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diagnosed today and feel lost with it all

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roxy44

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Hi, today after having test its confirmed i have diabetes, my HBA1C? sorry might have got that bit wrong...is 7, if it wazs 7.1 then i would have been put on meds..so i have 3 months to see if diet can bring it down!!
i go next monday for pulse test and i after have a pnumonia jab!!!?, and cholestral check...then eye exam,

i feel a bit over whelmed to be honest, the DN said to have no sugur at all for the nxt 3 months to see if it comes down....which is good in a way....i am over weight ...been borderline for a long time,...so it might be the kick up the ass i needed to sort myself out,

any advice would be very gratefully recieved..regarding diet etc?

also been told not to bother testing at home as it makes no difference altho i have a test kit but i think the strips are out of date..

please help

many thanks
 
Hi. I know what ya mean. Overwhelming is a term 4 it lol having bin diagnosed as type 1 just a few months ago lol. I am hardly by any means the voice of omniscient wisdom lol but the way I see it is 2 start early unless told not to then checking blood is always a good idea. Also excercise is an effective method of getting your cells to take in the glucose. Lowering your blood sugar. Maybe a 30 min walk a day? Possibly increase it as time goes on. However I would totally agree with avoiding high sugar contents as they lead to build up of blood glucose and unhealthy "peaks". I hope I helped in some way. I'm sire however some people with much more experience than me will reply
Good luck
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Oh and in terms of diet. I would reccomend long lasting carbohydrates rather than simple sugars. If you like biology and know how to apply the term polysaccharides then that's what you want to have your food contain as they take longer to break down and avoids peaks in blood sugars. Foods I would reccomend are whole grains e.g. Bread and pasta.proteins especially fibre
Nuts are always good. Carefully though as most contain high fat. Most fruits are fine. Pineapple is a no no lol. Vegetables for definite greens especially. Basically a diabetic diet is the healthy one recommended for all. However I would avoid at all times the sweets lol unless they are sugar free, at least until you know what your situation is upon your next evaluation. Oh and my personal saviour. Dark chocolate lol shown to be a powerful anti oxidant however high in fat. My sources are my own dietician. My own experience studying advanced biology. And of course my own diet as a type 1 that has given me last months blood glucose average of 5.6
 
Hi Roxy and welcome to the forum :) You definitely do need to test - only by testing before and after meals can you work out which foods make your levels go up too much and eliminate them from your diet or reduce them. In general carbohydrates, not only sugar, will make your BG high so you will find you have to cut a lot of them. This will also help your weight. Everyone is different so you have to see for yourself. See the following information which includes tips on how to get strips. Presumably your PCT doesn't want to pay for the strips so if you can't get them from there I recommend you try e-bay - lots of members here do that.

The Forum Monitors have put together the following basic information for new members which includes advice on diet and testing and will be very useful to you.

Here is the advice that Ken and I, as Forum Monitors, usually give to newly diagnosed Diabetics. We hope that these few ideas gained through experience help you to gain control and give you some understanding of Diabetes. This forum doesn't always follow the recommended dietary advice, you have to work out what works for you as we are all different.

It's not just 'sugars' you need to avoid, diabetes is an inability to process glucose properly. Carbohydrate converts, in the body, to glucose. So it makes sense to reduce the amount of carbohydrate that you eat which includes sugars.

For more information on CARBOHYDRATE see here:

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=20306

This is NOT a low carb diet suggestion, just a reduction in your intake of carbohydrate. You have to decide yourself how much of a reduction will keep your blood glucose levels in control.

The main carbs to avoid OR reduce are the complex or starchy carbohydrates such as bread, potatoes, pasta, rice, starchy root veg and also any flour based products. The starchy carbs all convert 100% to glucose in the body and raise the blood sugar levels significantly.

If you are on Insulin you may find that reducing the carb intake also means that you can reduce your dose of insulin. This can help you to keep weight gain down as Insulin tends to make you put on weight and eventually cause insulin resistance. This should be done slowly so as not to cause hypos.

