I haven't got a meter I'm only testing urine at the mo
Hi Lesley.
When diagnosed, I was given urine test strips too, and to be honest, I, personally, found them to be useless. The reason I say that is glucose will only show up in urine if the level is about 10 or more, then the measurements are in fairly broad bands. From a couple of days in, my urine was clear of glucose, but I still had no idea what I was doing. If you are still seeing glucose in your urine it does mean you definitely still have work to do on trimming that back.
If, like most of us, your Doc doesn't see the need for you to do finger prick testing, I would urge you to do some anyway. That's how you get immediate feedback on how you're doing. Finger prick testing isn't perfect, but it's a million times better, in my opinion, that urine testing.
In terms of how to to bring your numbers down, there are several things to look at.
- Firstly, the obviously sweet things really need to go, and that usually includes most fruits, although berries are usually a bit more blood sugar friendly.
- Secondly, the sad reality is we need to look at the overall carbohydrates we eat, so that means bread, potatoes, cereal, pasta and rice.
- Thirdly, if having done all of that, and you find yourself hungry, then adding some fat to your diet tends to stop any hunger pangs, but I'd tend to see how you go before upping the fats too much as ideally you don't want to be gaining weight, I assume.
- Finally, as far as breakfast is concerned, if you don't usually eat breakfast, and you're eating it because you think you should, I'd relax on that. Breakfast is simply breaking your fast, it doesn't matter if that happens at 6am, 8am, or 3pm - provided you are comfortable.
There is a school of thought which promotes intermittent fasting as part of the diabetes management toolbox. One of the leading experts in this is Dr Jason Fung, who is a Canadian Nephrologist. He has loads on the internet. Intermittent fasting can be fasting for the odd day, once a week or the most popular way seems to be to limit the "eating window". In other words, something like not eating before, say, 11am or after, say, 7pm.
If intermittent fasting is something you may be inclined towards (on the basis you don't usually eat breakfast anyway), then please do some reading and watching on YouTube, with Jason Fung being your starting point.
Intermittent fasting isn't something I deliberately do myself (although we all have the odd eating day when we have a short eating window - "just because that's how it happened"), but I know
@Brunneria , who is a member here, has some experience of it.
Good luck with it, whichever way you decide to go.
