Time to get serious

[Tom Battersby]

Hello. I’m Tom living and working in Glasgow. I’m 60 years old and was first diagnosed type 2 about 10 years ago.
As the medical management of my diabetes gets ever closer to insulin by injection, I want to try harder to do what I can with diet and exercise to mitigate the issue. I’ve got plenty of weight to lose and I have given up alcohol. It’s only now that I’ve started daily blood testing. Blood sugar falls into the ”acceptable“ range rarely, usually being a bit too high. Very seldom above 10 though.
The difficult truth is that the foods that give me the most sensual pleasure are sugar, salt, animal fat and refined carbohydrates!

I‘d be so glad to hear from anyone who is or has been in a similar situation. The task looks daunting to me. What’s the most important thing? How should I measure progress (or otherwise)? How have you managed to stay motivated?

Many thanks.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Welcome to the forum @Tom Battersby

Glad you’ve joined us 🙂

You certainly aren’t the first member to have joined after deciding that their diabetes management needs a bit of a ‘reset’. And we have many success stories of people who have transformed their experience of living with diabetes, and felt the benefits of feeling fitter, healthier, more energised and well in themselves than they have for years!

There is no one single approach that works for everyone, and one of the benefits of being in a community like this is hearing a variety of different perspectives and what works for different people.

It sounds like you already have a pretty good idea of some positive changes you could make? And certainly reducing your portion sizes of refined carbs, and reducing sugar intake will help your BG levels. Weight loss is a great benefit too, because it increases insulin sensitivity, and clearing visceral fat around the organs can help them function more efficiently.

Many new members find it can be really helpful to keep a brutally honest food diary for a week or two. Note down everything you eat and drink, along with a reasonable estimate of the total carbohydrate content in your meals and snacks (not just ’of which sugars’). All carbohydrates turn into glucose in the blood, and some things with ‘no added sugar’ can still cause a pretty hefty glucose rise even if starchy and wholegrain. It all comes down to how your body responds individually, and finding the portion sizes that work for you.

It might sound like a bit of a faff, and keeping the diary will involve weighing portions, squinting at the fine print on packaging, or possibly looking up things on the internet, but it will give you a really good idea of which foods are the main sources of carbs in your menu. Once you can see which meals or snacks are your ‘big hitters’, and where carbs might be unexpectedly lurking, the process might also suggest some likely candidates for swaps, portion reductions, or using lower carb alternatives (eg celeriac or swede mash, or cauli ‘rice’).

Some find it easier to cut back more dramatically for a ‘hard reset’, while others know it’s more sustainable for them to decrease portion sizes little by little and increase healthy fats and protein to keep feeling fuller for longer.

Good luck, and let us know how you get on 🙂