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Eat to your meter? How?

C

Cal M

Member
Messages
19
Location
Hampshire UK
Type of diabetes
LADA
Treatment type
Insulin
What does post prandial mean, assuming I have spelt it right. Why test two hours after starting a meal? What if you are still eating?
For bg testing a particular meal e.g. cauliflower cheese, I always also drink tea? How can you test one food on its own?. This does not reflect a true meal. I am starting to wonder who does regular single food testing? It's bizarre.
 
Sorry, need to add I am type 2, LCHF for 9 months. On Metformin, trying to get back up to 3 but fighting nausea. HbA1c dropped to 43 then went back up to 52 when I reduced from 3 tablets to 2, 5 month ago. Successfully lost 2.5 stone but now risk being under weight. Eating to my meter successfully might help me find out where I am going wrong.
 
Post prandial - after eating (I guess). Personally I don't bother with being precise. I test to see what affect the whole meal has. I work on getting a general idea of what works for me and what doesn't. But then I don't weigh or carb count or calorie count. I did count the number of cherries that I ate though but then I love cherries and wanted to be able to eat the maximum number of them that I could.
 
Post prandial means after a meal and two hours is chosen since the only official advice is that you are ok if your level is less than 8.5 two hours after a meal. I have no evidence for why that number was chosen and there are very many people who set their own target.

The debate about whether you test two hours after the first bite or two hours after finishing your meal has not really come up with a clear answer. Like most people I don't get anal about precision. If I am so close to the upper target that I need a stopwatch then I am probably worrying too much or doing it wrong.

As far as I know single food testing has never been proposed but it is possible I suppose. The usual advice has been to test a whole meal and figure out which bit of it was wrong later. If the meal has sugar, flour, rice or potato in it then there's the clue.

EDIT: I just checked up on what this site says about post prandial for type 2 diabetics and it agrees about the 8.5 number but gets round the first/last bite argument by saying that the reading should be taken at least 90 minutes after the meal.

http://www.diabetes.co.uk/diabetes_care/blood-sugar-level-ranges.html
 
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Testing should be done just before the first bite of a meal (pre prandial) then two hours after you had your first bite (post prandial). The difference in readings will show you whether or not something you had in that particular meal raised your blood glucose by more than 2mmol, if it did then you look at what you had and, let's say you had a pork chop with broccoli, cauliflower and carrots and your reading showed a greater than 2mmol difference, you then at a later date, have the same meal but you cut out one of the vegetables and compare readings. You are recording your meals and readings to compare so there is no real need to test individual foodstuffs. Things like tea and coffee etc can be counted as part of a meal but unless you are still sugaring your hot drinks a quick carb count will let you know how it is likely to affect your bg.
Hope this helps.
 
 
Cal M said:
For bg testing a particular meal e.g. cauliflower cheese, I always also drink tea? How can you test one food on its own?. This does not reflect a true meal. I am starting to wonder who does regular single food testing? It's bizarre.
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While we all react differently there are whole groups of food that are accepted to be high carb and raise BG or low carb and don't. So initially avoid the former, potatoes, bread, rice, pasta etc. and include the latter, meat, fish, cauliflower, cabbage etc. This leaves the types of food you need to test. So have a meal with say a pork chop, cauliflower and lentils and see what increase in BG you get after 2 hours. If it is way to high, lentils are not for you, if it is a bit high then reduce the portion of lentils next time. Or have egg, bacon, and a slice of Burgen toast for breakfast, if that's ok then next time add a small quantity of baked beans and so on. After a while you will have an idea what you can and can't eat and you can start fine tuning the types of foods and the amounts. Keep a diary of what you ate and the readings and a pattern will emerge.
 
I Have been Diabetic for 20 + years and at first I tested before and after every meal and became Paranoid about any movement and I really don't think this was helpful to my health overall Nowadays I Test at 7 am when I get up before I have a cup of tea and again at 5pm I try and eat at regular intervals but not always possible so before 5p m I would have had Breakfast and Lunch and between 5pm I would have tea with cake or savoury nibble and Dinner I try To Avoid sugary things except at tea time as a treat sometimes, . when I eat out I try to choose sensibly but since I live in Thailand if I Eating Thai I have no idea how much sugar they use so I just eat small portions and next time I take my BS I learn and this helps me choose better next time..Basically I Use Common Sense My Current average reading are 7 Days 112 mg/dl 14 Days 109mg/dl 30 Days 108 mg/dl 90 Days 110 mg/dl
 
Eating to your meter means allowing your meter to tell you which foods are your danger foods that need to be very low in portion size or eliminated. It is essential to keep a food diary including all ingredients and portion sizes, and to record your before and after meal levels alongside. Patterns will emerge that will show you how to change/alter/tweak that meal. The idea is not to go above 2mmol/l higher from before to after (and preferably less than 2mmol/l) If you do go higher, it will be the carb content of the meal. Fats and proteins won't cause a rise.

