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Am I low carbing already ????

Swebster

Swebster

Member
Messages
9
Location
Aberdeen
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Insulin
I'm pretty much sold on the idea of low carbing as a solution to the peaks and troughs that my daily blood glucoses follow! My Hba1c are usually quite good number wise usually in 6-7 range and were below 6 regularly when first diagnosed but with frequent hypos caused by taking too much insulin as I battled to prevent too high blood sugar levels in the 1-2 hours after a meal ( a meal that I ate as instructed ie 1/3 complex carbs such as potato wholemeal bread etc ) then followed a low as the truth is the insulin cannot work fast enough to control blood sugars even of complex carbs.
Ok my diet at present is
  • breakfast 2 slices wholemeal bread 4 units humalog +/- 2 units depending on blood sugar at time
  • lunch wholemeal sandwich & piece of fruit 4 units humalog +/- 2 units depending on blood sugar at time
  • dinner higher carb meal pasta or 3 potatoes etc 6 units humalog +/- 2 units depending on blood sugar at time
When a diet is considered very low carb say less than 50gm per day does that mean 50gm of high carb foods say bread or 50gm of carbs which would be about 130gm of bread?

I think it would be most helpful if we were told a quantity of carbs per meal not to exceed I think i could then make a diet plan and insulin regime to keep my blood sugars between 4-8 around that

Why doesn't diabetes.co.uk format a diet and let us follow it for 6 months to see what effect it has on our daily blood glucose levels; HbA1c; weight; health etc

If enough people did this it would be anecdotal evidence but may push for the NHS to review their position on carbohydrates for diabetics
 
hi, im type2 and dont know about insulin etc, but low carbing is reducing or cutting out carbs, i assume your only listing your carbs in your menu as all you are having is carbs lol, low carbers count all carbs not just the high "bad" ones (they are all bad imo), what is low? that depends on how low you want to go or how low works for your bg, its different for everyone and very personal, which is probly why they dont set an amount as 99% of whatever that level would be will disagree, i am guessing you will have to go with the old trial and error ploy

ps. all just my opinion and im sorry if you didnt want a t2 answerer but if nothing else itll bump your post
 
I'm also a Type 2 so know nothing about insulin.

All carbs count, and also anything with sugar in. Your bread would be a no-no for low carbers. I've only had one sandwich since I started and spiked to 12.4 - a tuna mayo sandwich on granary at that. Never again! Pasta and spuds are also very high carb, and most fruits are full of sugar.

Low carb is the number of grams of carbohydrate in the portion you are eating. One slice of normal wholemeal bread is about 17g carbs. You don't get much on 50g of carbs a day.
 
The 50g you refer (when people mention this) is the total carbs for the day over all meals, not the weight of a food item such as bread, the total has to include everything that is eaten over all meals including snacks.

As for being told how many carbs to eat, that would never work as we are all different and some low-carbers can go as low as 20 - 30g a day where others find this difficult and eat a higher level of carbs .........but still well below the RDA.

If you look in the Community pages of Diabetes.Co.UK you will see that they do have information and recipes on low-carb diets and other dietary approaches to manage diabetes.
 
If you use a rapid insulin there are basically two ways of managing in.
The method you are using is a fixed dose which you vary according to glucose levels before meals. This can work well but only if you eat the same amount of carbohydrate for each meal . This would include all carbohydrates including those in milk, vegetables, fruit as well as the more obvious ones in starches like potatoes, pasta and rice,

I started with this method and was given a fixed amount to eat at each meal. I weighed, measured and calculated. It became relatively easy to see that for me 1U of insulin 'covered' about 10g of carbohydrates (for me slightly more at breakfast and lunch than at dinner we all differ in this)
I'm not in the UK (in France) and was taught to have 1/2 plate veg. 1/4 plate starch. 1/4 ''protein' plus a fruit and some dairy
I still tend to stick to this pattern but moved on to changing my insulin according to what I wanted to eat; so if I had a smaller meal with fewer carbs then I would take less insulin, if I ate more then I would take more.
(that's the simple version, as you do it more you find that there are exceptions, especially if you eat a very low carbs meal when you may find that you need proportionately more insulin ; record keeping helps a lot.
Have a look at this online course which teaches you how to adjust your dose.
http://www.bdec-e-learning.com
Counting carbs is different to adopting a low carb diet; the number of carbs and calories that anyone needs varies according to their activity levels, gender and age. There is no one diet that will suit all. There are Olympians (and a Commonwealth games cyclist) who use insulin. I need far fewer carbs than they do as I'm much older . On the other hand, I walk or run at least 5 miles a day so I probably require more than someone of the same age who is sedentary.
One size/diet would not suit all.
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