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Newbie with questions!

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Nickisax

New Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
Hi everyone I have recently been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. I was just basically told I have it and was given a prescription for metformin.
I have two questions
1). If I am on metformin do my sugar levels still go up and down. Ie would there be any point in getting a testing meter to try to sort out what certain foods do to my levels?
2). I have been following Michael Moseleys 8 week blood sugar diet for about 6 weeks. If I succumbed to temptation and ate a chocolate bar what would this do to my body?
Thanking you in anticipation
 
Hello,
yes your blood sugars will still go up and down.

A testing meter is always a great idea because it gives you the ability to take control from a position of knowledge instead of guesswork.

Different foods have different effects on different people -what sends one person's levels soaring may be tolerable for another person because exercise levels and other factors all impact blood sugar levels.

Big peaks where your sugars change a lot are called spikes and spikes are not good for you when they happen often over many years but if you get mostly excellent control then once in a while is okay.

The good news is that there are things you can swap into your food choices instead of the things that tend to cause issues and the things you swap in taste just as nice and in some cases are even nicer and so you can keep control and there won't be 'temptation' because you will be enjoying your food so much you won't want to eat the stuff that is bad for you.

For example if chocolate is your downfall - then you can make a chocolate dessert very quickly that won't impact your blood sugars that you can eat to get your 'fix' and the dessert is actually good for you!!

Screenshot 2020-08-26 at 10.56.06.png

This is made by mixing a teaspoon of 100% Cacao powder with three tablespoons of 10% fat Greek yoghurt (or even better three tablespoons of whipped double (heavy) cream) and a teaspoon of erythritol/stevia sweetener. You can whip cream with a fork and the exercise does you good. Any exercise will help keep your blood sugars in balance.

I made the chocolate 'dots' myself by melting some cocoa butter in the microwave and then mixing two teaspoons of cacao powder and some more erythritol/stevia sweetener into the melted cocoa butter and then pouring it into a silicon mould and popping that into the fridge for ten minutes to set. I keep the dots in a bag in the fridge to add to my desserts as I need them. I sprinkle a little bit of powdered sweetener for the 'snow' effect.
To make this even more filling and even better for you than it already is (dark chocolate has magnesium and other good things in it, greek yoghurt has good bacteria and calcium etc, double cream has vitamins and calcium and good fats for your metabolism) you can add some chia seeds as well.

It is delicious and will help you stay on track and is far better for you than a chocolate bar which will have other things in it that are just as bad for you as the sugar - which is bad enough to start with.

This is great even without the chocolate dots and takes moments to prepare.
 
Hello @Nickisax and welcome to our forum.
Yes your blood sugars will still go up and down, as the main things that influence them is what you eat and to a lesser extent how much exercise you do.

Metformin reduces the amount of glucose released from the liver. ( It does not increase insulin production but makes better use of body’s own insulin) - so it may help, but the main thing that will help is finding out what foods are the main triggers for
putting your blood sugars up. A chocolate bar would certainly do this!

A test meter is a very useful tool in helping to work this out.
if you are considering getting one then SD Gluco Navii is one that many people use, and test-review-adjust gives information on how to go about testing.

There is more information on the Help for Newbies section and Diabetes UK Learning Zone -there is a link to this at the top of the page.
Please keep posting and asking questions, and we will always try to help,
 
Welcome to the forum @Nickisax

You have already had loads of useful advice and links to useful resources,
so I will just encourage you to ask any questions that you have. Nothing is considered silly on here. Just ask.
 
Hi @Nickisax
You will find that many T2's who are serious about getting into remission, or avoiding diabetes complications find that self funding a BG Meter invaluable. They test to see which foods spike their own BG most and learn to either cut them out or cut down on the amount they eat of those.
2 popular meters with cheap(er) test strips (which you will need lots of) are the SD Gluco Navil and the Spirit Health TEE2+

I use the 2nd of those.
 
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