Is this true about low carb?

[WelshSailor]

I don’t think I have diabetes but my brother was diagnosed with T2 five years ago. Since then, I’ve done a fasting blood glucose test on the first of every month, and eaten relatively low carb. While I know one random test means very little, I do now have 60 normal results over 5 years. While of course there’s been variations I don’t see any upward creep.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I had a random test at the GP as part of a well person screening and was horrified to get result of 8.8mmol/l (venous blood, not a finger prick). Unfortunately the test was done within two hours of an uncharacteristically high carb (for me) breakfast of porridge with honey drizzled on it. I was panicking a bit and when the nurse phoned with the result she was using words like urgent and extremely serious which got me in a right state.

People here scraped me off the ceiling and for the last 10 days I’ve tested before and after every meal plus early morning and bedtime as I really wanted to get a clearer picture of what was going on. My range in that time was been 3.6 to 5.8 (after quite a big dinner) with a mean of 4.5. However, I spoke to the nurse again yesterday when she did a fasting blood and she had a right old rant that I’d probably made myself so insulin resistant by eating low carb that I could tip into diabetes if I ever ate a ‘normal’ diet again. That my pancreas would be ‘dormant’ as it was never used properly and my muscles would have lost the neural pathways they needed to take up glucose. She said it was a totally fad diet and I’d made myself very vulnerable and that I should be eating to a healthy plate model. I ended up crying in the car for ages before I could drive home. Is this true? I thought I was doing the best thing possible for my health and she made it sound like I’ve put myself at terrible risk. I would say I eat low carb 95% of the time, but don’t lose sleep over whether a spice rub had sugar in it, or my soup had some carrots.

Can anyone advise?

 

[Ronancastled]

Low carb = low insulin.
To even consider taking a 75g OGTT you need to "carb up" for 3 days preceding.
That's all that's required to turn the taps on again, the neural pathway quote is nonsense.
The healthy plate model leads to a hyperinsulin state & is the cause of so many of today's ailments.

 

[AndBreathe]

In my experience my insulin resistance at diagnosis improved beyond belief when eating low carb.

One thing to bear in mind is that our bodies like to run to routines, whether that be eating, sleep exercise or other stuff. That way our bodies are "set up" for what we usually throw at it.

What can happen when we low carb (9 years here, so some time under my belt) is our bodies aren't used to eating lots of carbs, so if/when we do it can over or under react. By the over/under mean it can get caught out and have higher than usual sugars because it isn't quite ready to deal with what's been eaten, of it can over react and result in a bit of a low. It is extremely important to realise that unless we are on strong blood sugar lowering meds any over stimulation low is very unlikely to be medically concerning.

Personally, my bloods and lifestyle are much better for low carbing. When I have bloods done there are usually comments on how good they look.

Obviously, it is individual choice how we live our lives, but my feel is low carb is not harmful and indeed beneficial for the vast majority of folks.

 

[Mbaker]

Strange that, they call insulin resistance an inability to eat mostly fake or hybridised food like products. It is no coincidence that approaching 100% of the recommended foods were not around 10 k years ago or their original form / sweetness is nothing like it is now.

I would not reach for the custard cream just yet.

 

[KennyA]

I don’t think I have diabetes but my brother was diagnosed with T2 five years ago. Since then, I’ve done a fasting blood glucose test on the first of every month, and eaten relatively low carb. While I know one random test means very little, I do now have 60 normal results over 5 years. While of course there’s been variations I don’t see any upward creep.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I had a random test at the GP as part of a well person screening and was horrified to get result of 8.8mmol/l (venous blood, not a finger prick). Unfortunately the test was done within two hours of an uncharacteristically high carb (for me) breakfast of porridge with honey drizzled on it. I was panicking a bit and when the nurse phoned with the result she was using words like urgent and extremely serious which got me in a right state.

People here scraped me off the ceiling and for the last 10 days I’ve tested before and after every meal plus early morning and bedtime as I really wanted to get a clearer picture of what was going on. My range in that time was been 3.6 to 5.8 (after quite a big dinner) with a mean of 4.5. However, I spoke to the nurse again yesterday when she did a fasting blood and she had a right old rant that I’d probably made myself so insulin resistant by eating low carb that I could tip into diabetes if I ever ate a ‘normal’ diet again. That my pancreas would be ‘dormant’ as it was never used properly and my muscles would have lost the neural pathways they needed to take up glucose. She said it was a totally fad diet and I’d made myself very vulnerable and that I should be eating to a healthy plate model. I ended up crying in the car for ages before I could drive home. Is this true? I thought I was doing the best thing possible for my health and she made it sound like I’ve put myself at terrible risk. I would say I eat low carb 95% of the time, but don’t lose sleep over whether a spice rub had sugar in it, or my soup had some carrots.

Can anyone advise?

My opinion would be exactly the opposite of what your nurse has quoted. I'm three years into ~20g/day and there is no sign of any increasing insulin resistance. Possibly the reverse, but I have no way to prove it. Please remember that avoiding starchy (ie high in carbohydrate) foods was recommended for T2s and for weight loss up to the 1980s (in the UK anyway). The ration books issued to T2s in WW2 swopped bread and sugar for meat and fats. The "fad diet" is the Eatwell plate.

BTW, porridge with honey would probably raise anyone's BGs to that sort of level. Your subsequent readings look be to be bang normal.

 

[WelshSailor]

Thanks for your reassurance everyone. After my brother was diagnosed I researched on here, read the Michael Mosley books and as a result went low carb so it’s been 5 years now. The plan was I’d be his accountability buddy but I actually started to feel so well (and even lost the pesky 30lbs that appeared in my fifties) that I just kept going. My brother didn’t stick with it and is really quite unwell now, even though he’s younger than me, so I’m incredibly anxious about the whole thing. I really thought I was being so proactive with the monthly testing and low carbing and she made me feel stupid and irresponsible. She even said they really didn’t recommend testing. Just felt I was being told it was all inevitable and there was nothing I could do.

