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It is finally official I am diabetic

@Gezzabelle I know exactly where you are coming from as I now live on my own and a lot of the time especially in the last few weeks (I’ve had an operation) I couldn’t be bothered to cook for myself and just had sandwiches. But as I’ve gained weight and my blood sugar has gone back into the teens I’m determined to get back to how I was. I have a supermarket delivery and order large packs of chicken thighs and drumsticks then bag them Into serving sizes and freeze them. I also buy mince and I’ve made simple meatballs (Laura Spath recipe on YouTube) and lots of eggs and cheese.
Big hugs x
 
Sorry to hear things are not so good for you after your surgery and I hope you get better soon. I know how it goes when you are on your own....you stop bothering and then things get messy when your sugar levels get out of control. I lost my husband a while back and just stopped making proper food.... a sandwich or take away was always much easier. Thank you for the tips on what and how to buy stuff. My freezer is empty now I have thrown out all the bad foods I must not eat anymore so I can fill it up with all the things you suggested. I really hope things improve for you...we are all in this boat together and YOU and all of us can do this Big hugs right back at you xx
 
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Just another thought @Gezzabelle have you got an air fryer? You can cook frozen chicken thighs and drumsticks in it so no need for planning and remembering to defrost and I’ve just seen a recipe where someone got minced beef (or could be lamb) mixed in her favourite spices, divided it up into koftas and put them in the air fryer at 180° for 10 minutes. My mother in law has just bought one from Asda for £20 and is raving about it.
 
Thanks for the info!! I do have an air fryer so I will be using it a lot more for good healthy food. I am bust stocking up my freezer with chicken and fish etc so hopefully it will be much easier to have good food without having to think too much
 
I was diagnosed as diabetic (T2) just about a year ago - a1c was 63.

First thing I did after reading this forum was to try and control it by diet.
My first step was to get a GlucoNavii tester and a load of strips, carried on with my normal diet for a couple of days, and tested.

This is something I would recommend to any newly diabetic... plenty of testing and see what does and does not push your BG up.

I quickly found out what was raising my BG, and set about changing my diet. For example, out went the breakfast muesli, instead I now have about 200g strawberries and a sprinkling of blueberries, with double cream.
I cut out rice and pasta, most potatoes, and bread at first, also all processed foods.

Increased my intake of protein foods and natural fats, plenty of green veg (though I avoid peas.
One of my favourite meals is roast salmon, green beans and a pile of mushrooms.

Within three months I lost 10kg (and a further 5kg since) and my A1C was 39. My retinopathy has also started to reverse a little, too.
Obviously your mileage may vary, but it can be done.

I've been able to go back to my favourite Warburtons seeded bread, it helps to have a sandwich with a generous filling of protein to offset the carbs. I've also found I can have a half chicken and a goodly pile of chips (my local restaurant does the best chips I have EVER tasted) and the chicken offsets the carbs in the chips and my BG doesn't spike.

Best of luck.
 
Gezzabelle said:
Thanks for the info!! I do have an air fryer so I will be using it a lot more for good healthy food. I am bust stocking up my freezer with chicken and fish etc so hopefully it will be much easier to have good food without having to think too much
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I have an ancient Tefal Actifry and it is great for easy cooking.
Mine has a stirrer and timer so it can be left to do the meat, then I keep it warm in a halogen oven as I cook the stirfry, mushrooms, all the things my husband doesn't eat in the juice from the meat in the Tefal and make what my husband will eat.
I have a large freezer, so I stock up with any meat on offer, and fish, butter and lard, all sorts of frozen veges and berries as long as they are low carb, and all the low carb baking ingredients as I don't do much. The ingredients are years out of date, but they taste fine thanks to being frozen (I used to do storage testing for Allied Lyons) I buy frozen stirfry from Lidl, and frozen mixed berries. Sausages from the Co-op or Iceland as they are low carb and taste good. I freeze packs of cooked ham and corned beef - I really have to read ingredients on packs of ham as they love to add carbs to it. I don't buy from deli counters as they do not display the ingredients and a lot of cooked meat is glued together with starch. They give it innocent seeming names such as 'stabiliser'.
 
Update .... had my Hba1c tested again after changing my diet for a couple of months and the result went down from 50 to 46!! The doctor said ''Your HbA1c is down so much with no medication?? I have never seen that before and didn't know it was even possible to achieve''. She of course didn't ask how I did it but to hear the words you are now PRE diabetic will do for me
 
I am due to go for my blood test tomorrow, so I will find out if fasting and shakes are of any benefit for me.
I did make a beef stew for Halloween though - in my pressure cooker.
Just a bag of mixed veges and an onion, with some already cooked beef cubed, and it was lovely. I have a stock pot in the fridge so I just tipped that in and topped it up with water, but the pressure cooker in the fridge and will be adding more veges and meat to it at some point in the near future. I add some Yorkshire puddings for my husband.
 
Fingers crossed for you ....good luck!
 
Well done on getting your hba1c down again. My hba1c has been at normal levels for 10 years and not once have I been asked how I managed it but I was frequently told off when I mentioned that I used a blood monitor!!
 
Daphne917 said:
Well done on getting your hba1c down again. My hba1c has been at normal levels for 10 years and not once have I been asked how I managed it but I was frequently told off when I mentioned that I used a blood monitor!!
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Thank you so much!! I was told the same thing... do NOT test!! I know I will always be pre diabetic ... I also know they will just go on in blissful ignorance on the proven ways to get the numbers down. Meanwhile I will go on doing it my way. It is thanks to this forum that I found out what that way is and without all the help I have received here I would no doubt be on a load of pills and potions for the rest of my life so a HUGE thank you to everyone here
 
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