Newbie

[beachlady]

I'm new here Good Morning everyone. Four months ago diagnosed as pre diabetic advised by letter from GP surgery to lose weight thus reducing BMI and that was that. Told if I needed advice visit this site. so here I am. I take statin Atorva
statin because I have Peripheral Arterial disease which reared its ugly head two years ago. So that is my history.
I am eating healthy foods but need some help regarding carbs and how much I can have in a day/week. for instance 2 weetabix for breakfast which I enjoy. So to have a slice of bread with homemade soup at lunch or even sandwich - is that too much. Dinnner I usually have 1 baby potato merely to say I have had one.
I would really appreciate any help or advice anyone is happy to give. Thank you

 

[Drummer]

@beachlady your diet is quite high in carbs, and from densely starchy foods too so if you were already in diabetes numbers then it might be problematic. As you are not, but could be, a few changes might make all the difference to the eventual outcome.
To see how you deal with carbs you might get the most information from using a blood glucose meter.
I have the Sprit Healthcare Tee2+ which seems to work well.
When checking my after meal levels I discovered that beans and peas were not giving the expected results, and I now eat a half portion as I saw results which would only make sense if I ate 180 gm rather than 100.
Reducing carbs often alters the metabolism and it is far easier to lose weight, so an added bonus.

 

[ianf0ster]

Hi @beachlady and welcome to the forum.
It's particularly confusing when you have both CAD and T2 Diabetes or pre-diabetes.
For avoiding CAD I was constantly told to eat low fat, lots of fruit and whole grains. I did exectly that and both gained weight plus needed a 3x CAB.
Then I was told the problem was I just wasn't doing it enough. SO cut even more fat and ate even more fruit and whole grains. - I continued to gain weight and was then diagnosed as Type 2 diabetic by which time I had gone from being mid normal range BMI to being 2lbs overweight (so still a slim Type2).
Once I heard about reversing T2D by eating less carbohydrates and more protein & fat this conflicted with the failed advice I had been following for almost 20 yrs. Fortunately I bought Blood Glucose meter and immediately found that all that Fruit and whole grain (and even statins) were raising my Blood Glucose. SO I decided to believe in my BG meter and eat accordingly.
So it is up to you to decide who to believe:
Those that say Low Fat/High Carb is good, that LDL cholesterol is always bad, that the side effects of Statins (including higher Blood Glucose ) are worth it, that weight isn't about hormones but just calories in/calories out etc.
Or those who say my meter tells me that I need to reduce carbs, so I have no choice but to either add protein, fat or both;
that LDL is vital for life to exist and so probably not bad as such if the Triglyceride/HDL ratio and levels are good; that low carb not only reduces BG but also weight, high Blood Pressure, excess Water Retention. Or at least that 'I would rather die quickly from a heart attack, than slowly for diabetic complications'.

 

[beachlady]

@beachlady your diet is quite high in carbs, and from densely starchy foods too so if you were already in diabetes numbers then it might be problematic. As you are not, but could be, a few changes might make all the difference to the eventual outcome.
To see how you deal with carbs you might get the most information from using a blood glucose meter.
I have the Sprit Healthcare Tee2+ which seems to work well.
When checking my after meal levels I discovered that beans and peas were not giving the expected results, and I now eat a half portion as I saw results which would only make sense if I ate 180 gm rather than 100.
Reducing carbs often alters the metabolism and it is far easier to lose weight, so an added bonus.

thank you , i have ordered a spirit healthcare tee2 from amazon. it would seem that will help keep me on track. I feel sure now that I have come to this site I will have a lot to gain by sharing any food problems that may occur thank you again

@beachlady your diet is quite high in carbs, and from densely starchy foods too so if you were already in diabetes numbers then it might be problematic. As you are not, but could be, a few changes might make all the difference to the eventual outcome.
To see how you deal with carbs you might get the most information from using a blood glucose meter.
I have the Sprit Healthcare Tee2+ which seems to work well.
When checking my after meal levels I discovered that beans and peas were not giving the expected results, and I now eat a half portion as I saw results which would only make sense if I ate 180 gm rather than 100.
Reducing carbs often alters the metabolism and it is far easier to lose weight, so an added bonus.

 

[beachlady]

Hi @beachlady and welcome to the forum.
It's particularly confusing when you have both CAD and T2 Diabetes or pre-diabetes.
For avoiding CAD I was constantly told to eat low fat, lots of fruit and whole grains. I did exectly that and both gained weight plus needed a 3x CAB.
Then I was told the problem was I just wasn't doing it enough. SO cut even more fat and ate even more fruit and whole grains. - I continued to gain weight and was then diagnosed as Type 2 diabetic by which time I had gone from being mid normal range BMI to being 2lbs overweight (so still a slim Type2).
Once I heard about reversing T2D by eating less carbohydrates and more protein & fat this conflicted with the failed advice I had been following for almost 20 yrs. Fortunately I bought Blood Glucose meter and immediately found that all that Fruit and whole grain (and even statins) were raising my Blood Glucose. SO I decided to believe in my BG meter and eat accordingly.
So it is up to you to decide who to believe:
Those that say Low Fa/High Carb is good, that LDL cholesterol is always bad, that the side effects of Statins (including higher Blood Glucose ) are worth it, that weight isn't about hormones but just calories in/calories out etc.
Or those who say my meter tells me that I need to reduce carbs, so I have no choice but to either add protein, fat or both;
that LDL is vital for life to exist and so probably not bad as such if the Triglyceride/HDL ratio and levels are good; that low carb not only reduces BG but also weight, high Blood Pressure, excess Water Retention. Or at least that 'I would rather die quickly from a heart attack, than slowly for diabetic complications'.

Thank you Information you are sharing makes interesting reading plus very informative. It would appear Since Covid started our GPs no longer have interest in looking after us!! I have purchased as a BG machine which i feel in the coming weeks will become my best friend. Thank you for your help and taking time to read my thread.

 

[ianf0ster]

Thank you Information you are sharing makes interesting reading plus very informative. It would appear Since Covid started our GPs no longer have interest in looking after us!! I have purchased as a BG machine which i feel in the coming weeks will become my best friend. Thank you for your help and taking time to read my thread.

Unfortunately many/most GPs have never been interested in us Type 2 diabetics.
The reason is that 'apparently' they know that we don't follow their advice to eat lots of fruit and whole grains, because they can see that our condition is 'apparently' incurable and just gets worse! Some of them suspect that even those who claim to be teetotal are secret alcoholics because of noticing Fatty Liver disease - not realising that Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver often accompanies (or precedes) Type 2 diabetes. We are told that having BG meter and seeing the way our body reacts to food will only make us distressed and then depressed (because we won't take any action to improve it) and any way prescribing them would cost too much money.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Welcome to the forum @beachlady

Well done on the changes you’ve been making, but sorry to hear about your PAD.

Unfortunately there’s no ‘one size fits all’ approach that works for everyone, as different people can have very different reactions to foods, and some can happily cope with far more carbohydrate than others. 130g of carbs a day or less is generally considered to be a low carbohydrate meal plan. Some members do well on moderate carbs, while others find an even lower amount suits them better.

It sounds like you are being pretty careful with your carb intake. And hopefully checking with your BG meter will help you fine tune things. Many folks on the forum use the strategy of checking immediately before a meal and again 2hrs after the first BG check to see what the difference in BG was. Ideally looking for a rise of 2-3mmol/L or less.

You can use this approach to tweak your meals, and experiment with the effects of different portions and types of carbohydrate. Sometimes just having things at a different time of day helps (breakfast time is often the trickiest).

Good luck and let us know how you get on 🙂