Effect of porridge on blood sugar

Sweetbinty

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I wish ... my bloods can be 5.5 pre breakfast at 630 am by 9am I'm up to 15 then by lunchtime back to normal.
I'm praying that once I start with my pump ratios can be tweaked to counteract the highs
 

Mbaker

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I'm not suggesting you are lying. I asked for the reading which informs your statement to broaden my reading around my own experience and observations.
These aren't the references I used, I prefer documentaries, or evidence presented by "heavyweight" leaders like Dr Phinney or Prof Noakes. I don't assess and assimilate on a "free pass" basis, just because they are a name, I still question. The below seem to indicate later eating has insulin sensitivity issues:

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20190304-how-meal-timings-affect-your-waistline

"Our sensitivity to the hormone insulin, which enables the glucose from the food we eat to enter our cells and be used as fuel, is greater during the morning than at night. When we eat late"

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170602143816.htm

"Timing meals later at night can cause weight gain and impair fat metabolism: Findings provide first experimental evidence of prolonged delayed eating versus daytime eating, showing that delayed eating can also raise insulin, fasting glucose.
 
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ert

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I wish ... my bloods can be 5.5 pre breakfast at 630 am by 9am I'm up to 15 then by lunchtime back to normal.
I'm praying that once I start with my pump ratios can be tweaked to counteract the highs
I've always found breakfast the most difficult to manage, even before starting insulin pens last week. I've decided to have coffee with cream for breakfast because of this. The most my blood sugars I've increased by (the spike) after lunch and dinner is plus 1.2 mmol/l. I'm aiming for plus 0.3 mmol/l. How? Dr Richard Bernstein's Diabetes Solution. He suggests waiting until your blood sugars fall by 0.3 mmol/l after the short acting injection before eating. Even on Fiasp (which states just to wait 5 minutes) I find it takes 45 minutes before I can start.
 
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DCUKMod

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These aren't the references I used, I prefer documentaries, or evidence presented by "heavyweight" leaders like Dr Phinney or Prof Noakes. I don't assess and assimilate on a "free pass" basis, just because they are a name, I still question. The below seem to indicate later eating has insulin sensitivity issues:

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20190304-how-meal-timings-affect-your-waistline

"Our sensitivity to the hormone insulin, which enables the glucose from the food we eat to enter our cells and be used as fuel, is greater during the morning than at night. When we eat late"

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170602143816.htm

"Timing meals later at night can cause weight gain and impair fat metabolism: Findings provide first experimental evidence of prolonged delayed eating versus daytime eating, showing that delayed eating can also raise insulin, fasting glucose.

Thank you. I'll read those later.
 

Brunneria

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I am another whose insulin resistance (and carb tolerance) is significantly worse in the mornings.

Going back to the OP’s query about porridge, there are a number of possibilities that may affect reactions to the same foods at different times of day. In my case, activity levels, carb intake in the day(s) preceding, fatigue levels and stress all play a part.

@Inchindown i am very impressed with your morning porridge readings! Am quite jealous. I cannot tolerate the stuff at any time of day. Do you have significant Dawn Phenomenon? I do, and suspect that is a factor in pushing up my IR in the mornings.
 
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Sweetbinty

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I have the dawn rise ... however today I tried chia seeds .. which are a protein ... on my porridge and they seemed to of helped. I didn't get the rise .
I am praying that once I start with my omnipod things get sorted out.

