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Type 2 Carbs v Sugars

Squire Fulwood said:
Your list has a similar format to the one handed out by my surgery and I have often thought of making my own version. Your one doesn't quite fit my non spiking food but it is not far off so I have stolen a copy and will modify it. Thanks.
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You're welcome. It will always be a personal plan since we are not all the same size. Hope it helps. Sorry it is pdf, but that is more shareable than Word or Excel.
 
psignathus said:
Your blood sugars are high. The first thing I would do in your situation is limit my carbs per meal to about 20g. this should start to bring your blood sugars down to single figures. If they are not lower after maybe 5 days (usually they will improve immediately) reduce it to 15g etc. you can play with these numbers to your hearts content until you hit a number that your blood sugar and your personal food preference can tolerate as a sustainable ongoing diet. No need to panic, plan each meal ahead and ensure the food is nice and tasty. The fat content is what will ensure you don't get to hungry so fry your food in good quality oils or butter adding full fat mayo or olive oils to salads. Completely avoid any low fat products as they are high in added sugars. When counting carbs just go for the total amount you can always get more detailed as you become confident in what your eating. you may find you cannot eat pasta, bread, rice and potatoes on a regular basis especially until your numbers come down. good luck with whatever you choose to do.
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Personally I have found keeping cabs under 100 g most days by eating very little bread, pasta, potatoes and rice. I have not totally cut them out but keep a close eye on my BS levels. How many carbs usually depends on how active I have been that day. after a while you get a good idea of the likely reaction to various foods.
 
LinziC78 said:
I'm have posted once before as I have only been diagnosed a couple of months. I am confused about the advise given by the nurse and wonder if anyone can help me clarify it. She said anything under 5gs of sugar per 100gs would be the best thing to look at as far as diet goes. So am I looking at grams of carbs, or grams of carbs that are sugars? If it's the second one then pasta, bread and crisps seem to be OK, but this can't be surely?! Can anyone help, as I have been healthy eating, lost half a stone in the last month but bs seems to not move from between 13 to 16. Help please x
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Hi Ive found since diagnosis ive mode off gliclazide and only on metformin with a massive increases in exercise going to the gym 4 times a week has helped massively get it under control as far as carbs go is a hard one as for me personally bread and potatoes send it over if I'm not exersiseing so i avoid it like crazy on non gym days but ive only been dealing with it for 2 months and have been keeping note of what i eat and my starting and bed time results if its to high I look for patterns in that day like did i eat something new ect... I find that rice and pasta dont bother me to much but one of my friends at the clinic cant eat pasta as it causes problems i think where all unique and have to do a lot of trial and error dont give up
 
LinziC78 said:
I'm have posted once before as I have only been diagnosed a couple of months. I am confused about the advise given by the nurse and wonder if anyone can help me clarify it. She said anything under 5gs of sugar per 100gs would be the best thing to look at as far as diet goes. So am I looking at grams of carbs, or grams of carbs that are sugars? If it's the second one then pasta, bread and crisps seem to be OK, but this can't be surely?! Can anyone help, as I have been healthy eating, lost half a stone in the last month but bs seems to not move from between 13 to 16. Help please x
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I think your nurse was talking about sugar. One teaspoon of sugar weighs 5g.
You're unlikely to find many foods containing less than 5g of total carbs per 100g. It's a good start to avoid sugar as much as possible, as it goes straight into your blood stream. 'Carbs' are more complex molecules that take longer to be broken down into simple sugars, and some carbs are present as fibre, which won't get digested. Of course, it's also good to avoid carbs of any kind as far as possible. If you can limit total carbs to 130g a day you're doing well!
 
Squire Fulwood said:
Use the total carbohydrate figure since they all affect your blood sugar. The line about "Of which sugar" can be disregarded since that figure is included in the Carbohydrate figure. I am not sure what use it is quoting the sugar content separately.

At all costs avoid looking at the traffic light label which is usually on the front of the package. This lists only the sugar and not the total carbohydrate. I checked a loaf in a supermarket on which the traffic light label said it had 2% sugar. The big label on the back said it had 44.6% carbohydrate and that is the important information for a diabetic.
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Presumably 'of which sugar' is useful as that will go straight into your blood stream, whereas othet carb can be more gradual.
 
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I started to get serious about my carb intake in mid October as my BG had plateaud and wasn't showing any further fall. I don't weigh foods or count carbs (too lazy!) I just try to avoid carbs - half a slice of toast, 3 or 4 small chips or two small boiled potatos are about as far as I go. Doing this has brought about a sustained reduction in my BG.
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@LinziC78 have you got a blood glucose monitor ? I you haven't and your surgery won't give you one can I suggest you buy one .
You can get one a buy 50 monitoring sticks . For me it is such a good investment in my health , test before and then 2 hours after your meal or when you have symptoms etc , only then will you really know how different foods affect you .
Diabetes is such an individual condition but given time , and the right tools and advice like you will get on here, you will find your way .
 
Oldvatr said:
I have produced my own crib sheet that I use as an Aide Memoire. Its stuck on our larder door as a family reminder of my personal set of rules.

I recently shared a copy with my T1D buddy who has been having real swings and roundabouts on his pump, and he is reporting much more stable bgl's and has cut down on his insulin. We gigged together just last week, and he did not hypo at all, which is an improvement

I have also given a copy to my GP and my DCN. I now share it with you all. It is not a full list, but it works for me,
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thank you for sharing, that would be a good idea for everyone newly diagnosed to make such a plan and also know the arguments behing each chosen meal type..
 