The way to find out how different foods affect you is to do regular daily testing and keep a food diary for a couple of weeks. If you test just before eating, then two hours after eating, you will see the effect of certain foods on your blood glucose levels. Some foods, which are slow acting carbohydrates, are absorbed more slowly so you may need to test three or even four hours later to see the effect that these have on your blood glucose levels.

Buy yourself a carb counter book (you can get these on-line) and you will be able to work out how much carbs you are eating, when you test, the reading two hours after should be roughly the same as the before eating reading, if it is then that meal was fine, if it isn’t then you need to check what you have eaten and think about reducing the portion size of carbs.

When you are buying products check the total carbohydrate content, this includes the sugar content. Do not just go by the amount of sugar on the packaging as this is misleading to a diabetic.


As for a tester, try asking the nurse/doctor and explain that you want to be proactive in managing your own diabetes and therefore need to test so that you can see just how foods affect your blood sugar levels. Hopefully this will work ! Sometimes they are not keen to give Type 2’s the strips on prescription, (in the UK) but you can but try!!

For TIPS FOR STRIPS see here:

viewtopic.php?f=20&t=19002#p173253

If you are an Insulin user in theory you should have no problem getting test strips.

The latest 2011 NICE guidelines for Bg levels are as follows:
Fasting (waking and before meals).......between 4 - 7 mmol/l...(Type 1 & 2)
2 hrs after meals........................no more than 8.5 mmol/l.....( Type 2)

2hrs after meals......................... no more than 9 mmol/l ......(Type 1)

If you are able to keep the post meal numbers lower, so much the better.

It also helps if you can do at least 30 minutes moderate exercise a day, it can be split into 10 min sessions to start with. It doesn't have to be strenuous.

The above is just general advice and it is recommended that you discuss with your HCP before making any changes. You can also ask questions on the forum on anything that is not clear.

Finally a few QUESTIONS TO ASK AT DIABETES CLINIC.

viewtopic.php?f=20&t=17091



Sue/Ken.
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Hi Roxy

I was diagnosed a few weeks back and I can understand the feeling of being overwhelmed.

Here you'll be able to relate to newly diagnosed who've gone through the entire range of the emotional spectrum. There are loads of experienced folk too.

Hope you find the support and guidance you're looking for.

x
 
Hi roxy44 and welcome to the forum.

First things first, try to relax, your feelings of being overwhelmed are quite normal and we all felt like that after diagnosis but rest assured every one here will try to help you with whatever questions you might have. Try to read everything you can on diabetes and read it over and over again and let it slowly sink in, there will be loads of new jargon like the HbA1c that you mentioned and the more you read all this jargon the sooner it will all start to make sense and dont worry it will get easier :D

Testing, it is quite the norm for PCT's to advice that you dont need to test but that is a cost saving exercise and IMHO is just not true, you will need to test and in the early days you will need to test regularly, it is not just sugar that raises your blood sugars all carbohydrates do too, why doctors dont make this clear at diagnosis is quite frankly beyond me. The human body converts all carbohydrates to glucose which will in turn raise your blood glucose (bg) levels, eat fewer carbs and your bg leveks will remain lower than if you eat more carbs.

The only way for any one to know how many potatoes or how much rice, how many slices of bread or how big a portion of pasta they can safely eat and keep their bg levels down to an acceptable level is to TEST, before a meal and 2 hours after that same meal.

If your pre meal numbers are say 6.7mmol/L and 2 hours after you eat they are say 11.6 then you will know that that meal contained to many carbs so the next time you eat that same meal cut the carb content back by 50% test again before and after and if your bg has returned to close to your pre meal level you know that you have 'got it right' if your numbers are still way too high you will need to reduce the carb content still further till you find a level of carb intake that is within the N.I.C.E. recommendations which are posted in Daisy's reply to you.

Its a good idea to start using a smaller sized diner plate as this will help you eat less and it will still look as though you have a 'plateful' of food :D

Another good adea is to keep a food dairy noting the amount of carbs along with your pre and post meal bg levels, this will help you to see what different foods do to your numbers.

There seems to be a lot to learn but soon it will all make sense and will become second nature, I rarely test nowadays as I know that I can eat 3 small new potatoes or 12 thin chips or two tablespoons of basmati rice and my levels will be OK, once you find out what you can eat you will be able to teat less, but testing really is the only way to take control of your diabetes.

