An update - 6 month review results today.
Since March, my weight has gone from 104.5 kg - 86.5 kg - loss of 18 kg so far.
HbA1c March: 8.9 October: 5.4
I don't have all the cholesterol data, but suffice to say it was very high 6 months ago, and is now under 5 overall, with the various numbers/ratios getting a gold star from the Doctor. I did allow myself to be talked into starting statins again. Mostly because heart disease in the relatively young women on both sides (40s - 50s) is my heritage. They probably had undiagnosed diabetes!
Diet wise, I did OMAD until it stopped working, and then went through a month of turbulent weight loss and gain despite keeping to a strict LCHF diet with one eye on the calories involved - but only because I practically know the calories of everything off by heart from years of calorie restriction, including lapband surgery without any sustained success. I am currently at the lowest weight I've been since a young teenager.
BP - 120/70. I've had idiopathic hypertension since my late 30s, so this is quite new to me. I was having some serious dizzy spells when I got up from seated quite regularly, so I had a pleasant 24 hour monitoring done, and sure enough, it was getting very low, especially at night. No more BP meds!
Currently I've been at the same weight for 6 weeks - no change from last weigh in at the doctors.
While my doctor is very pleased and keeps telling me that no gain is a win, I want to lose another 20 kg minimum, probably more. (I've shrunk 1.5 inches in height since I set that goal.. what a rip off!) What I have become is an odd shaped creature with tiny arms and legs and a big belly still. I fit into off the rack L sized women's clothes provided they aren't too tight around the middle. I feel like a christmas pudding with pipe cleaner appendages.
The doctor agreed to a trial of taking me off metformin. He is confident that my BG will be fine because I stick to 20g of carbs per day fairly strictly. I will confess that I have the occasional treat that puts me over 20g of carbs for the day. I have found I LOVE chomping on frozen raspberries or strawberries and crave them, so if I have an all meat day, I have been known to eat a 300g bag of frozen strawberries which comes out at around 30g of carbs for the day. Generally I'm a lot more restrained and eat meat and fat and whatever amount of lower carb veg I can and still keep to under 20g of carbs. My other guilty pleasure is my once a week gorge on 85% chocolate - I cannot open a 100g block and not scoff the lot. It contains 16g of carbs/100g, so it is within the rules provided everything else is meat and fat. It doesn't even taste that good, and sometimes as I'm gobbling away, I wonder why I'm doing it - but. chocolate. For dinner! I have given up on nuts - there are just too many carbs in any decent serve of nuts which makes me feel satisfied, as if I eat them, I have them as a meal. Easier just to say no to nuts. I am considering adding a single daily brazil nut as a sort of medicine, because they are full of selenium which is a pretty important mineral which is tough to get from other sources.
So now I take 2 massive horse sized magnesium tablets, 2 combined vit K and D3, a multivitamin because I deserve to be producing expensive urine as much as the next person, and I figure I'm probably missing out on the odd obscure thing from keeping to a very limited range of things. My veg is green and white pretty much exclusively.
I am a bit disappointed that I've really put 100% into this 'project' and I think my results are fairly lacklustre. I have done lots of intermittent fasting, as well as some extended 72 hour fasts and mixed it up to try to trick my body's metabolism to play nice with me. It has been a moderate success. I've tried fat feasts pre fasting to see if that would help, but I can't say that it really has.
So I love my new collar bones on my scrawny shoulders. I hate that I'm so out of proportion. I want this big approx 7 months pregnant looking belly gone though. So I am determined to keep going, keep mixing it up, keep learning, keep reading, keep coming here to read what's working for you other inspirational people.
I'm really happy with my new doctor. He's a strange mix of old school and "whatever works so long as there is actual evidence" for it. He's cautioning me out of thinking that I can "fix" this and then go back to my life. My head knows that's true, my inner 2 year old is throwing a mega tantrum and refuses to listen to sense.
I think the important thing for me is that I cannot afford to be sick, as in chronically ill with problems that result from poorly controlled diabetes. I'm already up against some of them. I have peripheral neuropathy and restless leg syndrome. I have to say the pain has pretty much gone, and now it's just more irritating and annoying and the number of times I have to get out of bed and pace around the room in a sleepy stupour is decreasing slowly. Sometimes I get 5 - 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep. That used to be enough when I was in my 20s. 3am pacing is something I should have left behind when my youngest child began to sleep through the night, right? 3am is the darkest hour for me. Luckily, by morning I've usually recombobulated myself and I'm all sensible and positive again.
The doctor suggested that if I start to gain weight again consistently, that we give Trulicity a go. Some people find it helps them to lose weight. Same applies to the metformin - if I find that I'm getting hungry and having trouble with self control, then he suggests I go back on to it. It didn't have any really bad side effects for me, so it isn't really an issue in most respects. I think I just want to rattle less when I walk.
So if you've got to this bit, you deserve a gold star. Since I got 3 from the doctor today, I have a couple I can spare. I will see him again in 4 weeks. I feel very grateful that he seems invested enough in my success (or alternatively alarmed at my obsessiveness?) to come on the walk with me, fairly closely, and regularly. I would say that apart from this forum, the very best thing which has happened to me is finding a doctor who will listen to me, and gently put other perspectives without going all authoritarian on me. I think he's got my number there. He also said the best thing, which I think I quoted here before, but he summed up how I really feel when he said "You want to die young, but for that to take a very long time". That's it.. I think I'm done. Thanks for reading