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lewisdv said:
I think your nurse was talking about sugar. One teaspoon of sugar weighs 5g.
You're unlikely to find many foods containing less than 5g of total carbs per 100g. It's a good start to avoid sugar as much as possible, as it goes straight into your blood stream. 'Carbs' are more complex molecules that take longer to be broken down into simple sugars, and some carbs are present as fibre, which won't get digested. Of course, it's also good to avoid carbs of any kind as far as possible. If you can limit total carbs to 130g a day you're doing well!
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Sorry Lewis but you are a bit wrong there.. I would try and go well under that carb amount and do myself every day.
I doubt I have more than 10-20g of carbs a day and have maintained good control that way. My only carbs come from green veg or salad stuffs. The OP would be best avoiding all starchy veg, any kind of flour as well as any kind of sugar.. I also cut out any sweeteners too.
 
The idea that all starches will digest much slower than table sugar, due to the length of its chain, has been shown to be incorrect. The speed is actually due to the types of links between the simple sugars; each type of link usually needs a separate type of enzyme to break it, and the link being broken does not need to be at the end of the chain. Humans don't have the type of enzyme needed to break the links found in cellulose, which makes cellulose a fiber that humans cannot digest. Cellulose is one of the main ingredients in wood.

Some of the foods with carbs that digest slowly are sweet potatoes, cooked dried beans, and pizza.

You can add maize (known as corn here in the US) to the list of high-carb foods.
 
Oldvatr said:
The bread I use is much lower than sugar, and has a minor effect in my bgl, thank you.
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Yes it is possible to buy lower carb bread but the loaf I referred to in post #10 was a bog standard Hovis loaf sold in Tesco. To remind readers of that post I wrote of a loaf that had 2% sugar on the traffic light label but 44.6% total carbs on the full label on the back.
The reason why the traffic light label does not mention the total carbs is still unclear to me.

To satisfy all readers I just got a Burgen loaf out of the freezer. The traffic light label says 2% sugar and the total carbs on the other label says 25%. This may well be kinder on your blood sugars but the numbers are still different and one of them is useless as far as diabetics are concerned.
 
lewisdv said:
Presumably 'of which sugar' is useful as that will go straight into your blood stream, whereas othet carb can be more gradual.
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I am not sure what you are trying to say here since I was referring to the sugar listed on the traffic light label and not the "of which sugar" on the other label.
 
I am type 2 and was diagnosed approximately 7 months ago and put on 4 x 500mg of metformin a day, looking at the advice given on the forums I seem to be doing things wrong, I have always liked my carbs and have not massively reduced them. I have been really strict on my sugar sugar intake if that makes sense, as regards to other sources of carbs I have switched to wholemeal/wholegrain bread and rice and still have boiled or baked potato on occasion but I have cut out pasta and have reduced my portion sizes somewhat. I have increased exercise - mainly walking but luckily I walk a lot at work and do a lot of stair climbing which helps. I have got a blood sugar monitor but have not really do much testing with regards to before and after meals my morning reading at present are in the range 5.0 to 6.5mmol/L. So far my hba1c has dropped from 111 at diagnosis to 45 at my last check a week ago and have lost a smidge over 2 stone. So it would appear what I am doing is working upto a point, so if I was much stricter on my carbs as many above are doing would I be likely to be able to drop my medication levels ?
 
[QUOTE="malcr99, post: 1323252, member: 326088" So far my hba1c has dropped from 111 at diagnosis to 45 at my last check a week ago and have lost a smidge over 2 stone. So it would appear what I am doing is working upto a point, so if I was much stricter on my carbs as many above are doing would I be likely to be able to drop my medication levels ?[/QUOTE]

As you rightly say what you have done so far is working well..the answer to your question is probably but the best way is to try. I gave up on metformin after 3 weeks as it did horrible things to me... since then I have just relied on intermittent fasting and diet. Seems to have worked ok so far. Some here may consider me a bit extreme but I took my diagnosis as a wake up call and as I'm quite attached to my vision and toes I thought I'd better get a grip. I would suggest trying an even lower carb diet ( I probably have less than 20g per day) and see how it works. You have nothing to lose.
 
Squire Fulwood said:
Yes it is possible to buy lower carb bread but the loaf I referred to in post #10 was a bog standard Hovis loaf sold in Tesco. To remind readers of that post I wrote of a loaf that had 2% sugar on the traffic light label but 44.6% total carbs on the full label on the back.
The reason why the traffic light label does not mention the total carbs is still unclear to me.

To satisfy all readers I just got a Burgen loaf out of the freezer. The traffic light label says 2% sugar and the total carbs on the other label says 25%. This may well be kinder on your blood sugars but the numbers are still different and one of them is useless as far as diabetics are concerned.
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I agree that the traffic light system is inadequate for those of us carb counting, but I was not aware that the one for sugars was ever supposed to indicate anything other than sugar content. I was not aware of any attempt to show a GI value for any foodstuff.

I must point out yet again that the percentage of carb counters in relation to the general populace is still very low. In a UK population of some 65 million, we currently have about 3.5m registered diabetics. The number of insulin dependant diabetics within that group is around 4% , and even fewer using MDI or bolus control, So there is no incentive for adding carbs content to the traffc lights,

We are lucky they give us the label info That is what we should use for our LC lifestyle. Calorie counting is different, and catered for. Until LC diets are recognised as a valid method for diabetic control, then we remain on the sidelines, I'm afraid.
 
Freema said:
thank you for sharing, that would be a good idea for everyone newly diagnosed to make such a plan and also know the arguments behing each chosen meal type..
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I have to point out that absolutely nothing in my plan came recommended by any of the dieticians I was referred to. All they offered was Eatwell# 1 (version 2 came later that year)
 
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