Thank you for all the advic.This is what works for me. No guarantees, obviously. The other point is that this is the Tour de France, not a 500 metre sprint. What happens in one stage has very little impact on the race overall. It's only when you add everything together over a much longer time that you'll see which team is leading.
I aim for around 20g carb/day. That comes mainly from veg, and sometimes pulses because I can handle those acceptably. I don't eat any of the heavy carb items - bread, fruit, pasta, rice, pastry or sugar. I don't want to be using protein for fuel, because I'm interested in keeping and building muscle, so fats are the only practical fuel option (alcohol will provide 7 calories energy per gram, but that's not a realistic plan) .
So I eat plenty of meat and veg. That goes along with cream, ghee, butter (before I found SRSLY I had difficulty finding a method to eat butter other than in cooking) and olive oil. So, for example, a lamb and spinach curry will have onions as the base and I'll use lamb with plenty of fat. Eaten on its own as my meal in OMAD and (depending on quantity) that tops out at a maximum 10g carb from the spinach and onions (I usually overestimate) . Doesn't have to be curry, you could make a stew the same way and leave out the spices. I eat only what I want - I find it impossible these days to overeat.
One of my other priorities is not to be hungry. I do really badly in that respect on "calorie-control" diets, and they never worked for me. I have not felt hungry on 20g carb as I'm taking in enough food and fats are sufficiently satiating.
I'd advise eating to your meter. It can sometimes be difficult to predict results for foods in combination and any alcohol (eg one glass of wine) will tend to suppress your post-meal reading. The issue is though that you're not diabetioc, so the official "targets" for diagnosed diabetics are different. In a sense, that doesn't matter. What you are trying to establish is whether your system can handle the glucose load you just took in.
If my (unskewed by alcohol) post-meal reading is not above 7.8 and not more than two points higher than where I was when I started, I am happy. In practice I rarely see a readinbg above 6mmol/l after food (and I usually know why). The one-off meter readings do not directly predict your eventual A1c (they measure different things in different ways) but if yiou're testing after food and first thing in the morning those are likely to be your high BG points in the day, so you should be getting a worst-case picture. If that's consistently (say) under 6, and stays like that for three months, you should be seeing an A1c improvement.
Best of luck
Hi Robbity. Some very useful advice. Thank youThere's nothing at all wrong with normal full fat food - and the fat in dairy produce (milk, cream, youghurt, butter...) is there for a definite purpose - it's nature's source of basic building material for new life. But there are plenty of other sources of suitable fats - e.g. from skin on chicken, fattier cuts of meat, oily fish, avocados, olives. nuts..... It's the low/reduced/lite/etc type stuff , often padded out with extra carbs, that you need to avoid if you want to eat a healthy low carb/ketogenic diet, and this means you'll (hopefully) be replacing your body's main source of fuel for energy with sufficient fat instead of often continuous carbs. And less carby input is actually what results in improved/lower glucose levels and so better HbA1cs.
It's not really a sensible idea to simply cut down on the carbs . You may well lose weight without a problem if you have plenty of it to lose, but if not you may well find your body will end up believing it's starving and start struggling overtime to preserve what fat there is still available to keep it functioning if you choose not to provide it with a sufficient amount of external fuel.
Hi, and thank you. Your meal plan for yesterday sounds very temptingKeto diet literally saved my life! -over the 14 years since diagnosis and low carbing to then keto I lost over 11st to date, have gone from max meds to small dose of Metformin, I no longer walk with a stick, I can sleep flat. I feel years and years younger. (I was 45 and felt 75!) all my other health markers are within range
If eating unprocessed foods, fresh above ground vegetables, meat from a local butcher, natural fats from animal and plants, cooking from scratch is considered a fad diet than bring it on
Yesterday I ate -
a salad made up of steamed broccoli, green beans and cherry tomatoes with a homemade oil & vinegar dressing, baked salmon filet
Chicken kebab marinated with garlic and fresh mint and olive oil with a slaw made from thinly sliced fennel, more cooked green beans, some red onion and a smal, amount of chopped apple and walnuts bound with mayo
Strawberries and a splash of double cream, a square of 85% chocolate, a bit of cheese and plenty of water - my one vice is a small glass of Irn Bru Extra with my main meal
How can anyone say that this isn’t healthy?
