• Please Remember: Members are only permitted to share their own experiences. Members are not qualified to give medical advice. Additionally, everyone manages their health differently. Please be respectful of other people's opinions about their own diabetes management.
  • We seem to be having technical difficulties with new user accounts. If you are trying to register please check your Spam or Junk folder for your confirmation email. If you still haven't received a confirmation email, please reach out to our support inbox: support.forum@diabetes.org.uk

Low GI diet

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

lucy123

Well-Known Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
Hi All,

You may have read in my other post today that I have to go on a low GI diet. I have been on a low carb diet - does anyone know what the difference will be.

I need to do my online shop today and my new book doesn't come until tomorrow so any ideas of what food to buy and what not to buy - all confused again now re food!!🙄

Thanks all🙂
 
GI is the effect it has on your blood sugar, low meaning its a slow gradual release of glucose, which is good for everyone..........high meaning fast with more risk of spiking, which can be damaging in its own right........

Essentially you could have a large carb diet but still low GI............🙂
 
Low GI is an averaged figure based on how quickly you might expect the carbs/sugars in something to be absorbed. GL (glycaemic load) also takes into account likely portion size, so that while watermelon is quick to be absorbed it has a low glycaemic load because in a regular portion you'd eat almost no carbs.

My understanding is that a low carb diet would be a low GI diet! (in that you would not be eating a lot of rapidly absorbed carbs).

M
 
Agree with NRB - it's more to do with the type of carbs rather than the amount. You might also like to look into Low GL diet, which is similar to GI (based on it actually), but somewhat more practical as it takes account of portion size. For example, something may appear to be high GI, but you might need to eat a kilo of it for it to have the same effect as, say, a few ounces of something with the same GI (think parsnips and chocolate - both high GI, but you would need a lot more parsnips than chocolate to spike your levels). The following books explain GL better than me!:

http://www.diabetessupport.co.uk/boards/showthread.php?t=7719


http://www.diabetessupport.co.uk/boards/showthread.php?t=7337

🙂
 
novorapidboi26 said:
Essentially you could have a large carb diet but still low GI............🙂
Click to expand...


Weeeeeeeeellllllll.... Only sort of surely.

Try to find anything significantly carby in the 'low GI' range and it's quite a challenge (partly because ascertaining the GI of something is quite expensive, so many products aren't easily findable).

The only officially 'low GI' bread I found was Burgen, though I know that many seedy ones are medium-ish.

Cabbage is very low, as is celery, and broccoli. But potato (high), basmati rice (medium), most breads (medium-high), noodles (medium), parsnips (high)... most breakfasts cereals (medium-high)

You might end up having to eat a lot of pasta!

And we know that many here spike significantly with supposedly low GI foods like porridge (myself included).

At the end of the day, it's gonna have to be eat-to-your-meter again 🙄
 
As you say the GI number is only a guide and everyone will absorb at different rates........

My statement was maybe unrealistic, but you could eat lots of carbs that are digested at the slower side of the Index..............but I suppose the high carb content may have a cumulative effect in term of digestion.......

Best thing to do is pick some low GI products, allegedly, and eat and test and go from there...........
 
There are a couple of things that change the Glycaemic load of a food

Fat content
Protein Content
Fibre Content

So for instance a high carb food such as quinoa, rice, pasta, bread could be healthy and have an acceptable GI/GL rating if

a - it was a wholefood and full of fibre
b - relatively high in protein


Alternatively a piece of deep fried chicken or a deep fried doughnut filled with peanut butter could be low GI / GL but be detrimental to your health

The federally funded studies by PCRM in the USA have had great success at reversing type 2 diabetes by combining 3 principles

1) Whole Food Plant foods

2) Low Fat - Oil Free

3) Low GI

You should not undertake this diet without supervision and some homework as in their trials the diet worked better than the drugs (over double the effect) so drug doses had to be reduced.

The stipulation wholefood plant based foods qualify and self regulate the GI element to differentiate it from a high saturated animal fat Atkins style diet that can be detrimental to health.

