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Prediabetes Can some low carb veg spike BG?

sharonm1

Member
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13
I eat roasted low carb veggies for dinner almost every evening (usually asaparagus/courgettes/aubergine/peppers/cherry tomatoes/broccoli/preserved lemon or olives/olive oil). Three days ago I started testing my BG to see what foods could spike it. For evening meals, day one's pre-reading was 5.2 and 2 hours later 5.4; day two 5.5 pre and post 5.4. Today, pre was 5.3 but post was 6.8. The only differences between tonight's meal and the first two days was that I added about 80g of mangetout to my roast veggies and also had about 100g of sliced avocado on the side. My instinct is that the mangetout caused the increase in BG; it's a low carb veg (net carbs 4.2g/100g) but I suppose it could have been the avocado too (net carbs 2g/100g). But, can low carb veg increase BG?
 
That isn’t a big spike but yes mangetout would spike me as well.
In German they are called sugar peas so I guess that’s a clue.
I doubt it was the Avocado. But you can always test it separately.
 
I find that carbs from legumes always seem to punch above their weight - giving me higher than expected BG levels. A couple of others have said that they get a similar response - maybe something in the genes.
 
I had to stop eating roasted peppers - started to taste very sweet as my tastes changed and BG to match! You may get more acceptable readings eating them raw.
 
Hotpepper20000 said:
That isn’t a big spike but yes mangetout would spike me as well.
In German they are called sugar peas so I guess that’s a clue.
I doubt it was the Avocado. But you can always test it separately.
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Thanks for your reply. Here in the UK sugar snap peas are different to mangetout - sugar snaps are rounder with a bigger pea whereas mangetout is flat with a very small pea - also known as snow peas.
 
Resurgam said:
I find that carbs from legumes always seem to punch above their weight - giving me higher than expected BG levels. A couple of others have said that they get a similar response - maybe something in the genes.
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Many thanks for your reply. I don't eat any type of lentil or dried/canned beans like kidney/haricot/cannellini etc. simply because they bloat me to 9-months pregnant state! Although green/string beans are a legume (eg French beans) opinion seems to differ about their characteristics as a legume. I haven't tested them but they are also 4.2g net carbs per 100g.
 
Goonergal said:
I had to stop eating roasted peppers - started to taste very sweet as my tastes changed and BG to match! You may get more acceptable readings eating them raw.
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Thanks for your reply. Peppers (a half) are always a part of my roast veggies except for green which repeat on me! On day 3 I did change up to a yellow pepper instead of red but I don't think that would make any difference to BG.
 
Honestly, that isn’t a spike. It is a tiny hummock. A minor rise. A blip.
People have started calling small rises ‘spikes’ and talking about them as if they are a cause for concern.

They really really aren’t.
They are perfectly natural, perfectly normal parts of food digestion and life - and they happen to ‘normal’ people too.
The meters are not so accurate that the variation you saw (based on one meal and one test) is significant.

your reading was still nicely in the safe zone, with a nice small rise of less than 2mmol/l after eating. That is a good result and shows you are tolerating that level of carb intake well. If you like that veg combo, feel free to enjoy it again.

In addition, blood glucose levels can be affected by much, much more than a bit of extra green veg. Fatigue, stress, more or less activity than usual... even food intolerances, or running upstairs to fetch something.

PLEASE do not fall into the trap of thinking that this is a exact science, or that your glucose tester is a precise instrument.

Best thing to do is settle in for the long run, take your glucose readings as approximate, not exact, record them, use an app that automatically plots them on graphs. and once you have several weeks of them, you will start to see patterns and trends. The trends won’t all be about food.

Readings higher on weekends? Is that because you are taking more, or less exercise? Or because of the hot choc you were tempted into by with a friend?

Reading always higher after you eat over at the kids house? Hmm. Stress? Excitement? Family rows? Or were there hidden carbs? Or were you hungrier than usual because they eat later than you usually do, and your hunger triggered a liver dump?

In my case my morning fasting reading is affected by how exciting/dull my dreams were. Tiresome, but true. And often the best dreams (the wonderful cloud sailing swashbuckling save-the-damsel ones) result in the highest readings.

Now if you want to talk actual ‘spikes’ have a look online for some type 1 continuous glucose meter (cgm) graphs. Rises and drops from the 3s to the 20s and back again.
Those are spikes.
 
Hi Brunneria. I was happy to read your reply and will take what you say onboard given all your experience. I guess as a newbie tester I'm taking it all too seriously and narrowly; I had already wondered if I was doing that given my 'good' numbers but just had to ask the mangetout question! I might/will probably add them back to my veggie mix...
 

This is a really good post, I have noticed more and more now that people are calling natural (minimal) rises 'spikes' as if they are somehow dangerous and might lead to loss of your toes. I personally, think this is irresponsible and could give some posters, especially new ones, the impression they are somehow failing because their levels went up by 1mmol. Thank you.
 
