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Hi I am new

Jache

Jache

Active Member
Messages
31
Location
Singapore
Type of diabetes
Other
Treatment type
Diet only
Dislikes
Diabetes
Hi everyone,

I'm new to this forum and to Diabetes. I'm from Singapore. I have only recently been monitoring my blood sugar levels using a glucose meter- before and 2 hours after each meal. I had one doctor tell me my Diabetes had "gone away" (when a previous OGTT had clearly shown Diabetes). A second doctor I saw said Diabetes usually does not "go away" especially in my case where I'm actually underweight and have been keeping a fairly healthy lifestyle.

I've been trying hard to control my diet as I really want to avoid having to rely on medication for now. I read a little about the Low Carb High Fat diet from this forum too.

I've some questions which I was wondering if anyone could help me with:
1) Is it possible for a skinny person to get Type 2 Diabetes? Or is it usually a sign of Type 1 or Type 1.5 diabetes?
2) Is it normal for my blood sugar levels to be all over the place? Eg, I eat the exact same food today and yesterday, but the 2 hour after meal blood sugar reading is much higher today.
3) Will I lose weight on the LCHF diet? I'm already too skinny and I don't want to lose too much weight! Is there anyway for a person to actually GAIN weight eating low carb and high fat?

Thank you in advance. And thanks for reading.
 
@Jache

Hello Jache and welcome to the forum :)

In the meantime while some members who can answer your questions come along, here is the information we give to new members, newly diagnosed or not. Ask more questions if you need to and someone will be able to reply.


BASIC INFORMATION FOR NEWLY DIAGNOSED DIABETICS

Diabetes is the general term to describe people who have blood that is sweeter than normal. A number of different types of diabetes exist.

A diagnosis of diabetes tends to be a big shock for most of us. It’s far from the end of the world though and on this forum you’ll find over 130,000 people who are demonstrating this.

On the forum we have found that with the number of new people being diagnosed with diabetes each day, sometimes the NHS is not being able to give all the advice it would perhaps like to deliver - particularly with regards to people with type 2 diabetes.

The role of carbohydrate

Carbohydrates are a factor in diabetes because they ultimately break down into sugar (glucose) within our blood. We then need enough insulin to either convert the blood sugar into energy for our body, or to store the blood sugar as body fat.

If the amount of carbohydrate we take in is more than our body’s own (or injected) insulin can cope with, then our blood sugar will rise.

The bad news

Research indicates that raised blood sugar levels over a period of years can lead to organ damage, commonly referred to as diabetic complications.

The good news

People on the forum here have shown that there is plenty of opportunity to keep blood sugar levels from going too high. It’s a daily task but it’s within our reach and it’s well worth the effort.

Controlling your carbs

The info below is primarily aimed at people with type 2 diabetes, however, it may also be of benefit for other types of diabetes as well.
There are two approaches to controlling your carbs:

  • Reduce your carbohydrate intake
  • Choose ‘better’ carbohydrates

Reduce your carbohydrates

A large number of people on this forum have chosen to reduce the amount of carbohydrates they eat as they have found this to be an effective way of improving (lowering) their blood sugar levels.

The carbohydrates which tend to have the most pronounced effect on blood sugar levels tend to be starchy carbohydrates such as rice, pasta, bread, potatoes and similar root vegetables, flour based products (pastry, cakes, biscuits, battered food etc) and certain fruits.

Choosing better carbohydrates

Another option is to replace ‘white carbohydrates’ (such as white bread, white rice, white flour etc) with whole grain varieties. The idea behind having whole grain varieties is that the carbohydrates get broken down slower than the white varieties –and these are said to have a lower glycaemic index.
http://www.diabetes.co.uk/food/diabetes-and-whole-grains.html

The low glycaemic index diet is often favoured by healthcare professionals but some people with diabetes find that low GI does not help their blood sugar enough and may wish to cut out these foods altogether.

Read more on carbohydrates and diabetes

Eating what works for you

Different people respond differently to different types of food. What works for one person may not work so well for another. The best way to see which foods are working for you is to test your blood sugar with a glucose meter.

To be able to see what effect a particular type of food or meal has on your blood sugar is to do a test before the meal and then test after the meal. A test 2 hours after the meal gives a good idea of how your body has reacted to the meal.

