Can anyone give me some help and advice? I was diagonsed as prediabetic. I came out of the prediabetic range with my Hba1c reading of 37. I was pleased with this as I was in the 'normal' range. However, I had pretty much starved myself with turkey mince and vegetables and had lost a significant amount of weight (I wasn't big to begin with). I then began reintroducing carbs into my diet as I was getting dizzy spells. Admittedly, I was eating too many carbs (but not really to an excessive degree) and not good ones and so I am now back at 42 Hba1c, just within the prediabetic range. My mood has definitely been affected and I have a very low testosterone reading (something like 3). I am utterly dejected and demoralised, which is not helping my depression and anxiety. Can anyone help?
Completely demoralised.
- Thread starter Macky1
- Start Date
JT65
Newbie
- Messages
- 2
- Type of diabetes
- Type 1
- Treatment type
- Insulin
Hang in there Mackey. I don’t have a definitive answer as newly diagnosed as T1 and the learning curve is very steep. The key learning achieved so far is from others that have experienced symptoms and shared their knowledge which is why I am on this forum. I have learned and recognised that when my blood glucose levels are at the lower end, this does affect my mood and I do tend to get a bit aggy. My friend, also diabetic suffers the same. I’m not entirely sure if this helps but if nothing else, you will know that this is not unique to you. I cannot comment on the testoerone though as I don’t know anything about that. Good luck and take care
JoKalsbeek
Expert
- Messages
- 6,595
- Type of diabetes
- I reversed my Type 2
- Treatment type
- Diet only
Turkey mince and veg? The same thing day in, day out? Your body needs more to run on than that, so I'm not surprised it wasn't sustainable. You need more fats, more protein, to compensate for cutting the carbs. Turkey mince is often about 1% fat or less, it's very lean... Where were you getting energy from, of not from carbs or fats? When you re-introduced carbs, you re-introduced the original problem. You had the symptoms under control, doing low carb, but the underlying cause, your genetic predisposition to develop T2, never went away. Up carbs, see the high blood sugars return.
Look at your diet again and make it one that will actually nourish you, not starve you of rather vital nutrients and fuel until you collapse. There's more to this whole low carbing thing than just cutting carbs... You'll have to get your vitamins, minerals, all that good stuff, from somewhere. Poultry's fine, but where's the meat, where's the fish? Mutton, pork, cow, salmon, tuna...? Cheeses, eggs, full fat greek yog? And what veg? Varying types, or the same thing over and over again? Because a bit of variety would likely help.
You do need something to run on, otherwise, you're quite right, it's not going to be keeping you upright and functioning. I know it's a bit of a balancing act, but just a bit of adjusting and you should be able to get back into the normal range again. Without faceplanting with malnourishment.
Do yourself a favour, figure out what you're going to be eating before you make any new drastic changes to your diet and check whether what you're adding in is something that is nutrient-dense and will help you in the long run. Check dietdoctor.com for ideas, maybe? No need to join, there's loads of free stuff on there. Just please... The diet you were on was indeed a starvation diet, you need and deserve more.
Good luck!
Jo
i like when people are telling trught right in the face but it sound so inspring in sincere, i had some problems with dieting too (like 2 years ago) and i know how hard this can be, im glad that people like JoKalsbeek can make such great post that will help some people to fight in hard times!!!
