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Type 1 Diet

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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
Tom1982

Tom1982

Well-Known Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Parent of person with diabetes
Morning all. Well over two years into this journey now and still using the “eat whatever everyone else eats, just carb for it” guidance the hospital gave us. But in reality, are there foods we should be avoiding? Do people with type 1 swerve certain foods?
 
The only thing I was told to avoid was full sugar Coke and similar unless I was treating a hypo or exercising. I don’t really avoid anything. I just have to think a bit more about it. I suppose I avoid sugary fudge and the like unless hypo, but I usually just take some and spread it over a longer period of time.

If I want something, I have it, but do think about portion size and what I’ll be doing afterwards, as well as what my blood sugar is. So - no forbidden foods, but the normal (and very tedious) extra thinking.
 
I’m like @Inka and would never drink full sugar drinks. My body just couldn’t cope with it. If we’re dining out I tend to skip starters and puddings and just go for the main. It saves splitting doses and I feel it’s just extra carbs I can’t be bothered dealing with. I also wouldn’t eat jelly sweets, unless I’m hypo. In theory we supposedly can inject for everything but in reality it’s not as easy as that, not for me anyways.
 
I never did drink fizzy drinks, so that’s not an issue for me. When I thought I had type 2, I cut out anything sugary completely to lose some weight. etc. Now I find I’m using snack bars to control my big levels quite often. I’d prefer not to eat them, but often it’s the most convenient thing. I generally avoid desert. I try to eat a lot less carbs- now I realise how they turn to glucose I’d rather have less. I’ve got my 20 something 32” waist back and want to keep it that way.
 
For me. The sweet stuff, only when low. If out for a meal? Main course only. That tends to suffice. I’m more into nutritional content, than anything else.
 
Only foods I avoid are those that don't taste nice, other than that don't really exclude anything apart from obvious like sugary pop.

Rarely have desert but do like starters when out for meals, so it's 2 course rather than 3.

Wife & I enjoy our coffee so will have a cake or scone occasionally when in coffee shops, see food as one of life's few pleasures & so won't be changing anytime soon.
 
Like others, diabetes does not limit my diet.
Before I had a pump, I would rarely eat things that would require split doses like pizza. However, that was before I had a CGM so less likely to know it needed splitting.
 
I eat what I want but choose to stick to around 30g of carbs to avoid bug spikes after meals. This seems pretty normal for us now so don’t think of it as a limitation.

Pizzas caused me issues even on a pump with spilt doses and I have no great yearning for them so just don’t bother.

I no longer crave sweet things apart from chocolate which I happily eat. When out we often go for two courses: share a starter, have a main and share a pud if there is something we fancy.

So in general eat what I want and have smaller portions than we used to which feels fine.
 
I try to have a flexible approach to eating, but I’m also pragmatic. I generally have the same breakfast and lunch choices each day, because that reduces variables.

Some foods I just found fell on the wrong side of the ‘predictability and relative reliability’ balance for me. So personally I don’t often eat breakfast cereal, because it wasn’t enjoyable enough for the chaos I seemed to get, and toast was a perfectly satisfactory alternative. Then 2 slices of toast seemed to be a bit variable (frustrating) depending on the ebb and flow of other factors - so I went down to one slice and found it basically just as satisfying.

Plus as I’ve got older I seem to be finding that eating the same quantity of food as I used to seems to lead to slight weight gain - so I’ve reduced portions here and there to aim for a new balance.

So I keep the enjoyable things - even if I have to work hard at them or they aren’t very predictable (hello beer!), but I also ditch things if they cause me frustration and BG chaos, and I can’t be bothered to fight for them.
 
Now THAT is bolusworthy.

Though to be fair, I often find the extra ‘holiday wandering’ and warmer weather / insulin sensitivity often mean I hardly need to dose for a holiday ice cream
 
everydayupsanddowns said:
Now THAT is bolusworthy.

Though to be fair, I often find the extra ‘holiday wandering’ and warmer weather / insulin sensitivity often mean I hardly need to dose for a holiday ice cream
Click to expand...
Well she’s currently legging it up and down getting wet sand to make a house for a crab….. or a carb….. I can’t keep up but that 2.5 units is looking generous!
 