Does anyone use an omnipod ,m
 

Stephen Lewis

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My list of acceptable foods from a diabetic nurse when I first went on insulin included steel-cut oats for porridge as it had a low glycemic index. Oatmeal was also a standard part of the diabetic hospital diet for breakfast. So I regularly ate about a third of a cup for breakfast for several months. I love porridge.
At the time it was only recommended to bg test just before a meal. Several months later I started testing 1 hr and 2 hrs after a meal. I imagine my surprise when I saw on my cgm that there was a huge spike in bg often from 6.5 to 9.5 or higher when I had porridge for breakfast. Imagine my concern when the diabetic clinic dietitian refused to accept this information. Regrettably I no longer eat porridge at any time of day.
As we all say, "We each react differently to the same foods" and I certainly react differently to the same foods eaten at different times of the day or on different days. Of course we are not eating under 'laboratory conditions' so many medical professionals ignore what we have discovered about ourselves.
One aspect that affects my after breakfast bg level is my pre-breakfast dawn syndrome bg level that I check once at wake-up and again just before I eat. The size of these bgs and the rate of change influence what I have for breakfast. If it is 7.5 before I eat I will have less cards (2 gms.) than if it is 6.5. This may allow a very small quantity of a low carb cereal. I have found that puffed wheat is best and never porridge. Currently I am trying to keeps spikes below 8.5 and I will drop this to 7.5 as my carb amounts, bg % and A1cs drop more.
Hope there is help for you somewhere in all this wordage.
 

Jomary

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Well.
In the end I had to give up on porridge for breakfast it was fine for about 3-4 years then for reason unknown my morning level were rising 5 or 6 after porridge which in the past had only risen 1-2 I now go for fry up typical English breakfast eggs, bacon,sausage and tomatoe so far no problems and I love porridge so not happy to give it up.
Same here. For some reason my levels were rising after eating porridge made with oats, it does not happen when I make it with oatmeal. Strangely if I have uncooked oats soaked in milk with berries and yoghurt it remains stable, but I suppose I’m not eating as much oats
 

Sweetbinty

Active Member
Messages
41
Type of diabetes
Type 1
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Insulin
We re all different mine can be 6.5 before eating .. 2 hours later sky high. I'm trying different cereals.
I have found a dessert spoonful of chia seeds seems to help with a few berries and spoonful of Greek plain yogart.
Its trial and error.
My diabetic nurse said as long as the insulin spike drops not to worry. . I have to say it does drop after 2 hours .
 

Brillpaul

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I have porridge toast and marmalade every morning at 5 or 6 o’clock. I know BG rides high but I eat nothing else until 12 noon or take vigorous exercise.This seems to work for me.
 

Graham_Taylor

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My blood sugar is normally between 3.0 - 5.0 first thing in the morning before breakfast. It rises to about 7.0 - 8.5 an hour after breakfast and slowly drops down to about 4.5 - 5.0 during the morning. I have my blood glucose levels well under control but some people are talking about their HbA1c levels of 40 - 42. Just how do you monitor your HbA1c levels ?
Regards,
Graham T.
 

wiflib

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I have porridge toast and marmalade every morning at 5 or 6 o’clock. I know BG rides high but I eat nothing else until 12 noon or take vigorous exercise.This seems to work for me.

Aren’t you worried about high numbers?
 

wiflib

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My blood sugar is normally between 3.0 - 5.0 first thing in the morning before breakfast. It rises to about 7.0 - 8.5 an hour after breakfast and slowly drops down to about 4.5 - 5.0 during the morning. I have my blood glucose levels well under control but some people are talking about their HbA1c levels of 40 - 42. Just how do you monitor your HbA1c levels ?
Regards,
Graham T.

Your GP does them.
 

Annb

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My diabetic clinic does them, once in a while, when I can get an appointment - about every 6 months.
 

Annb

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Oats of any kind push my BS levels up significantly. I no longer eat porridge, which I used to eat in the traditional Scots way - a little salt and cream or creamy milk. It was great, but I always felt hungry very soon after eating. Once I started checking levels after eating, I realised that even small amounts with relatively few carbs, still pushed the levels up well above where I wanted them to be.

Very occasionally these days, my level drops below 4.5, at which point I know it is in freefall so I eat an oatcake to push it back up. Today, in the absence of anything else to eat after a fasting blood test in the morning, I had an oatcake with a bowl of kale soup. Usual result - straight up to 9.6. It has taken until tonight to drop again to 4.9 and I can't go into the night with it that low, so just had another oatcake. It will be high in the morning but I can't risk it dropping any further.

Actually, oats are worse than wheat for me and wheat is worse than potatoes. So I try to avoid them all as much as possible.
 

Jacquie S

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I like a bowl of porridge for breakfast most mornings and it normally doesn't affect my blood sugar readings badly.

For example this morning my fasting / pre breakfast reading is 7.7 and 2 hours after a bowl of porridge my reading had dropped to 6.7.

