How close to "normal" am i?

[nothing56]

Hi All,

im looking for some advice. Im a type 2. I followed the ND for 2 months but was a little disappointed with my glycemic control at the end. While i had much improved fasting levels. They had normalised in the low 5's but my post meal levels when testing high carb foods were still very high. I didnt believe I had hit my personal fat threshold.

I then decided to continue my diet but follow the less restrictive low carb approach. After loosing more weight (10kg) my fasting levels have now normalised in the low to mid 4's.

My benchmark for testing carby food was the Tesco sweet chilli noodles.

My test after the ND were:
before: 5.6
1hr: 11.1
2hr: 8.7
4hr: 7.4
Next day fasting:5.7

My recent test after low carb'ing:
before:4.6
1hr:7.2
2hr:8.2
3hr:7.5
6hr:5
next day fasting:4.7

This is showing a great improvement. I peeked at ~8.2 and not 11.1 like after the ND.

But my question is, how close to normal is this response profile? I still have 15kg to lose so expect this to get better but do you think these readings are close to normal or more in-line with a well controlled diabetic.

Thanks

 

[Avocado Sevenfold]

Fab weight loss, great fasting levels. The answer to your question is really how tight you want your levels to be? Personally, I don't like to see an 8 on my meter at any time, but that's just me. Keep up the good work, you are definitely going in the right direction

 

[nothing56]

Thanks for the encouragement and response.

As you can imagine its quite confusing to work out what's best so heading for "normal" seems the best option.

I was reading this study (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2892065/)

It seems to indicate that most "normal" people go above 7.8 but only for a short amount of time ~26min. So i'm thinking short spikes should be fine.

But from all my research all i can really tell is that there is no normal.

 

[Avocado Sevenfold]

My target is not based on science, to be honest, I just start to feel ropey at 8 so try to avoid it. I have also read on here that meters can be 15% (?) out either way so if it tells you 8, you could anywhere between 7 and 9. Sorry, not much help.

Edit: so meters are good at showing trends is that I am trying to say and your trend is in the right direction.

 

[nothing56]

My target is not based on science, to be honest, I just start to feel ropey at 8 so try to avoid it. I have also read on here that meters can be 15% (?) out either way so if it tells you 8, you could anywhere between 7 and 9. Sorry, not much help.

Edit: so meters are good at showing trends is that I am trying to say and your trend is in the right direction.

Good point. Ill remember that.

 

[nothing56]

Just in case anyone else might stumble upon this I did find an interesting study aiming to record glycemic response in none diabetic folk.

The study is here and if its taught me anything its that "normal" dosent really exist.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2769652/

The interesting bits for me were

"The highest postprandial increase in interstitial glucose concentrations was observed after breakfast (peak 132.3 ± 16.7 mg/dl, range 101–168 mg/dl), and mean time to peak glucose was between 46 and 50 minutes."

and

"Minimum and maximum interstitial glucose values, observed under everyday life conditions, were 59 and 168 mg/dl, respectively." -- That's a peak of a 9.3 mmol/L which is much higher than I expected.


So to answer my own question (for my own targets). I think a spike of less than 9 and to be back in the 5.5 - 5 mmol/L range within 2hrs should give me "within the norm ranges".