The 2 hours after first bite "rule" is just a guide, but is the one used by the medical profession to test post prandial levels. (In the Oral Glucose Tolerance Test, which is the only post prandial test done by doctors). If you always have a cup of tea after the meal, this is part of your meal. I always have one after lunch and tea, so I include it. If one day you don't have a cup of tea, note in in your food diary.
 
I was diagnosed just six months ago @bangkokdiabetic. Without testing I would be flying blind. How else can we see how our individual reactions to different foods affect blood glucose levels? A glucometer is, in my opinion, the best piece of kit at my disposal.

Welcome to the forum, btw.
 
 
I am not suggesting not toe use a meter but here in Thailand 25 strips cost 450 - 550 Baht around 20 Pounds so maybe this affects my thinking as I am approaching 77 next month. I think in my early days I paid to much attention to trying to eliminate one item as opposed to eating less and avoiding things that had high sugar content. and stopping myself snacking between meals its what I mean by common sense IE I like Heinze Tomato Sauce High In Sugar, Buy Heinze Tomatoe Sauce Reduced Sugar etc
thanks for the welcome
10 1
 
Thank you for all your comments. I will chill out for a while. I was taking it far too seriously and getting stressed. I keep a food diary and my meter records time of day of all tests ever taken, so I can link up the likely food culprits and gradually fine tune if smaller amounts are ok.
 
Thanks for that very helpful to a confused newbie
 
So I test just before a meal - but have to take metaformin with the meal - so that will have an effect on the next test result
 
rosajean said:
So I test just before a meal - but have to take metaformin with the meal - so that will have an effect on the next test result
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No, it won't have any effect at all. Metformin doesn't work like that. Some of the stronger drugs would, but not Metformin. It will not alter what happens to your levels after eating, not one little bit. Please don't worry about this. Metformin works on the liver to help reduce the amount of glucose the liver secretes from its stores, it helps a little with insulin resistance, and it is an appetite suppressant.
 
Thanks for clarifying that - this is a steep learning curve at the moment !
 
Resurrection of an old thread (sorry) but it is relevant to my question which is regarding “first bite”.
When I cook, I taste for seasoning etc. What if I prepare a meal, taste or nibble a bit as I go along, then pop said meal in the oven for an hour before I actually eat a portion of it?
What counts as “first bite”?

Similarly, if I know the meal is going to take an hour to cook, but I have been fasting for 24 hours, just got home from work after being stuck in traffic, and absolutely have to have something to eat (eg. a piece of cheese or slice of ham), how does the post prandial test time work in that case?
 
I sometimes see posts from diet controlled Type 2's that give the impression that testing affects your blood glucose - it doesn't. What makes a difference is what you do as a result of the tests. The useful thing about the post-prandial test is that it gives you a guide to what food and in what quantities, you can eat and what you can't. The testing is not a precise laboratory experiment, there are all sorts of variables, not least the accuracy of meters, so doing a bit of tasting is not going to affect the result significantly. Measuring 2 hours after starting a meal or finishing it doesn't make much difference if you a a fast eater like me, just do the same thing each time for consistency. If you are eating a long drawn out meal, then that is not the time to be testing the effect of certain foods. Similarly if you have been fasting for 24 hours, who knows how that is going to affect your testing of a meal. As I say, the actual testing achieves nothing, leave the testing to more typical circumstances when you can use the result.
 
Tasting is very different from nibbling - tasting is dipping a spoon/fork in once possibly twice to get a little bit that touches your tongue to check for seasoning etc - shouldn't have any effect on you bs

Nibbling is picking subconsciously on food you are making/preparing until you realise you've eaten half of it lol

If your a nibbler whilst your cooking (I am or was) chop up some celery/cucumber into cubes in a little dish to nibble on
 
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