Well, day 1 after the test and so far fully back to normal. Nice low FBG and similar mid morning. Absolutely no cravings, although probably easier for me because the word "snack" hasn't been part of my vocabulary since I was a child. (and I dislike nuts!!) It has been suggested to me that my FBG on the morning of the test may well have been down to stress because of the impending test rather than what I ate the evening before. Either way, it happened and is now back to where it should be.
@CherryAA 's comment about perhaps leaving longer between meals to give my pancreas a rest made me smile as that is the very advice I give to newbies where appropriate, and is one of my pieces of advice that I do actually follow myself.
I food fast from after tea until the following lunch time, and then food fast for a further 6+ hours until tea time. I find this very easy.
I will have another go in a few months.
So having now nearly regained normality, I thought people might like to see exactly how blood sugars respond in a T2diabetic with a 42 hba1C with fasting insulin of 8 at the last test using LCHF when they then abandon it for a bit.
During Sept 1-7 I followed my normal diet ( ignore the carb counts - I usually forget to record them - I am normally at around 30-35g ) to get the average glucose figures of 5.2 to 5.7 for the whole of that week .
late on 7th September I had a big meal including some bread and some mashed potatoes .carbs 140g
during Friday 8th I recommenced my LCHF diet and as such for most of the day would have progressed to a similar result as previously. However mid afternoon I caught a train and treated myself to a big cornish role and a tuna sandwich with the resulting surge in blood sugars . Again if I had stopped there, then my figures would have returned to normal pretty quickly - again I went out for a late meal including some mashed potatoes and again the response worked reasonably well . (205 g carbs)
During Saturday 9th - I started out well - normal LCHF breakfast- egg , spinach and caught the train home. it was while I was on the train I realised that I had now had 2 days of 200g carbs, so one more day would give me a " standard" test for OGTT .
So Saturday evening I deliberately ate some carbs, fish in batter and a cheese sandwich - ready for sunday's OGTT test.
You can see that by Sunday morning - ie three days in- I am now struggling to keep my system calm, so that at the point I take the test my figures are already a lot more volatile than they have been in months. carbs 207g
I do the test, big spike, back to below 5 within 2 hours - so great result however by now my carb cravings have been reawakened and that evening I succumb to some Kentucky Fried Chicken and pringles. with 140g carbs
Monday 11th another try to get back into gear, but I succumb to a late night meal again - 90g carbs - making progress
Tuesday 12th down to 42g carbs and flatter lines - but still not yet back to my average 5's
Wednesday 13th doing pretty well carbs around 40g , until I went to the movies. went for a coffee after, the machine wasn't working so I said Id have hot chocolate instead - that turned out to have about 50g of carbs in it ans was thus a mini OGTT all on its own. At least that time it was not me losing control, but moe a misunderstanding of what they could possibly put in a cup of unsweetened hot chocolate.
My Conclusion re OGTT
If you have a 24/7 monitor so you can see the same sort of volatility or not happening to you over the days before and after the OGTT, then it MIGHT be interesting to carb up first so you can follow the entire thing for two weeks .
If instead you are relying on finger prick tests , then in practice both
@bluetit and
@bulkbiker have shown that its possible to see how your insulin levels are responding without going through the disruption I just put myself through ! if somehow waking up my pancreas, makes my result more valid, then I for one would have preferred to leave it asleep.
In terms of other lessons:
1) the processed foods gave a MUCH bigger spike than real foods even if there was technically more carbs in the real foods.
2) the data clearly shows the ratchet effect both on the way up, and on the way down , of eating too many carbohyrdates and the increasing oscillation of the swings.
3) the extent to which there is some kind of circadian rhythm involved where Monday 11th almost re-enacted Sunday 10th, giving me a smaller spike at the same time as the OGTT test without any matching foods.
One can almost see the pendulum starting to swing getting more and more out of control and gradually calming back down again as the inability to process the carbs takes hold !
Hope people find this helpful - !