Low carb for getting into remission is not a fad diet - it is supported by research. The other side that promotes ultra low calorie research usually omits the fact that ultra low calorie diets are also low carb.Yes, you're right because that study excludes diabetics and the OP says they're not diabetic. I'm not debating that carbs elevate blood sugar levels -- anyone with a meter can see that they do. But protein does as well (I can't cite a study, that is an anecdotal statement, but I'm sure I could find one). However, and this makes sense, fats do as well (https://diabetesjournals.org/care/article/36/4/810/37916/Dietary-Fat-Acutely-Increases-Glucose). I don't think this forum should be promoting fad diets, and apart from some very specific cases I think that "keto" is a fad diet. I'm glad that it works for you though
This was my approach also, your meter is you best friend, test right before and 2 hours after eating will tell you how you cope with the carbs you have eaten, aim for no more than a rise of 2 points, less if possible. We are all different, lots on here can’t eat any fruit except berries but I can cope with half a small apple with a meal, I wouldn’t know this if I didn’t test and wouldn’t probably eat that apple because others don’t.Thank you for all the advic.
20 grams of carbs seems very low but I imagine you got there over time. I’ll perhaps start by aiming for 20 frames per meal and then maybe work my way down. I’ll be sure to test along the way to see what I can and can’t cope with.
I'm afraid I went from high carb one day to 20g the next. That works for me, you need to find what works for you.Thank you for all the advic.
20 grams of carbs seems very low but I imagine you got there over time. I’ll perhaps start by aiming for 20 frames per meal and then maybe work my way down. I’ll be sure to test along the way to see what I can and can’t cope with.
Thank you. My Fitness Pal sounds like a good app. I’ll start using it next week.This was my approach also, your meter is you best friend, test right before and 2 hours after eating will tell you how you cope with the carbs you have eaten, aim for no more than a rise of 2 points, less if possible. We are all different, lots on here can’t eat any fruit except berries but I can cope with half a small apple with a meal, I wouldn’t know this if I didn’t test and wouldn’t probably eat that apple because others don’t.
Keep a diary of everything you eat and your numbers will help you build a picture. I use MyFitnessPal to record all my food, even after all these years I still like to use it to keep me going straight.
It’s a lifestyle not a quick fix diet so you need to be able to sustain it long term, finding foods that you like that don’t affect your blood sugars is a massive part of this
That seems good going, but until I really start checking carbs in various foods I can’t really tell what that entails. Is there a good app for checking carbs by any chance?I'm afraid I went from high carb one day to 20g the next. That works for me, you need to find what works for you.
"Doing Keto" as currently being bandied about on the web may well a be a fad diet, but the type of ketogenic diet that most of the T2s on this forum are eating is most definitely not and is actually a perfectly normal and beneficial way of eating , which has been used since the late 1700s to help manage type 2 diabetes..... I don't think this forum should be promoting fad diets, and apart from some very specific cases I think that "keto" is a fad diet. ....
I haven’t looked at My Fitness Pal. I’ll go and have a look and see what it has to offer. I have to say the advice I’ve had on this forum is excellentI originally did Keto to lose weight, before any diagnosis. I went straight to 20g a day, everything calculated via my fitness pal. I lost 25kg in 4 months. I got any help and advice via a specialist Keto forum, they were very good, and very knowledgeable. When i was diagnosed, and found my way here, the advice and knowledge was equally as good, and having previously done full on Keto, reducing carbs was easy for me. The difference now is carb targets are not important anymore, only Glucose levels. So my meter for me replaced my fitness pal.