 

[Resurgam]

To be rather blunt - the nurse is spouting half truths and total nonsense.
A low carb diet will defeat type 2 diabetes and put your Hba1c into normal numbers - it is easier to do so testing after meals so you can see how you react - sugary starchy breakfasts are not on my menu as I know that they would send my BG high, so I eat protein and fat mostly.
If you had a broken bone and got it set and held in place, hitting the break with a hammer would be crazy - yet hitting your pancreas with a need to pour out insulin day after day in response to a high carb diet is a really good idea?

 

[HSSS]

You nurse is an ill informed dinosaur with no bedside manner. Frightening that’s shes the one tasked to care for diabetics at her practice.

Perhaps let her know that’s there’s nhs official training units in low carb available via dr David unwin That she’d benefit from. Personally I’d avoid her as much as possible,if this is how she treated me.

 

[ceesisson]

Hi,
I'm new here but have been doing low carb/keto/intermittent fasting since 2018 after reading The Diabetes Code by Dr Jason Fung. Also Michael Moseley books, as well as a plethera of information on youtube. (covid was my enemy and reached for food instead of fasting as usual, but everyone was clueless as to which was the best thing to do so here I am trying to get on it again.

I'm here to ask, has everyone's HbA1c test been changed to non-fasting? It used to always be a fasting test which makes more sense to me, just asking someone to take a blood test after food is going to give a high reading, no professional could decide how their blood sugar is reacting without sufficient knowledge of what meal occurred beforehand. As I fast until lunch almost every day of the week now, it's never a problem for me to worry about. But as stated above oats and honey will spike it.

Also the reason you are fine and your brother is not is purely down to diet, sure on occasion there are hereditary factors but I don't believe that means hereditary for diabetes just how your body stores fat. Some studies with one blood test discovered that your body burns it or stores it and this can come from where in the world your ancestors derived. If it was the colder climates, you put on weight during winter, if you are for example from Africa your ancestors walked miles for water etc, the minute you are placed into the diet of the western world you will gain weight, you move less and food is abundant, same can be said for everyone. Too many food and service places now, but thats another rant in another place i'm sure

 

[Resurgam]

Hi,
I'm new here but have been doing low carb/keto/intermittent fasting since 2018 after reading The Diabetes Code by Dr Jason Fung. Also Michael Moseley books, as well as a plethera of information on youtube. (covid was my enemy and reached for food instead of fasting as usual, but everyone was clueless as to which was the best thing to do so here I am trying to get on it again.

I'm here to ask, has everyone's HbA1c test been changed to non-fasting? It used to always be a fasting test which makes more sense to me, just asking someone to take a blood test after food is going to give a high reading, no professional could decide how their blood sugar is reacting without sufficient knowledge of what meal occurred beforehand. As I fast until lunch almost every day of the week now, it's never a problem for me to worry about. But as stated above oats and honey will spike it.

Also the reason you are fine and your brother is not is purely down to diet, sure on occasion there are hereditary factors but I don't believe that means hereditary for diabetes just how your body stores fat. Some studies with one blood test discovered that your body burns it or stores it and this can come from where in the world your ancestors derived. If it was the colder climates, you put on weight during winter, if you are for example from Africa your ancestors walked miles for water etc, the minute you are placed into the diet of the western world you will gain weight, you move less and food is abundant, same can be said for everyone. Too many food and service places now, but thats another rant in another place i'm sure

The fasting is not for the Hba1c test as such, as it looks for glycated haemoglobin, which will be exactly the same fed or fasted.
It is probably for some other test done at the same time.

 

[bulkbiker]

has everyone's HbA1c test been changed to non-fasting

HbA1c is a kind of "average" of your past 2-3 months blood glucose levels with a bias towards the past few weeks.. whether it is fasted or not will make almost no difference.
Cholesterol testing on the other hand should always be carried out after a 12-14 hour fast so that the results are "clean" and not influenced by what you have just eaten or drunk.

 

[ceesisson]

I remember doing a glucose tolerance test when I was pregnant, the sugar water finger pricks all morning, now that was sore. I was diagnosed in 2016 with type 2 and was always asked for a fasting one, then suddenly within the past year, told it's not necessary but I tell them it is anyway.

btw, I didn't know about the cholesterol check, interesting. thanks

 

[HSSS]

I remember doing a glucose tolerance test when I was pregnant, the sugar water finger pricks all morning, now that was sore. I was diagnosed in 2016 with type 2 and was always asked for a fasting one, then suddenly within the past year, told it's not necessary but I tell them it is anyway.

btw, I didn't know about the cholesterol check, interesting. thanks

Glucose tolerance test and hba1c look at different things in the blood. The first literally looks at glucose whilst the hba1c looks at the effects glucose has had on the red blood cells over their life.

cholesterol used to be tested fasted. Now to save people failing to show up or having to fast for a long time they do it unfasted As it’s more efficient for appointments. As bulkbiker says above it does make a difference to the results whatever you are told to the contrary. If you want to compare one test to another and know it’s not effected by a random or non typical food item do it fasted whatever they tell you.

 

[Robbity]

I've mainly tended to fast before my tests because I'm not a great breakfast eater, and my tests have usually been done before mid day. But I have also been aware of fasting and cholesterol, probably due to info on our forum.

And regarding diet, mine, growing up during the 1940s and 1950s was closer to my current low carb style than it ever was to the so called Eatwell Plate.