When I was first learning how to "eat to my meter", I used this table from our main diabetes.co.uk site as a guide for what results I should try to aim for.



My meter allows me to to set (and reset!) target my own ranges based on this to help keep me on track.

Robbity
 
Many thanks for sending me the table Robbity, I appreciate it. My numbers to date are in the non-diabetic range with my low-carb eating but I've yet to test out any high carb beige food! Not that I will return to bread/pasta/rice/pastries/sugar/high starch veg etc., I'm just curious to know what they do to my BG in terms of numbers - one thing I do know - all those foods make me bloat terribly and always have done.
 
My after eating levels should be in the normal range, having got that sorted out some time ago - but my Hba1c levels are seemingly welded to the top end of the range - I put it down to my metabolism being hammered with healthy carb diets inflicted by my doctors over the decades.
Your reaction to legumes seems very like mine, so I'd be a little wary of allowing higher levels of blood glucose if you can stay lower.
First of all there is the look of bewilderment on the faces of the nurses to look forward to, when you get called in.
Secondly there is the knowledge of going against accepted dogma and the hope of avoiding possible complications during your wait for the telegram from the Queen - or maybe by then it will be something electronic.
Thirdly there is the return of a more youthful experience of life.
I'm still trying to work out if you are playing left handed or is it in image reversal by reflection, by the way.
 
Thanks so much for all your insights Resurgam, it's so good to get the low down from forum members. My HbA1c is 40 and I haven't been given a formal diagnosis so no nurses or clinics involved! I just need to stick with the low carb plan and hope to remain stable.

Hee hee, I am not playing the guitar at all - the full picture would reveal that I am sitting next to a statue of a seated Bob Marley playing the guitar outside a CBD shop in Sorrento!
 
Ha! you got me there.
I did low carb eating for many decades before I was diagnosed - I think that was why I wasn't diagnosed, the HCPs were too busy arguing with me about it.
Back in the 1970s I was working at Lyons Tetley in Market Harborough doing storage testing, and got involved in the mixing of various trials of different options and packaging for a Dr Howard, hospital trials for what would become the Cambridge diet. Naturally I did some research of my own with the leftovers - my favourite was an apricot or peach flavoured jelly, which has not been kept in the scheme, probably because it is not instant - but I am still quite experimental in my cookery - I am always being asked for recipes for my concoctions....
 
Yours is an interesting story. I am wondering why if you ate low carb for decades you still became diabetic? Your current HbA1c numbers over three years indicate pre-diabetic now though? Were you strict about low carb over the decades, did you do low carb as we do it today or did you allow certain foodstuffs that we wouldn't today?

I had only heard of the Cambridge diet plan but I've just Googled it; it doesn't sound like my cup of tea, I like real food, cooked from scratch - I'm a foodie and also really enjoy cooking. Your old job sounds interesting, as does the spin-off using leftovers! Tell me about some of your current favourite concoctions that people ask your recipes for!
 
Oh - I was always very athletic as a youngster, in my days in Market Harborough I used to walk through the park and swing by my hands across the horizontal ladder on the climbing frame, morning and evening. Because I was muscular I was considered overweight, and my doctor put me on a low fat low calorie diet, with a diet sheet for high carb meals.
Although I 'got away' with eating low carb at intervals over the years, I was always pestered to lose weight and I gradually lost the excessive muscular strength - I could lift a dead drunk lead guitarist off the floor and onto the transport in my days as a roadie.
I was still strong enough to move knitting machines around when working on servicing them, but at my annual checks for my Thyroxine levels I was always instructed to eat more carbs, less fat, fewer calories - then when cholesterol was checked I was pestered even more. When diagnosed I'd been on a cholesterol lowering diet for almost two years, and was practically spherical.
I am very pleased with my increasing muscular strength over the last three years, I have even gone back to work on the knitting machines. My level of carbs to control my diabetes is just about the same as for losing weight when I was in my 20's and 30's.
 
Not a big rise,
but I found I had to reduce the amount of tomatoes and peppers.
I tested before and 2 hours after until I got to know which (lower carb) foods affect me the much.
Half a premade pack of roast mediterranean veg was too much so I picked out all but one small tomato and had some broccoli or spinach instead.
Any kind of peas were reduced to a tiny mouthful - but usually avoided.
 
sharonm1 said:
Yours is an interesting story. I am wondering why if you ate low carb for decades you still became diabetic?
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Hi there, I believe that anyone can become diabetic due to a host of reasons whether they eat low carb or not, in the same way those who eat 100s of carbs a day don't become diabetic. I truly think it is mainly genetic exacerbated after that by the so called 'lifestyle' factor.
 
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