Am I doing this right? Low-carb diet and blood sugar readings

[DMWinter88]

I got diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and ignored it for the better part of a year. I decided I needed to take it seriously in early December for the sake of my children. My doctor prescribed me metformin, but honestly, I don't want to be beholden to pills for the rest of my life if I don't have to be.

So, I've cut carbs to somewhere between 50 and 75 grams daily. I know this is more than some people on this forum, but honestly, my diet previously was pretty much 100% carb-based, so this has been the most significant step I can handle at the moment. I also test my blood regularly with a finger pricker and a little device that reads it.

When I first started testing my blood, before properly cutting down on carbs, my readings would be around 9 - 12mmol/L. They're generally between 6 and 7 mmol/L, with occasional dips down to 5.5 or up to 7.5. The overall average for the time I've been tracking has been 6.9mmol/L.

The app I use to track this, MySugr, also gives an estimated HbA1c number, which is around 5.4.

So... yeah. I guess I have no idea if my actions are enough and whether my numbers are good or not? Is there anything I should be doing differently? Am I a fool for not taking my Metformin? Some places that I read up on this suggest what I'm doing is okay, but then others don't, so I could just use some more perspective on the matter.

 

[Goonergal]

Sounds like you’re doing very well.

 

[ianf0ster]

You have certainly made a big improvement - better than Metformin alone could ever do.
So you are doing great!
Exactly how well you are doing depends a bit on when you are testing your Blood Glucose. Obviously for a good comparison it has to be at the same time (relative to meals, sleep, exercise ) each day.
Many people like to test just before breakfast (fasting Blood Glucose), but for quite a high percentage of us the Fating BG is the last one to show any improvement because in the early morning our liver 'helps us out' by producing extra glucose and dumping t in our bloodstream so we can go hunt/gather our breakfast like a cave dweller would.

Personally while I still had diabetic/pre-diabetic HbA1C numbers (hardly test at all now , when I do it's about 2hrs after my first meal of the day) I preferred to test just before and then again 2hrs after every meal. This was both to check what my highest numbers were but mainly to test if I had eaten a meal that had too many/wrong sort of carbohydrates for my body to easily tolerate. Unfortunately we are ll different- so some can tolerate legumes, carby veg or even fruit which would spike others. So testing your meals is the only way to find out exactly which foods (in which quantities) agree with your body!

 

[DMWinter88]

You have certainly made a big improvement - better than Metformin alone could ever do.
So you are doing great!
Exactly how well you are doing depends a bit on when you are testing your Blood Glucose. Obviously for a good comparison it has to be at the same time (relative to meals, sleep, exercise ) each day.
Many people like to test just before breakfast (fasting Blood Glucose), but for quite a high percentage of us the Fating BG is the last one to show any improvement because in the early morning our liver 'helps us out' by producing extra glucose and dumping t in our bloodstream so we can go hunt/gather our breakfast like a cave dweller would.

Personally while I still had diabetic/pre-diabetic HbA1C numbers (hardly test at all now , when I do it's about 2hrs after my first meal of the day) I preferred to test just before and then again 2hrs after every meal. This was both to check what my highest numbers were but mainly to test if I had eaten a meal that had too many/wrong sort of carbohydrates for my body to easily tolerate. Unfortunately we are ll different- so some can tolerate legumes, carby veg or even fruit which would spike others. So testing your meals is the only way to find out exactly which foods (in which quantities) agree with your body!

Thanks! I generally test my blood when I first wake up, before each meal, and 2 hours after each meal. Although the strips and lancets are getting expensive, so I may need to cut back. I'm considering getting one of those constant ones that go in your arm.

 

[KennyA]

I got diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and ignored it for the better part of a year. I decided I needed to take it seriously in early December for the sake of my children. My doctor prescribed me metformin, but honestly, I don't want to be beholden to pills for the rest of my life if I don't have to be.

So, I've cut carbs to somewhere between 50 and 75 grams daily. I know this is more than some people on this forum, but honestly, my diet previously was pretty much 100% carb-based, so this has been the most significant step I can handle at the moment. I also test my blood regularly with a finger pricker and a little device that reads it.

When I first started testing my blood, before properly cutting down on carbs, my readings would be around 9 - 12mmol/L. They're generally between 6 and 7 mmol/L, with occasional dips down to 5.5 or up to 7.5. The overall average for the time I've been tracking has been 6.9mmol/L.

The app I use to track this, MySugr, also gives an estimated HbA1c number, which is around 5.4.

So... yeah. I guess I have no idea if my actions are enough and whether my numbers are good or not? Is there anything I should be doing differently? Am I a fool for not taking my Metformin? Some places that I read up on this suggest what I'm doing is okay, but then others don't, so I could just use some more perspective on the matter.

Looks like you're doing fine. I never took metformin either.

If your pattern is like mine you'll find in a while that you can predict your readings with some accuracy: and the need to test so often should drop off. I'm probably testing as much in a fortnight now as I used to do in a day.

Libres and similar, if you fund them yourself, can be pretty expensive. I took advantage of a free trial and it really did show me some things that I'd never have found out through fingerpricking.