At a very basic level, concerning any foods, ask would a caveman have access to that, and in their own area. If yes then on the whole it's alright for the human body. If no then it doesn't belong there.
Did not even know I was a diabetic person till August 2023. I went full carbs eating 300-400 grams of good carbs every day (lots of fruits, dates, figs, grains, rice, oats, and other vegetables) and lowered my HbA1c from 13.7 in August to 6.8 in November. Avoided all form of fat including milk, oil, nuts, and butter. I guess either full fat or full carbs works as I am not going to argue about which one works better than the other. Mixing and matching both may or may not work as every one is different. Let's not conclude ourselves quickly that carbs is better than fat and vice versa. I already see that my fasting blood sugar is under 110 mg/dl and my postprandial after 2 hours of eating is under 135 mg/dl. Hope my HbA1c may have gone down further under 6.0 by now. Fingers crossed as I am waiting to get my next HbA1c check in 2 months from now. Happy New Year!
I'm doing exactly the opposite and dropped 30 pounds (from 180 to 150) and for some reason my body is well responding to carbohydrates. Even if I eat 2 ripe bananas, I don't see the blood sugar spiking up. Anyway every person is different and you are the best judge to yourself on what you want to eat.Sorry, but for me fruits, dates, figs, grains, rice and oats are poison, not good carbs. Dropped carbs from my diet and my HbA1c is now 4.9-5.0. Used to be 5.6-5.7. And I’ve lost and kept off 55 lbs for 4+ years.
Didn't work for me, alas... Cutting fats and upping ("good") carbs, as perscribed by the hospital 's dietician, got me on the fast track to diabetes, morbid obesity and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. I'd be hitting the 30's with your current diet, I'm afraid. Surprising results, but if it works for you, it works for you. Hope your next HbA1c will be very pleasing indeed!Did not even know I was a diabetic person till August 2023. I went full carbs eating 300-400 grams of good carbs every day (lots of fruits, dates, figs, grains, rice, oats, and other vegetables) and lowered my HbA1c from 13.7 in August to 6.8 in November. Avoided all form of fat including milk, oil, nuts, and butter. I guess either full fat or full carbs works as I am not going to argue about which one works better than the other. Mixing and matching both may or may not work as every one is different. Let's not conclude ourselves quickly that carbs is better than fat and vice versa. I already see that my fasting blood sugar is under 110 mg/dl and my postprandial after 2 hours of eating is under 135 mg/dl. Hope my HbA1c may have gone down further under 6.0 by now. Fingers crossed as I am waiting to get my next HbA1c check in 2 months from now. Happy New Year!
Like the others who have responded to your post, I can only dream of eating what you are doing, and even dreaming about it raises my FBGDid not even know I was a diabetic person till August 2023. I went full carbs eating 300-400 grams of good carbs every day (lots of fruits, dates, figs, grains, rice, oats, and other vegetables) and lowered my HbA1c from 13.7 in August to 6.8 in November. Avoided all form of fat including milk, oil, nuts, and butter. I guess either full fat or full carbs works as
The follow-up done by the Newcastle researchers showed that 7% of the original group on the low calorie diet had maintained weight loss/ BG reduction after five years. 93% had not. I don't rate that as a successful method. Tellingly, they tried to massage the figures by excluding those who had dropped out of the program in its earlier stages - even so this (iirc) only increased "success" to around 18%.Isn't there the school of thought led by Prof Taylor that a quick reduction in weight (eg the Newcastle diet et al) can put T 2 into remission? It's just there been no follow up yet to prove the effects last.
@nsturgeon 's diet seems to have been low calorie and low protein and to have induced quick weight loss so maybe the results aren't unexpected .
Only time will tell how sustainable it is from both weight loss and lower bg.
That seems good going, but until I really start checking carbs in various foods I can’t really tell what that entails. Is there a good app for checking carbs by any chance?
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