I have just been put on Gliclazide 80 because my health professional said I had to take something I feel so washed out. Is there any advice please because she says changing my diet will not help now! I did take my first reading before lunch and it was 9,2 mmol on the first day of taking the medication
Medication
- Thread starter BevyW
- Start Date
Changing your diet WILL help lower your BG (reducing carbs), but be very careful with your Gliclazide as they can cause hypo's. If you are in the UK and drive you should have also been prescribed a tester & strips, use them to monitor you levels carefully
JoKalsbeek
Expert
- Messages
- 6,615
- Type of diabetes
- I reversed my Type 2
- Treatment type
- Diet only
That's a grim view... Dr. Jason Fung helped people who were very, very diabetic back into remission, with diet, so... Why not? I do agree with @lessci though, a low carb diet combined with gliclazide would make you more likely to hypo. (Been there, done that, as no-one warned me!).
You've been a member for a while, and you got low carbing advice way back when... Did you implement it, and it didn't work for some reason or other (not sustainable for you, didn't have the desired effect, whatever), or didn't you go down the low carb road? Did anything change and is there any reason why low carbing would not be in the cards now, aside from it clashing with gliclazide?
Just be very, very careful if you mix the two. It can go very badly. You could get in touch with the nurse and ask whether you can try diet again for 3 months, and THEN start the glic if it doesn't work enough.... She might do an eyeroll and a sigh, but it's your body, your choice.
Hang in there eh,
Jo
Low carb did work for me and I thought foolishly I was "cured" so then slipped back into bad habits with bread, pasta and rice! Then recently I have been having a lot of stressful events and I mean a lot. eating erratically and not recovering from infections so went back to the doctors for a blood test and this is where we are now are reading of 98 in HbC test! A panicked nurse and me on medication
This isn't medical advice just some observations from my own experience.
My HbA1c was 113 at the start of April and I was prescribed Gliclazide and Metformin, and told by a GP to take them 12 hours apart with meals. Nothing about what should be in those meals! I was also given a BG meter in order to test for hypos.
Now I've been low carbing for about 8 years, so some of my meals are zero carb, and so far I've never come anywhere near a hypo. A confident-sounding doctor (when I rang 111 in a bit of a state after not managing to get a blood drop out to test) said the chances of a hypo with such a high initial blood sugar were virtually zero and that I should go ahead and take the meds. I keep a sugary drink and sweets by my bed just in case.
Also, low carb can be anything up to 130g carbs per day, which allows me to take my meds, but still way better than the "standard western diet". It's not all or nothing - I expect I'll have to take meds for a while, possibly for life, but I can still help myself by making better food choices at the same time.
Silly of the nurse to panic, I too had a number of staff at my surgery metaphorically flapping their hands and threatening all kinds of dire consequences, which didn't help my stress levels in the slightest.
I've been lucky not to have any obvious side effects with the Gliclazide, and over the last 4 weeks my BG readings have come down significantly. Hopefully this will work for you too and you'll be able to reduce your dose or even stop needing meds altogether.
All the best
Debs
My HbA1c was 113 at the start of April and I was prescribed Gliclazide and Metformin, and told by a GP to take them 12 hours apart with meals. Nothing about what should be in those meals! I was also given a BG meter in order to test for hypos.
Now I've been low carbing for about 8 years, so some of my meals are zero carb, and so far I've never come anywhere near a hypo. A confident-sounding doctor (when I rang 111 in a bit of a state after not managing to get a blood drop out to test) said the chances of a hypo with such a high initial blood sugar were virtually zero and that I should go ahead and take the meds. I keep a sugary drink and sweets by my bed just in case.
Also, low carb can be anything up to 130g carbs per day, which allows me to take my meds, but still way better than the "standard western diet". It's not all or nothing - I expect I'll have to take meds for a while, possibly for life, but I can still help myself by making better food choices at the same time.
Silly of the nurse to panic, I too had a number of staff at my surgery metaphorically flapping their hands and threatening all kinds of dire consequences, which didn't help my stress levels in the slightest.
I've been lucky not to have any obvious side effects with the Gliclazide, and over the last 4 weeks my BG readings have come down significantly. Hopefully this will work for you too and you'll be able to reduce your dose or even stop needing meds altogether.
All the best
Debs
JoKalsbeek
Expert
- Messages
- 6,615
- Type of diabetes
- I reversed my Type 2
- Treatment type
- Diet only
Oh, jeez... It wasn't foolishly, you just hoped what everyone hopes, being human and all: that it'll go away, good and proper. And it doesn't, which is just a solid disappointment. Good news being, you've done it before, you can likely do it again, if you want to. Just, you know. Careful with the glic in the mix, if you do go that route.
Be good to yourself. Stress itself raises blood sugars, and it doesn't do a whole lot for healthy eating either. If you can find pockets of time where you can take care of yourself, to just breathe, do something to take the edge off that doesn't involve carbs, then do take that moment. You deserve it.
Hugs,
Jo
