Sarah
Most of the people on this forum will agree that the most effective way to reduce your blood sugar levels is through a combination of
- restricting your intake of carbohydrates ( pasta, bread, rice, sugar,)
- replacing carbohydrates which cause your blood sugar to rise quickly (I.e have a high glycemic index value) such as white bread and pasta for lower glycemic index carbohydrates such as brown whole grain multigrain bread, brown pasta, bulgur wheat.
- exercising more and losing weight - helps as it reduces insulin resistance in t2 diabetics.
Where people on here do not agree is on how much you should reduce your carbohydrate intake by and the extent to which you should substitute the carbohydrates with fats particularly saturated fats. If you restrict your carb intake greatly then you almost have to have more fats just to stop you from feeling hungry. An alternative would be to have a lot of protein but that is both difficult to do and probably not a good idea as high protein diets have been linked with kidney disease.
So how do you decide how much you need to restrict your carbohydrates and what carbohydrates to chose. As we are all individuals, in my opinion you should experiment and monitor how different quantities of different carbohydrates affect your own blood glucose levels. For this you will need to test before and two hours after each meal- your after reading should be within 2 mmol/l of the before reading. You should then be able to make your own educated choices.
It helps if you keep a record of your readings and a food diary. There are a number of phone apps or online that will help you do this. Personally I use glucosebuddy and myfitnesspal on my iPhone but as I said there are plenty of good alternatives.
I hope the above helps and you are able to get those numbers down soon.
Pavlos
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