The blood sugar ranges recommended by NICE are as follows:

Blood glucose ranges for type 2 diabetes
  • Before meals: 4 to 7 mmol/l
  • 2 hours after meals: under 8.5 mmol/l
Blood glucose ranges for type 1 diabetes (adults)
  • Before meals: 4 to 7 mmol/l
  • 2 hours after meals: under 9 mmol/l
Blood glucose ranges for type 1 diabetes (children)
  • Before meals: 4 to 8 mmol/l
  • 2 hours after meals: under 10 mmol/l
However, those that are able to, may wish to keep blood sugar levels below the NICE after meal targets.

Access to blood glucose test strips

The NICE guidelines suggest that people newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes should be offered:

  • structured education to every person and/or their carer at and around the time of diagnosis, with annual reinforcement and review
  • self-monitoring of plasma glucose to a person newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes only as an integral part of his or her self-management education

Therefore both structured education and self-monitoring of blood glucose should be offered to people with type 2 diabetes. Read more on getting access to bloodglucose testing supplies.

You may also be interested to read questions to ask at a diabetic clinic

Note: This post has been edited from Sue/Ken's post to include up to date information.
 
Welcome.
1) Yes, it is quite common for normal/underweight people to get diabetes. It certainly could be something other than standard type 2 diabetes. You'll need to keep after your doctors to get them to check that and do some research on what kind of tests you may need to have done.
2) Yes, that is also common. Your body's ability to control your blood glucose levels is out of whack.
3) You might - some people have trouble gaining weight on a LCHF diet. However, you may be able to put on weight with a healthy LCHF diet.
 
Hello and welcome,

Yes, skinny people can get type 2. They also get LADA or type 1.5. I know little about LADA so can't comment further.

What do you mean by "all over the place"? It is normal to get different readings after the same meal. The meal may not have been exactly the same in every respect unless weighed and correctly portioned. Other things come into play, such as meter inaccuracies (15% plus or minus is acceptable), stress, exercise, timing etc.

In order not to lose weight on LCHF you must replace ALL the calories lost by not eating carbs with additional fat and/or protein. I struggled to maintain my weight and had to count calories in addition to counting carbs until I found the right balance. It does mean a lot more fat and a bit more protein. It is a balance that isn't easy to find, but perfectly do-able.

Hope that helps
 
Hello jache

Welcome , what a lovely warm place you live in ...

Have a read of the information from Daisy ...

hope you find a good Dr to provide regular health care ....

Best wishes ..Kat
 
The answer to your first question is yes skinny people do get T2
If you do go low carb high fat you will probably loose some weight. When I was diagnosed as being prediabetic withBG levels of 6.9 I gave up all sugar stuff and lowered my carbs but not very low I jusl ate lower portions of potatoes root veg and bread and I do moderate fat no red meat but I did have good oils and some full fat dairy but I did loose weight when I didn`t need to. I stopped loosing after a while but did not gain any until recently when I started to eat a bit more of the full fat dairy like cheese butter and cream I also started to eat salted peanuts along with the other nuts I already ate and after more than a year I have now managed to gain about 4lb. I am still not back to what I weighed before though. You will just have to work out the balance in fat and carbs that best prevents you loosing to much weight
 
HI. I was skinny at diagnosis and never been overweight in my life so I understand. Low-carbing with enough protein and fat should not mean you keep losing weight because even if you have low pancreatic output the body will eventually burn fat rather than you few carbs you do eat. However it's not ideal if your insulin output is very low. I agree with AnnieC that skinny people can be labelled at T2 (just as I was), but I suspect many are the 15-20% of T2s who are skinny and many may actually be LADA as the NHS is not good at diabetes diagnosis and assumes T2 too readily and sometimes guesses. I'm still labelled as T2 but I know I'm not. In many ways it doesn't matter as the treatment route is similar but not the same. The starting tablets may be different and if LADA then insulin is often the end result. You could lean on the GP to do the two tests for LADA which are GAD and c-peptide. The latter can be more useful as it shows how much insulin your body is producing and helps the right medication to be prescribed. Keep up the low-carb with fat and protein, keep monitoring your blood suagr and if the HBa1C goes above around 7.5% then insist on the right action being taken which may be insulin?
 
Thanks everyone for the replies!

Bluetit (haha your name is cute), by all over the place, i meant that for the exact same meal (e.g., overnight rolled oats with greek yoghurt milk and blueberries) I had post-meal reading of 5.1mmol (the measurement commonly used in Singapore) on Day 1 and 7 mmol on Day 2. I had a few "discrepancies" of this nature in my past 10 days of regular testing.