The more refined the carbohydrate is the faster it gets into your bloodstream. Sugar and white bread are the obvious ones but you can give yourself some latitude, biscuits contain refined sugar and probably white flour but the odd one isn't going to do you any harm, a full packet probably isn't a good idea and I've seen people start at one end of a packet of chocolate digestives and work their way through. I only eat stand pasta made of durum wheat, I don't know if the fact of it being a hard wheat makes any difference but I don't have any problem with it and I'd rather do without than eat the wholewheat stuff.

Other than watching out for refined carbs I take care about the amount of saturated fat in my diet. I also avoid ready meals because of the hidden sugars and other unpleasant sounding extenders and life prolonging additives, the life that's prolonged is the product not that of the person eating it.
 
everydayupsanddowns said:
Now THAT is bolusworthy.

Though to be fair, I often find the extra ‘holiday wandering’ and warmer weather / insulin sensitivity often mean I hardly need to dose for a holiday ice cream
Click to expand...

Yes, I find beaches are a bit like gardening - that unexpected glucose-lowering effect even after a very moderate level of activity. I often have a Starter of a couple of Dextro tablets before I have my ice cream :D

I’ve found the good quality/richer ice creams don’t cause a massive rise anyway. I imagine the fat slows it down. I usually don’t bolus unless I’ve gone for something huge and sugar-garnished, and even then I wait until I’m sure I need some insulin. Beaches are great, blood sugar rollercoasters not so much!
 
Merluza said:
The more refined the carbohydrate is the faster it gets into your bloodstream. Sugar and white bread are the obvious ones but you can give yourself some latitude
Click to expand...
As a bread baker, often white bread, I find it far far to simplistic to assume white flour/bread gets into your blood stream faster. Shop bought bread often includes some sugar (especially in the US). Maybe that contributes to carb absorption. I certainly find that sourdough requires a later bolus than seeded bread, for example. And focaccia (white bread) is quite a later absorber which maybe due to the high olive oil content.
I have no idea about supermarket pre cut bread.
I have never felt the need to cut out white bread because it is absorbed too fast and not sure how it would go down for Tom’s young daughter.
 
helli said:
As a bread baker, often white bread, I find it far far to simplistic to assume white flour/bread gets into your blood stream faster. Shop bought bread often includes some sugar (especially in the US). Maybe that contributes to carb absorption. I certainly find that sourdough requires a later bolus than seeded bread, for example. And focaccia (white bread) is quite a later absorber which maybe due to the high olive oil content.
I have no idea about supermarket pre cut bread.
I have never felt the need to cut out white bread because it is absorbed too fast and not sure how it would go down for Tom’s young daughter.
Click to expand...
A tip to stop your flour from getting flour mites or weevils is to store in container or bag with bay leaves, we have had no problem since doing that.
 
Leadinglights said:
A tip to stop your flour from getting flour mites or weevils is to store in container or bag with bay leaves, we have had no problem since doing that.
Click to expand...
Mites and weevils!? That’s definitely something I wish I’d not learned today! Like something out of a Stephen King book!
 
Tom1982 said:
Mites and weevils!? That’s definitely something I wish I’d not learned today! Like something out of a Stephen King book!
Click to expand...
I'm afraid they can come in from the rustic flours, the mites you can hardly see just like a speck but the weevils are more evil looking.
 
helli said:
As a bread baker, often white bread, I find it far far to simplistic to assume white flour/bread gets into your blood stream faster. Shop bought bread often includes some sugar (especially in the US). Maybe that contributes to carb absorption. I certainly find that sourdough requires a later bolus than seeded bread, for example. And focaccia (white bread) is quite a later absorber which maybe due to the high olive oil content.
I have no idea about supermarket pre cut bread.
I have never felt the need to cut out white bread because it is absorbed too fast and not sure how it would go down for Tom’s young daughter.
Click to expand...

More bread-related info your you @Amyfaith 🙂
 
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