Any questions you have just shout...
 
wow thanks for that info Sid, i found it really helpful!! i sent for a new monitor and testing stips of the internet last night, so they should be here soon, and then i will do as you sugest,
if i can share with you what i ate yesterday

breakfast was branflakes with half a bannana
lunch was veg soup with a slice of bread
dinner was spaggetti and chicken coujons
night time snack was sugar free jellly with a drop of carnation milk

this may not be ideal but i have a lot to learn.....but this must have been the 1st time in a long time, sweets havent passed my lips :lol:

i also have to lose good bit of weight too

thanx again
 
roxy44 said:
if i can share with you what i ate yesterday

breakfast was branflakes with half a bannana
lunch was veg soup with a slice of bread
dinner was spaggetti and chicken coujons
night time snack was sugar free jellly with a drop of carnation milk
Click to expand...

Hi again Roxy once you get your meter your diet may surprise you Branflakes are fairly high in carbs I believe and bananas also can cause spikes in bg, I used to eat Special K with a sliced banana on it and a glass of grapefruit juice as I thought that was a healthy breakfast when I was first diagnosed and it was not till I found this forum and started to test before and after meals that I swapped my 'healthy' breakfast to a half a grapefruit :lol: I do now eat cornflakes sometimes but weigh out 18g to 20g with a minimum amount of semi skimmed milk.

Bread is often hard for diabetics to tolerate but you will only know by testing if it is OK for you, as a general rule of thumb white, brown and wholemeal bread is usually very high in carbs and best avoided, wholegrain bread is usually better and Burgen is often tolerated fairly well.

Spaghetti as with all pasta is another food that I personally have real problems with and even now only eat on very rare occasions, again testing will reveal all :D

More boring foody stuff, most forms of rice are high in carbs but basmati rice (the only rice to eat if you are a curry lover) is particularly hard for the human stomach to break down. I can easily manage two and a bit tablespoons full of basmati rice, not the plateful I used to eat, but at least I can still eat some of it :D

Pure fruit juices are generally high in carbs and some fruit is also high again test test and test again.

I found it usful to buy a collins gem carb counter book which lists most foods and there relative carbs, another usful little book is the collins gem GI book, both can be found on ebay or your local bookshop for about a fiver or less.

The Glycemic Index (GI) is a numerical scale used to indicate how fast and how high a particular food may raise our bg level. The higher the GI number the quicker that food will be digested and hit your blood stream the lower the GI the slower that food will be digested and hit your blood stream. So not all carbs are equal.

Then there is glycemic load or GL but your head is probably hurting by now so I'll shut up before you get a headache :lol:
 
actually Sid i have enjoyed reading tou posts and found them ever so helpful, so thank you very much, ...just on the off chance... any biscuits that may be good for diabetics??...am clutching at strawers here :)

thanx again
 
Mmmmm, biscuits :D

If you check the nutrition information on the packet of your favourite biscuits you may be lucky and find some around the 4g or 5g per biscuit, now one of those with your coffee or tea may be alright, personally I cant just have one or two biscuits and as there is a danger of me wolfing the whole packet I try to avoid them.

If I want a snack it is usually a handful of mixed nuts or if my bg is low enough a packet of mini chedars a small packet is 12.7g of carbs, I know this because I've just eaten one :lol:

Some members here would say I am mad to have a 12.7g snack, but I know I will be OK by diner time because I have tested this snack many times before :wink:
 
you say 4 or 5g on biscuit...is that what to look for on all biscuits? and is there something to look for when buying things? regarding carbs? and sugars etc?...thanx
 
Hi Roxy,

I can empathise with how you feel; I was in your position 16 months ago.

This forum is great and has a wealth of knowledge and past experiences. The first tip I'd give you is to use the "search" button on the top left hand corner of the page. Chances are, someone has asked exactly the same question you have previously, so you can find the answer without even asking the question on the forum.

Another tip is to click on a persons profile, then read all their posts. Regular posters like Sid have a wealth of knowledge, or alternatively, someone like me who has "gone through the motions" a year or two before you have. It might be useful to read their posts and share their experiences.

