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<blockquote data-quote="xyzzy" data-source="post: 313849" data-attributes="member: 40343"><p>Hi Warren</p><p></p><p>I agree with what everyone else is telling you. The best approach is to sort your diet as it works ten times better than any diabetic medication in my opinion. I got diagnosed in December last year with an HbA1c of 100 (11.3%) so higher than yours. Within 6 months I reduced it down to 30 (4.9%) simply by changing diet and reducing my carbohydrate intake. I have also normalised my cholesterol and blood pressure levels too. Not cured as if I eat something high in carbs or sugar my levels go through the roof but so long as I mostly keep to my new healthy diet my levels are fine. I do all of this with my gp's full backing. A lot of people on this forum have achieved similar results to myself in fact it was people on this forum who told me what to do when I joined.</p><p></p><p>Basically to get control involves two things. First accept you are going to have to make some long term lifestyle changes. You won't need to be "good" all the time but you will need to be good for the vast majority of the time. Diet wise first cut out all forms of natural sugar so the obvious cakes, biscuits, sugar in tea and coffee, non diet sodas and even pure fruit juices as they have loads of sugar. Next and <u>just as importantly</u> at least halve your intake of rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, cereals and other flour based products. Replace with extra meat, fish, cheese, eggs and especially green veg. Things like yoghurt are generally fine. If you want a small amount of fruit then "berries" are best and I find they won't raise your levels as high if you eat them as a pudding after your main meal. On the rice, pasta and bread you have left in your diet swap to brown basmati rice, brown or tri-colour pasta and the best bread by far is Burgen Soya bread that you can get from most supermarkets.</p><p></p><p>Try to do some exercise even if it is just walking. My exercise is simply walking the dogs each day.</p><p></p><p>Part two involves getting yourself a blood levels meter. If the gp won't give you one (some are really really anti and will give you a load of rubbish why you shouldn't use one) then get one called an SD CodeFree from the healthcare.co.uk shop on eBay. They also sell them on Amazon. It will cost less than £20 with test strips at around £5 for 50. This is by far the cheapest meter and loads of members have them in fact the majority of forum members will tell you a meter is essential especially in the first few weeks and months as you learn what is safe to eat and what is not. To be frank it's pretty obvious you are not using a meter by what you have given as your average diet!</p><p></p><p>Start testing 2 hours after you eat. You need to aim to be under 8 mmol/l as regularly exceeding 8 is where you start to risk complications such as blindness and amputations. With your HBA1c of 7.9% your levels are averaging at 11.4 mmol/l so well above the safe level of 8. The NICE guidelines say under 8 mmol/l two hours after eating and between 4 and 7 at all other times.</p><p></p><p>At the beginning you may find getting under 8 to be really difficult if your levels have been running high for a while. If it is then also test before you eat and aim for the two hour after eating reading to be back at roughly the level of the before eating reading. If you do that then you should see a gradual day by day improvement until all your two hour readings come out safe.</p><p></p><p>If you can't stop the readings spiking high after two hours then you have a stark choice. Either reduce the rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, cereals and other flour based products some more until your levels respond or if you really can't change your diet further then go back to the gp and ask for stronger meds. </p><p></p><p>The disadvantage of the extra meds route is many of the stronger meds that stimulate insulin production will make you gain weight as that is one of the primary things insulin does, it lays down fat. Remember that as T2 you are likely to be producing a good deal of insulin but it is not working properly (called insulin resistance). Any fat you put on will make what insulin you produce work even less efficiently as it will raise your insulin resistance further so you can end up in a loop of having to take stronger and stronger medication which in the end will lead you to insulin dependency as while your levels remain unsafe they are also killing of the very cells that actually produce insulin. In the end you end up as an insulin resistant T2 who needs to inject large doses of insulin because their pancreas has completely stopped and that is not a good place to arrive. People on the forum call this the drugs escalator.</p><p></p><p>The important thing is to recognize that which ever way you choose you need safe blood levels to stop you developing some pretty awful diabetic complications down the line.