The other evening I fancied a bowl of porridge instead of my normal evening meal. This time my pre meal reading was 6.2 and 2 hours after the porridge my reading had risen to 9.6.

So I'm wondering why the porridge has such a different effect on my blood sugar depending on what time of day I have it.

FYI, in the examples above my level of physical activity was similar after both bowls of porridge.

Hi guys I need lots of guidance
I’m new on here and only just taking my diabetes seriously as it rose from 56-87 at my last count. Diagnosed 4 years ago. So I have porridge in the morning with a little skimmed milk and a handful of blueberries. I had it this morning my fasting levels were 7.3 and it took it to 11.3. When I first starting eating it a week ago this was not the case. When I have Greek yoghurt and berries it’s even worse. The only thing that doesn’t raise it is an English breakfast and that never feels very healthy. I have a lifestyle LibreLink and take metformin and desperately want to get this thing into remission.
Any help would be gratefully received as I don’t seem to understand much about it at all.
 

bulkbiker

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Hi guys I need lots of guidance
I’m new on here and only just taking my diabetes seriously as it rose from 56-87 at my last count. Diagnosed 4 years ago. So I have porridge in the morning with a little skimmed milk and a handful of blueberries. I had it this morning my fasting levels were 7.3 and it took it to 11.3. When I first starting eating it a week ago this was not the case. When I have Greek yoghurt and berries it’s even worse. The only thing that doesn’t raise it is an English breakfast and that never feels very healthy. I have a lifestyle LibreLink and take metformin and desperately want to get this thing into remission.
Any help would be gratefully received as I don’t seem to understand much about it at all.

You'd probably be better starting off your own thread as this one is a bit old.

However you could do a lot worse than read @JoKalsbeek nutrition thread.

https://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/blog-entry/the-nutritional-thingy.2330/
 

Stephen Lewis

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I have


Hi guys I need lots of guidance
I’m new on here and only just taking my diabetes seriously as it rose from 56-87 at my last count. Diagnosed 4 years ago. So I have porridge in the morning with a little skimmed milk and a handful of blueberries. I had it this morning my fasting levels were 7.3 and it took it to 11.3. When I first starting eating it a week ago this was not the case. When I have Greek yoghurt and berries it’s even worse. The only thing that doesn’t raise it is an English breakfast and that never feels very healthy. I have a lifestyle LibreLink and take metformin and desperately want to get this thing into remission.
Any help would be gratefully received as I don’t seem to understand much about it at all.
Hi Jacquie S: I have always had different results from eating porridge at different times of the day and different seasons of the year. I always get a desire for more carbs in the autumn which I think is part of our bodies wanting to store up surplus fats for winter energy and heating. (A learned genetic behavior?) This year I went back to relatively small amount of porridge for breakfast. 1 instant pack over 2 days = 11 carbs per day. Usually I only have a couple of carbs for breakfast as my dawn phenomenon has been high since reducing Metformin to 1 x 500 gm per day. Like you the morning porridge is now having little or no difference to my bg. As diabetics our pancreas may be producing lower insulin (or our bodies unable to use it) but I believe my pancreas is still measuring my blood sugars, still motivating the liver to produce glucose when sugars are low and still telling the liver to change glucose to fat when sugars are high.
When I have porridge in the morning, my bg levels are already high so my pancreas tells the liver to store the excess glucose as fat so there is little or no additional increase in my bg. This fat is now available for the liver to switch back to glucose the next dawn helping to cause the increasing bg as I wake up.
In the evening, my pancreas is 'aware' that I am not sleeping so allows the increased glucose to stay as it may be needed.
It is these continuous but changing and interconnected loops that for me become the hardest to control and manage as my doctor decreases my medication.
Our bodies will probably work differently but this may help you to understand yours. Keep trying as you can get control.
 
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LittleGreyCat

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Interesting thread.
Just noting that yesterday, for a test, I ate one sourdough crumpet with lots of butter mid afternoon when fasted.
My BG didn't twitch for an hour and a half and then started to rise.
[Using a Freestyle Libre.]
Suggests that if I was finger pricking, 1, 2 and 3 hours after eating would be needed to track that.