Their researched premise is that the lack of refined processed oil reduces the calorie intake and allows the cells to do the job more efficiently allowing the insulin messaging pathways to open up communications again rather than trying to communicate in a cell full of custard-like saturated fat.

For more info read Dr Barnards book or watch his DVD Reversing Diabetes
 
Lucy

Given that you are having issues with hypos and have a high level of insulin production I guess the theory is that if you eat a decent amount of carbs, but try to stick to ones (brown basmati rice, seedy bread, pulses, oats, pasta) that *should* have a longer/slower absorption you might end up avoiding the hypos without subjecting yourself to a bucket load of spikes.

Will be interested to see how it goes. I guess you're gonna need a fair few test strips 😱

Hope it works out well
M
 
everydayupsanddowns said:
.

My understanding is that a low carb diet would be a low GI diet! (in that you would not be eating a lot of rapidly absorbed carbs).

M
Click to expand...

No, Low carb and Low GI are fundamenally inimical, low GI gets rid of the need to go low carb.
 
mcdonagh47 said:
No, Low carb and Low GI are fundamenally inimical, low GI gets rid of the need to go low carb.
Click to expand...

Perhaps I should have said 'moderate carb' rather than low carb?

All meat is low GI, as are green leafy veg. So if I eat that, and a small amount of low GI carb as well I'm confused as to why this would be deemed to be not low GI?

There must be more to it than the index of the foods... I certainly don't eat the 'recommended' 250-300g of carbs a day (I haven't got time for five or six slices of toast in the mornings). :D
 
😱😱😱 oh my goodness I am so confused now.

Can anyone give me a daily menu for starters? Ie what would you eat for breakfast, lunch and tea if on low gi? I need to shop!:D

Alan - thanks for the other books - will see how i get on with the Rick one and then progress.
 
I'm not personally completely convinced about low GI.

Pasta is identified low GI - but is that because the pasta spike falls outside of the standard 1 hour/2 hour GI assessment window?

My suspicion is that they need to do more work to differentiate High GI, Medium, Low GI and Delayed GI (maybe DUK might give someone a grant to do GI assessments whilst wearing a CGM).

The GI listing isn't complete either, many foods are estimated and not confirmed.

That said, I have reduced my High GI intake (bread, potatoes) and replaced with lower GI equivilents (couscous, burgen bread, more green veg). But I also cut my overall carb loading at the same time.
 
lucy123 said:
Hi All,

You may have read in my other post today that I have to go on a low GI diet. I have been on a low carb diet
Thanks all🙂
Click to expand...

All Diabetics in Britain are supposed to be on a low GI diet, that's the current recommendation - low GI, Mediterranean style diet.

If you are already low carbing you won't need to change much unless they want you to lower fats as well.
 
If you want a head start Lucy, my fave which I push at every opportunity is wholegrain muesli with low fat natural yoghurt. I have it for breakfast adn it maintains a steady 6 or 7 though the morning (with appropriate insulin) but I would think it wouldn't spike in just about anyone.

I would advise a good read about all foods to get the full concept of low GI/GL before trying anything though.🙂

Have they offered you a dietician ?

Rob
 
Thanks everyone for all the excellent posts - I will come back and read these again over the next day or two - slowly absorbing it all at the moment.🙂
 
Mark T said:
I'm not personally completely convinced about low GI.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure that foods which have a low effect on your BG is the way to go - however, a BG meter is the best way to find which foods that is... (using GI lists, and other peoples suggestions as a guide)

on muesli - has anyone tried dorset cereals? mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm! 😛
 
caffeine_demon said:
on muesli - has anyone tried dorset cereals? mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm! 😛
Click to expand...

I was given a free portion of Dorset muesli after the Great South Run the other year - I nearly fell over with fright when I saw how much sugar was in it! 63g carbs/22g sugars per 100g 😱
 
Status
This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
Back
Top