For a while, I was hoping that I wasn't diabetic. But the readings are clearly proving otherwise. So I kind of get depressed when I see high blood sugar levels overall, even when I'm trying to keep to a lower carb diet. And I don't look forward to losing weight...

I borrowed 2 books- Dr Bernstein's Diabetes book, and "The End of Diabetes" by Joel Furhman. I noticed many have recommended the book by Dr Bernstein. I will probably order these books from Amazon as I take a long time to read!

Which brings me to yet another question- does anyone have any good cookbooks to recommend for Diabetics?
 
Hello and welcome.
Im a skinny T2 ,more skinny with cutting carbs,but I have got my BS under control.
I perhaps have more carbs than most.due to having to cut down on fat through another condition.I didnt want
Read round ,you will find out what suits you best.we are all different.I didnt realy want to lose weight.but it was either lower carb or more medication.
I am on 1 x 500 mg of Metformin a day.
 
Jache said:
Thanks everyone for the replies!

Bluetit (haha your name is cute), by all over the place, i meant that for the exact same meal (e.g., overnight rolled oats with greek yoghurt milk and blueberries) I had post-meal reading of 5.1mmol (the measurement commonly used in Singapore) on Day 1 and 7 mmol on Day 2. I had a few "discrepancies" of this nature in my past 10 days of regular testing.
Click to expand...

After oats and blueberries those readings aren't bad at all, and I wouldn't call them all over the place. If you didn't weigh your oats or blueberries, that is where some of the discrepancy may be, then much depends what levels you were when you started, when you last had any activity, and what time it was. All these factors impact on readings, as well as meter inaccuracies. When are you taking your readings?
 
I took my readings 2 hours after food.

My 2 hour after meal readings are typically from 5.5 to 7.8mmol. They seem to get higher in the evenings for some reason. I have been watching my diet as much as I can.
 
Jache said:
I took my readings 2 hours after food.

My 2 hour after meal readings are typically from 5.5 to 7.8mmol. They seem to get higher in the evenings for some reason. I have been watching my diet as much as I can.
Click to expand...

But what are they BEFORE you eat? It is the rise from before to after that is important.
 
It was 5.0 before.

During breakfast this morning, I took only half a cup of greek yoghurt, but my blood sugar level still went up from 4.9 to 5.6 mmol after 2 hours... I thought if I don't take carb my blood sugar should not be going up at all.

Do you guys ever crave the taste of sweet things? Cos I do.
 
Your blood sugar can go up for a variety of reasons. Mine goes up in the morning after I get up regardless of what I eat, or even if I don't eat anything.

If your fasting blood glucose is around 5 and you are at or below 7.8 mmol/L 2 hours after eating a meal with carbs, that doesn't sound diabetic to me. How exactly were you diagnosed?
 
Jache said:
It was 5.0 before.

During breakfast this morning, I took only half a cup of greek yoghurt, but my blood sugar level still went up from 4.9 to 5.6 mmol after 2 hours... I thought if I don't take carb my blood sugar should not be going up at all.

Do you guys ever crave the taste of sweet things? Cos I do.
Click to expand...
If those are typical of your levels then you really don't have anything to worry about so just continue what you are doing
 
I did an OGTT. 1 hour after the glucose solution my blood sugar level was 11 mmol. 2 hours after the solution it was 12 or 13 mmol.

The levels of my post meal blood sugar levels do vary. The past 2 evenings my post dinner levels went up to 8.3mmol and 8.1 mmol. In my case my blood sugar levels tend to go higher for my dinner meals.

I have also been controlling my diet. I do take rolled oats on occasion in the morning but I've pretty much stopped eating the more "obvious" carbs like potatoes and rice when I have breakfast or lunch. During dinner I'm home with the family so I usually have some rice (though I limit that if I can), but the moment I eat rice/noodle, it seems that the blood sugar levels go up higher.

I was reading the Blood sugar 101 website and the 2 hours after meal target there is 6.7mmol (if I translated the numbers correctly). So many-a-time my sugar levels are higher than that.
 
Ok, sounds like you definitely have elevated blood glucose levels after eating carbs. The Blood Sugar 101 targets are good ones to follow. You need to reduce how much carbs your eating even more.
 
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