I Don’t want a low carb Christmas

davd said:

I know some people will say I can have a fairly low carb Christmas, but for just a few days I would love to be able to eat what I used to love eating at Christmas such as mince pies, Christmas cake, roast spuds, parsnips, chocolates, everything that I know I shouldn’t eat as a diabetic.
I was diagnosed in April with an HbA1c of 90 but managed to get down to 40 in September.
So for a few days if I high carb what long term damage would it cause if any .
I sometimes go on a cruise , not for the foreseeable future due to covid, and that would be the same as a lot of eating is done on a cruise ship.
So the question is can I spike my blood sugar levels for a week and then go back to low carb without causing any long term effects on my diabetic health .
I think a lot of other diabetics would also like to know.
I am a bit reluctant to relax my diet but if it is safe I would risk it.

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The obvious answer is you can relax your LC any time and for any length of time you want. Leaving the reservation is never safe so I would be sure I left for a good reason and the quality of food was high enough to justify it. Some "swaps" just spoil a good meal, no substitute for roast King Edwards or proper Yorkshire pudding with top end beef. Christmas needs a carefully calculated wander away. Much of the sweet stuff isn't quality and could be drip fed and tested before and after. How far off the reservation and for how long is personal choice. The longer and farther you stray the harder it will be to return and the more damage you are likely to do. All my opinion and I know 4/5 of 5/8 of didly squat.

A couple of Christmases ago, after having had no sugar for years, I ate some fudge. An almost instantaneous feeling of euphoria flooded over me and actually brought a tear to my eye. Minutes later I felt ghastly and terribly sick. Since then I've just doubled down on extra steak and eggs. Sugar is poison in my mind, but we must all make our own choices.

You could eat what you want but be aware of after effects of over indulgent
from my self experience even a afternoon cake for myself can cause feeling sick , tied , a overwhelming feeling of not feeling not well

So you can
medicated to accommodate the extras
every thing in moderation
then back to realty
back to your normal diet

Jim Lahey said:

A couple of Christmases ago, after having had no sugar for years, I ate some fudge. An almost instantaneous feeling of euphoria flooded over me and actually brought a tear to my eye. Minutes later I felt ghastly and terribly sick. Since then I've just doubled down on extra steak and eggs. Sugar is poison in my mind, but we must all make our own choices.

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That is exactly what happened to me after a year of very strict low carb eating - except I didn't just feel terribly sick I was terribly sick. It was supposed to be a special treat on a very special occasion and I was so looking forward to having my previously favourite desert.

It definitely put me off straying off low carb ever again. I suppose it was a form of aversion therapy

davd said:

if it only temporary.

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That's the key.. depends on what your food addictions were before going low carb.
As @DCUKMod says above if you can do a couple of days then go back to how you eat now you will likely be fine but if you awaken the monsters within that you have managed to silence then you could be in trouble. I have seen many many people go for a "cheat meal " or a "cheat week" and then come back 3 or 6 months later saying why oh why did I do that.
Only you know what your addictions were and how well you can control them. Maybe avoid the worst of them and indulge n a few "treats" or better still just carry on low carbing and forget the junk you used to eat?

We have been going to our daughter's for Christmas Day, as our son in law is from the USA so they would otherwise be alone. I make the Yorkshire puddings to a slightly lower carb recipe I have developed, but I really do not want the potatoes, as there are so many other veges. They do not have Christmas pudding so as to make it possible to eat later (the turkey is lunch) so I make a low carb trifle, almond flour sponge, sugar free jelly, some berries, real custard, whipped cream, desiccated coconut.
I have had four low carb Christmases now and really have not felt the slightest deprivation. I did check one year and my BG levels was well below 7mmol/l after lunch so I went ahead and had the 'high tea' option.
I do suspect that many people could be served a low carb Christmas dinner and never even notice that anything is 'not a treat'.

stay out of carbs,4 yrs low carbs now i can eat anything i like (ice cream,pasta,,pizza...etc)anything .i'm 60 yrs old now

Jim Lahey said:

A couple of Christmases ago, after having had no sugar for years, I ate some fudge. An almost instantaneous feeling of euphoria flooded over me and actually brought a tear to my eye. Minutes later I felt ghastly and terribly sick. Since then I've just doubled down on extra steak and eggs. Sugar is poison in my mind, but we must all make our own choices.

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This! I bought a deth by chocolate cake for my birthday, never again lol.

It's your choice is the simple answer. But, for what it's worth, the thought of eating the higher carb and/or sweeter foods is always much more enjoyable than the reality for me. I love the immediate taste, I hate the after-effects. Pre-diabetes I would eat a Twix most days and really missed it when I went very low carb. It was the first thing I tried when I was put on insulin and had learned to carb count. I spat it out and had to get something else to cover the insulin. That's how dramatically my taste buds had changed.

Whilst I eat more carbs now than I did when I was in my misdiagnosed T2 days, I prefer to eat what I enjoy now, and not worry about the diabetes side of life.

I'm also someone who has long enjoyed a solitary Christmas, which makes my food a lot easier than within a group situation where I'm often deemed "fussy"!

I had this dilemma last year. I was really stressed about it. We changed Christmas from a roast to seafood- In Australia so summer. We had lobster with a cheese sauce- very low carb, salmon etc. Seafood is a real treat for me so I enjoyed it. For dessert we did something similar to @Resurgam with diet jelly custard and cream- so low carb I could eat all I wanted.

If you go off I think you back to carbs it may be harder to go back on. There is a lot of low carb stuff- I stick to less than 20 grams a day so 70 feels like a big number to be able to get quite a few substitutions that will work.