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="xyzzy, post: 313849, member: 40343"] Hi Warren I agree with what everyone else is telling you. The best approach is to sort your diet as it works ten times better than any diabetic medication in my opinion. I got diagnosed in December last year with an HbA1c of 100 (11.3%) so higher than yours. Within 6 months I reduced it down to 30 (4.9%) simply by changing diet and reducing my carbohydrate intake. I have also normalised my cholesterol and blood pressure levels too. Not cured as if I eat something high in carbs or sugar my levels go through the roof but so long as I mostly keep to my new healthy diet my levels are fine. I do all of this with my gp's full backing. A lot of people on this forum have achieved similar results to myself in fact it was people on this forum who told me what to do when I joined. Basically to get control involves two things. First accept you are going to have to make some long term lifestyle changes. You won't need to be "good" all the time but you will need to be good for the vast majority of the time. Diet wise first cut out all forms of natural sugar so the obvious cakes, biscuits, sugar in tea and coffee, non diet sodas and even pure fruit juices as they have loads of sugar. Next and [u]just as importantly[/u] at least halve your intake of rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, cereals and other flour based products. Replace with extra meat, fish, cheese, eggs and especially green veg. Things like yoghurt are generally fine. If you want a small amount of fruit then "berries" are best and I find they won't raise your levels as high if you eat them as a pudding after your main meal. On the rice, pasta and bread you have left in your diet swap to brown basmati rice, brown or tri-colour pasta and the best bread by far is Burgen Soya bread that you can get from most supermarkets. Try to do some exercise even if it is just walking. My exercise is simply walking the dogs each day. Part two involves getting yourself a blood levels meter. If the gp won't give you one (some are really really anti and will give you a load of rubbish why you shouldn't use one) then get one called an SD CodeFree from the healthcare.co.uk shop on eBay. They also sell them on Amazon. It will cost less than £20 with test strips at around £5 for 50. This is by far the cheapest meter and loads of members have them in fact the majority of forum members will tell you a meter is essential especially in the first few weeks and months as you learn what is safe to eat and what is not. To be frank it's pretty obvious you are not using a meter by what you have given as your average diet! Start testing 2 hours after you eat. You need to aim to be under 8 mmol/l as regularly exceeding 8 is where you start to risk complications such as blindness and amputations. With your HBA1c of 7.9% your levels are averaging at 11.4 mmol/l so well above the safe level of 8. The NICE guidelines say under 8 mmol/l two hours after eating and between 4 and 7 at all other times. At the beginning you may find getting under 8 to be really difficult if your levels have been running high for a while. If it is then also test before you eat and aim for the two hour after eating reading to be back at roughly the level of the before eating reading. If you do that then you should see a gradual day by day improvement until all your two hour readings come out safe. If you can't stop the readings spiking high after two hours then you have a stark choice. Either reduce the rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, cereals and other flour based products some more until your levels respond or if you really can't change your diet further then go back to the gp and ask for stronger meds. The disadvantage of the extra meds route is many of the stronger meds that stimulate insulin production will make you gain weight as that is one of the primary things insulin does, it lays down fat. Remember that as T2 you are likely to be producing a good deal of insulin but it is not working properly (called insulin resistance). Any fat you put on will make what insulin you produce work even less efficiently as it will raise your insulin resistance further so you can end up in a loop of having to take stronger and stronger medication which in the end will lead you to insulin dependency as while your levels remain unsafe they are also killing of the very cells that actually produce insulin. In the end you end up as an insulin resistant T2 who needs to inject large doses of insulin because their pancreas has completely stopped and that is not a good place to arrive. People on the forum call this the drugs escalator. The important thing is to recognize that which ever way you choose you need safe blood levels to stop you developing some pretty awful diabetic complications down the line. [/QUOTE]
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