It all crept up on me!

[Eddy Edson]

Can I ask a question ? I don't mean to be intrusive. So please ignore it if you prefer. You mentioned you have peripheral artery disease. Is that the check the nurse does when she checks the pulse in my foot/leg? She told me I had a good strong pulse and I forgot to ask her what the significance was. So much to learn

Sorry, I missed this. As Jenny says, that one is for neuropathy stuff. For PAD in the legs, what she describes is the standard "ankle brachial index" (ABI) test, which compares blood pressure at top and bottom of legs to see what the flow is like.

Strangely, I never had that done & so I have no idea what my ABI is/was - doc went straight to doppler ultrasound, which I think would normally be Step 2.

But I guess it was obvious enough - diabetic + long time heavy smoker means my risk of PAD was very high, and my symptoms were "classic", which apparently is often not the case.

 

[growman]

If I was writing professionally then I'd double check and qualify statements as appropriate - but I'm not. I do know a fair bit about nutritional values etc from research I've been doing (nothing to do with diabetes or dieting), so I take the points made with a smile. One thing I won't do is analyse to the nth degree what I eat - a rough calculation of 250 calories is adequate, whether it's 220 or 270 really makes no difference to me when I've plummeted from about 2,600 a day to 1,000 or less. What I could do is turn eating into misery and when miserable I eat.
So to me 'low carb' means a heck of a lot less than I used to eat and 'no carb' means no spuds, rice, bread etc. just what carbs are in veg already. And if I'm honest, I'm a bit touchy at the moment with a giant boot dropped from the sky on my head.
Last week tonight's stir fry would have had a side of rice. Not really missed it though.

 

[Drummer]

Bean sprouts, chicken, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, carrots, onions, mushrooms, soy sauce - not sure what else. It was lovely though.

Ah - not entirely carb free then bean sprouts are 5 percent carbs bamboo shoots are very low, water chestnuts 20 percent, carrots 10 percent, onions about 10 percent, mushrooms are very low, soy sauce up to 6 percent.
I put sweet pepper into my stir fries and salads as that is about 7 percent - all these are good choices, even the water chestnuts in moderation - but I calculated them when I first started out on low carb eating, as I was keeping to under 50 gm of carbs a day then, and now keep under 40 gm - but I am sensitive to carbs and made a conscious decision to stay at 40 gm per day for the variety that gives even though I am just above the very top edge of normal for my Hba1c tests.

 

[growman]

Just a point you may not be aware of - the nutritional analysis of natural vegetables & fruits is quite variable. Factors which affect are; the nutrients in the soil, water availability, temperature, insolation, variety; when planted; age at harvest; storage method and length of storage. There's also, of course, variability introduced in the way a vegetable is cooked (or not). Most of the studies concentrate on vitamin and micro-nutrient content but logically there must be some variation in carbohydrate levels. Nearly forgot - plants also react to stressors - pest or weed pressure.
Don't want to worry you, I very much doubt those variations are significant or generally worth worrying about in this context.