The best advice I can give you is, don't let it get you down. When I was diagnosed my BG was above 16; so if you are circa 7 then you are borderline in my opinion.

Dont be blase about it, but don't be anal either.
 
thanks ardbeg....i am taking all the advice given....but i have really let myself down...its only been a few days, and MY EATING STRICT!! as fallen by the way side :(

no sugar, but ate some crisps and extra cereal!!! i feel i have let myself down, my Hubby says i am trying too hard too soon and if i change just 1 thing a day i would cope better,

maybe when my meter comes and i can test, then it might sink in better!!!
 
The early days are an emotional roller coaster Roxy.

In my case I went onto the internet, found this forum (thank goodness) and research lots of diabetic related things on Google. A lot of my pre existing ailments started to make sense; in particular my lethargy, falling asleep at the drop of a hat and the severe pains in my hands and feet; which I now know was diabetic related too and called neuropathy.

Having been on the Atkins diet several years previous, once I read the postings on this forum in favour of a low carb diet, I went back onto an Atkins style diet regime and started squeezing lemon juice on most of my food or cinammon. I also packed in the booze for several weeks (I have always been a big drinker) and now only drink red wine or spirits, never lager or beer. Well, very occassionally now i have a pint or two of Guinness. I used to use my BG meter several times a day in the early weeks, but now only check it once or twice a month if I'm lucky.

Yes, I have days when I eat junk food or chocolate, but i always fall back into my healthier eating regime. Stay positive, don't let diabetes consume your life and live your life like every day is your last. :D
 
roxy44 said:
no sugar, but ate some crisps and extra cereal!!! i feel i have let myself down, my Hubby says i am trying too hard too soon and if i change just 1 thing a day i would cope better,
Click to expand...

Dont beat your self up over a couple of spoonfuls of cereal Roxy none of us are saints, far from it :lol:

roxy44 said:
maybe when my meter comes and i can test, then it might sink in better!!!
Click to expand...

When you do first start to test, dont get freaked out if you see some pretty high readings, look on it as a tool to help you understand your body better not as a tool to scare your self with. Rome wasn't built in a day they say and diabetes isn't controlled over night either :D
 
great advice again Sid and Ardbeg :)

Sid , thats exactly what i want the meter for...to help prevent me eating rubbish..and guide me..i think i am a little overwhelmed with it to be honest as you say...need to chill out...i am going out for lunch tomorrow to celerbrate my dads birthday...i am hoping to have chips...i love chips when out eating...but i will stay away from dessert....i think that will be ok??

Ardbeg
thats why i went for tests, because i was feeling so rubbish all the time...had bloods taken...to which revealed anemia too, which doesnt help matters :shock: this is what showed my sugars was too high..hence the other tests....the lethergy is soo bad like you say i could fall asleep at the drop of a hat!!

the nurse said this will all go when its under control, about 6-7 weeks

thanks so much
 
Hello sid bonkers. have read your FANTASTIC advice n points with great interest, you are brilliant for me as a terrified newbie on victoza only [was on januvia previously] am due to start insulin levemir on june 1st when next see the consultant . Am definetely lost frightened n terrified to go onto insulin as am so drugs INTOLERANT and have other medical condidtions that complicate n impact on each other. Please could you take a look at my other posts on victoza n levemir and newbie to insulin am [anna29] read them through and PLEASE advise me accordingly. Your advice and simple guidance on this forum is like finding a diamond in the haystack! Also if you want , need, to ask me any questions do so to helpput you in the picture of my med n physical state. Went yesterday to see diabetic team nurse n dietician ended up in tears again being preached n bulldozed [must eat MORE carbs, HAVE to have insulin] it's all too much for me n am buckling under the pressure of them. I was diagnosed type2 in dec 2009 put on all sorts of meds that both my body n system couldnt n wouldnt tolerate. Take a peek at my earlier posts on victoza pages 43 44 45 n levemir n newbie to insulin too. Hope you can steer me in right direction? By the way I always chuckle at your "sayings" below your posts, they allways cheer me up! Anna. x
 
In regards to the signature of Sid...then we all dry up and get wrinkles!!!
 
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