Dr Bernstein diet

[fumanchu]

What do you all think of this diet for type 2s? I like his book and respect him for what he did to get the medical profession to listen to him, and just wanted to know what others feel about it all? It works for my hubby, but just sometimes I wonder if there is too much fat. Husband has had heart probs in the past.
Edited to add - husband diagnosed 2009 and is still diet controlled, no meds. He is 77.

 

[KennyA]

I guess Bernstein has a lot in common with most very low carb diets. If you're limiting yourself to 30g carb a day, it follows that a lot of foods are off the table. I've been on around 20g/day for just over four years now and am more than pleased with the results: my highest BG in that time has been 38, and I've lost about 70lbs. I feel fitter and healthier than I have for twenty years.

Fat has been thoroughly demonised recently. Dietary advice changed in the 1980s and if the current advice was in fact correct, you'd expect to see a fall in obesity and a decline in things like diabetes as the population eats less meat and fat and replaces these with more carbs. Of course the opposite has happened. I have a Pears encyclopaedia from 1984 that says that the medical advice (for weight loss) is cutting out sugar and starchy carbs. It has nothing to say about T2 diabetes.... because it vwasn't then an issue.

I followed the "modern" advice and wound up with T2 and overweight. Cutting carbs turned that round very quickly. I don't think I eat extra fat these days, I just don't remove or reduce it. I do only eat "natural" fats and avoid highly processed seed oils and similar.

Because I'm having next to no carbs, a higher proportion of my food must be fat just as protein also forms a higher proportion. It has done exactly nothing to my cholesterol (I'm not that bothered about cholesterol) and it is where it's always been. It used to be in the OK sixes but then they changed the "target" and now six is no longer OK. My reading varies by 2mmol/l depending on whether I fasted or not, and hasn't changed much at all since my very first test over twenty years ago.

So...if it's not broke, it probably doesn't need fixing.

 

[fumanchu]

That agrees with what I think Kenny, it's working for us too - but every now and then a wee worry creeps in there because of his heart disease. I compromise by not being over-heavy on the butter and cream but still giving him some for taste. I remember all the fuss about low fat diets years ago and always knew it was rubbish, and you'd think the rise in diabetes would be clear proof - yet still I keep reading about how bad fats are.

 

[Outlier]

Every decade brings a new food "scare" where the advice turns out to come from manufacturers who make "something" they are trying to sell. That's business, but it gets marketed as if it is a vital discovery by science for our good health. Same as most articles that start "scientists have discovered" or "the NHS recommends" which most times turns out to come from a drugs company that - guess what? Has some drug/s they want to promote. Always read about new health information with that in mind.

Also remember that journalists know nothing more about health than the average member of the public. They are paid to write about - anything - often at very short notice, and have to rely on the same sources as the rest of us.

 

[fumanchu]

Outlier - very true. Thank you.

 

[Lupf]

Hi @fumanchu, I've also concluded that fat was demonised wrongly. I have only glanced at the Dr Bernstein diet, so won't comment on it. Instead, I tell you a few bits from my story.
I am T2, diagnosed in 2014 and put on metformin, which helped, but HbA1c was still in the mid 60s. Almost five years ago, instead of taking Gliclazide I decided to do intermittent fasting (IF) based on Michael Mosley's book - The Fast Diet. For this I increased my intake of eggs and fish, as I wasn't allowed any carby food on fast days. This coincided with my cholesterol value improving, it was a bit high. After having lost 10kg and reduced my HbA1 to low 40s, I was able to go off metformin. My T2 has now been diet controlled for the last four years. It was only after this that I found this forum.

Since then my diet contains much more cheese, eggs and bacon, butter, full fat yoghurt, hummus,... While my diet is not as very low carb, as @KennyA and others here, I eat much fewer carbs and continue my two IF days with no carbs a week. In fact I've banned all low fat stuff and most vegetable fat, such as margarine from my diet. To compensate for lower carb I needed to increase fat and protein. As a result, all my cholesterol values - Total, HDL, LDL and Trig have continued to improve and are mostly green now. I've also been able to keep my weight.

 

[fumanchu]

Husband had got tired and let go of diet a bit earlier this year, and was having problems with his balance - falling and stumbling and felt like his legs wouldn't work properly. Took months and a few practice nurses then a useless gp who told him to stop wearing sandals , then a Falls & Faints clinic to find the problem - diabetic neuropathy! Well I was back in Bernstein's book readin gup on the diet again and found him saying that although you cannot reverse diabetic neuropathy, with tight control of BG you can much improve it. And that has happened. No more stabbing needle pains in his legs and toes, and no more falling or staggering about! So the good Dr does know his stuff.

 

[ianf0ster]

Dr Bernstein certainly should know his stuff regarding Diabetes (particularly Type 1) since he has been specialising in it (as well as treating his own T1, for such a long time! He's 89 and still practicing medicine!