counting any of your other ingredients. Rice is pretty similar.
If you want pasta then edamame or black bean pasta is only 15g carb per 100g dry wt. I only cook 25g per portion and find that sufficient.
Most other things look good choices except maybe the porridge.
Home made chicken curry should be fine as there are some low carb prepared sauces or use dry spice mixes.
 
harbottle said:
Yes, I avoid carb heavy foods like pasta, rice, bread and potatoes.

I also avoid Oats as they cause my BG to spike, but some people don't seem to have a problem with them. The bread I make doesn't have grains in them, just almond flour, flaxseed and psyllium husk (Recipe came from a book I bought).

I love Olives! I could eat a whole bottle of them in one go, and I think they are good for us and won't raise blood sugar.
Click to expand...

Not sure about a whole jar of olives in one go.
That's around 250 calories for a small jar!
 
Grace1961 said:
Treats are digestive biscuits and ryvita thins
Click to expand...
Could you temporarily swap your digestive biscuits for something like Nairn's oatcakes or supermarket own brand equivalents?
A McVities digestive has 71 calories and 9.4g of carbs, compared to a ginger oatcake which has 44 cals and 6.6g of carbs or a cheese oatcake which has 39 and 3.7g. It's still a treat to have with a cup of tea, but it's roughly half the amount of calories and carbs.
 
travellor said:
Not sure about a whole jar of olives in one go.
That's around 250 calories for a small jar!
Click to expand...
Yep, which is why I don’t buy them! 🙂
 
Leadinglights said:
If you are having 80g dry weight of pasta then that is a lot of carbs as even wholewheat pasta is 62g carb /100g so 50g carb for that meal without counting any of your other ingredients. Rice is pretty similar.
If you want pasta then edamame or black bean pasta is only 15g carb per 100g dry wt. I only cook 25g per portion and find that sufficient.
Most other things look good choices except maybe the porridge.
Home made chicken curry should be fine as there are some low carb prepared sauces or use dry spice mixes.
Click to expand...
Thank you for your reply.
I just took the advice of my diabetic nurse at my first review, she said to change to brown bread, rice, pasta.
I too have been reading and realise that the way to control diabetes and loose weight is low carb. I brought books and tried this but found it impossible with my carb loving Hubby. I will have to cook separate meals or add rice etc to his. The black bean pasta could work for us both. Thank you so much.
 
Windy said:
Could you temporarily swap your digestive biscuits for something like Nairn's oatcakes or supermarket own brand equivalents?
A McVities digestive has 71 calories and 9.4g of carbs, compared to a ginger oatcake which has 44 cals and 6.6g of carbs or a cheese oatcake which has 39 and 3.7g. It's still a treat to have with a cup of tea, but it's roughly half the amount of calories and carbs.
Click to expand...
Wow, this is making me realise I can do better, thank you I will definitely ditch them, I thought they were OK to have. This group has given me so many useful tips already. Off to the shops after my blood test and nurse visit later.
 
Grace1961 said:
Wow, this is making me realise I can do better, thank you I will definitely ditch them, I thought they were OK to have. This group has given me so many useful tips already. Off to the shops after my blood test and nurse visit later.
Click to expand...
Hope the blood test and nurse visit goes well.
Food is a bit of a minefield,and there's conflicting views about what's ok to eat.
I've gone low carb, as it works for me, but the NHS guidance is to make 1/3 of your plate carbs, hence the advice from your diabetic nurse, and that I was given on the DESMOND course I attended. Some T2s eat more carbs and it works for them, we're all different and our bodies react differently. It's about finding out what's right for you.
You can buy bags of frozen cauliflower rice to heat in the microwave and have if your husband is having rice with his meal, or make your own if you have a food processor, and freeze it yourself in portions. Or have half cauliflower rice and half brown rice. I usually roast florets of cauli or broccoli on a baking tray with a spray of oil, pinch of salt and a sprinkle of herbs/spices, and have that with my chilli or curry as it's quicker than making cauli rice.
 
Grace1961 said:
Thank you for your reply.
I just took the advice of my diabetic nurse at my first review, she said to change to brown bread, rice, pasta.
I too have been reading and realise that the way to control diabetes and loose weight is low carb. I brought books and tried this but found it impossible with my carb loving Hubby. I will have to cook separate meals or add rice etc to his. The black bean pasta could work for us both. Thank you so much.
Click to expand...
If you hubby also need to lose some weight then reduced carbs could benefit him as well, most people eat too many carbs anyway.
He may not even notice if you make mash with half potato and half cauliflower or celeriac and add some spring onion and a bit of grated strong cheese on the top.
If you start doing some home testing of meals then you will know where you need to make changes.
 
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