Ultimately your decision but for me the danger is seeing low carb as a diet not a way of life. For me this is my life. My next challenge is a work function at a dumpling house that is sort of compulsory - not really sure what I am going to do- nothing really low carb- sigh.

Good luck and hope to see you here after Christmas

Since my last remaining parent passed away 3 years ago my cousins kindly invite me over even and we have what we lovingly call a “Mauritian” Christmas which tends to be snacks from the parents’ homeland and roast for dinner.
I allow myself the indulgence of the snacks, a couple of roasty spuds and plenty of chicken and veg.

I drive home that night and can spend Boxing Day back in my low carb hole.

My cousins are both diabetic themselves so make some adaptations...

davd said:

I am reluctant to give up my diet but temptation and still missing certain foods may cause me to reluctantly to eat what is about over the festive period.

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Please don’t reluctantly eat anything! There is really no need to fall off the low carb wagon over xmas if you don’t want to - there are usually plenty of low-carb treats kicking around - lovely roast meat, luxury cold cuts, sausages, bacon, assorted cheeses, prawns, smoked salmon.... whisky (other spirits are available, I believe!), wine... Just assemble yourself a tasty mixed plateful. And you could always make something keto and sweet (I make a keto ‘fudge’ which is really a fat bomb - no cooking just a bit of melting in the microwave - and mostly cocoa butter, but yummy) to eat when everyone else is rolling out the Quality Street .

On the other hand, if you fancy a bit of indulgence and think you will enjoy and it won’t be a gateway drug to more carbs, then I suppose the odd day probably won’t hurt. But I don’t think there are any studies of long-term effects of occasional carb-fests!

davd said:

I know some people will say I can have a fairly low carb Christmas, but for just a few days I would love to be able to eat what I used to love eating at Christmas such as mince pies, Christmas cake, roast spuds, parsnips, chocolates, everything that I know I shouldn’t eat as a diabetic.
I was diagnosed in April with an HbA1c of 90 but managed to get down to 40 in September.
So for a few days if I high carb what long term damage would it cause if any .
I sometimes go on a cruise , not for the foreseeable future due to covid, and that would be the same as a lot of eating is done on a cruise ship.
So the question is can I spike my blood sugar levels for a week and then go back to low carb without causing any long term effects on my diabetic health .
I think a lot of other diabetics would also like to know.
I am a bit reluctant to relax my diet but if it is safe I would risk it.

Click to expand...

Ah, Christmas.... I usually have a say in what gets served up, and not being British, mince pies and such aren't exactly the standard here anyway. It'll all be rather different this year, but it'll probably be all meat all the time these holidays. Venison, as a special treat, as well as salmon and steak. So I stick with lots of meat, fish, deviled eggs and whatnot, obviously. I love gingerbread spices so I've been putting those in my coffee. There are workarounds if you want them. And if you don't? Then you don't. It's YOUR choice. Just be aware that carbs are indeed addictive, and you might get cravings again you'd have to fight through into January, feel ill for a bit... I know if I spike, I'm knackered and confused, wobbly and whatnot, and I don't want to spend the holidays like that. But that might not happen to you at all...! You'd have to try it to find out. (Maybe on a day where it doesn't matter if you're knocked over by a feather, rather than the holidays themselves). We're all different, so that makes it a hard one to answer. If you have a backbone of steel and know you can keep it as a one-off... It's not going to give you diabetic neuropathy, kidney damage, blindness or retinopathy if you just have a few days off from being a diet-controlled diabetic. A lot of us relax our diet over the holidays, and then I also mean holidays in the sense of being on vacation somewhere... Though with a cruise's buffet I'd be all over the meat and fish and ignore the rest. Well, maybe steal a bite of my husband's chocolate cake dessert or something... It really is up to you.

But like I said, if this is something you want to be doing semi-regularly, for cruises and celebrations... Check how you are with stuff like that first. Whether you have difficulty getting back on the wagon and whether you feel tired and ill if you fall of the wagon more than a little.

And above all else... If you do drop off, make sure it's worth it. The meal'd better be a really, really fabulous one. Don't waste it on bland crisps.

Ah, now this is a hard one isn't it because at Xmas you are probably thinking about all the things you (think) you are missing, the mince pies, the roast spuds and all the rest. My take is that this is only nostalgia kicking in and making you crave the normality of it all. I would say instead of going all in and losing control just think to yourself well you MAY indulge a little bit more in some areas, ie, you might have 1 roast spud but loads of turkey and a gazillion sausages in bacon to make up the rest, you may have a mince pie, but only one, followed by a 10 minute walk, etc. In between all that, just stick to what you normally have and maybe get some dark chocolate/low carb mince pies whilst accepting there is NO low carb alternative for a roast potato in my opinion. I find that way, you (possibly) won't feel deprived and when you know you COULD have something normally off limits, you probably won't go overboard. I realise of course that if you are the type that is likely to lose control (understandable with cravings and 'addiction) then in answer to your question, you may well feel ill after a sudden indulgence over 2/3 days but you will be able to get back on track as you did when you started off. Approach Xmas casually, don't worry too much, accept your carbs will rise (hopefully not too much) and get right back on the bandwagon asap. Some people think it's an all or nothing situation and I guess that depends on personality, but I suspect you will find that those items you crave are nowhere near as tasty now as you thought they'd be. x

This will be my third diabetic Christmas. As long as I can stay well away from the Quality Street its fine. We have brunch of smoked salmon, prawns and crab and then a big roast dinner around 5pm. I allow myself one roast potato and a helping of bread and herby stuffing for one day only. So it works out a rare for me two meals a day. Drinking champagne between brunch and dinner really helps. I also think it helps to make a personal plan and stick to it. Btw you have done AMAZING to bring your levels down so much so quickly, be very proud.