Newcastle diet starting Monday, done it once who gonna join me on my journey??

[AndBreathe]

And I apologize for having gone missing - since "finishing" the diet almost two weeks ago I have been very busy. Having lost about 50 pounds I started pushing my body to test my ability to metabolize carbs.

The diet might not work for everyone, but it worked for me! Carb - heavy meals are not spiking like anything resembling my pre-diet spikes. Now, 60 - 80g of high GI carbs hit 130 mg/dL tops, before dropping below 100 mg/dL at two hours. I've now transitioned from weight loss/restoring beta cell function to the next phase: combating insulin resistance. I have not smoked in 10 days, and my exercise levels are through the roof (training for a triathlon, even though I have never, ever been athletic previously). I will come back periodocally, mostly too see all of your awesome progress. Based on what I've read, wanted to leave a couple points.

1. DO NOT OVER EXERCISE. Biking 20 miles a day is daft on these few calories - the only reason to exercise is to reduce the amount of lean muscle mass lost, you sure as hell are not going to get into shape on starvation levels of calories.

2. When the urge to cheat hit me, I reminded myself of two words - "Dedication" and "Motivation." Dedicate yourself to restoring your pancreatic function, and remind yourself that diabetes is what is motivating you to lose all this weight - you CAN do this, and you WILLL. Second thoughts have no place here, nor does excessive tinkering. This is a hard diet, just keep it simple, add some light exercise, and drink water nonstop.

Know that you are screwing up your metabolism too. I'm netting 1600 calories per day and not losing any more weight, despite a lot of exercise. It'll take at least another two months to get my metabolism back, so know that the ND diet is just the first step towards correcting your metabolism and shedding all that visceral/organ fat. YOU CAN DO THIS. KEEP IT SIMPLE. STAY DEDICATED, STAY MOTIVATED.

I love all of you that are putting yourselves through this hell in order to bring some normalcy back to your bodies. I can say that even if I hadn't seen the BG results that I did, it still would have been worth all the pain to see my mom crying when she saw how much healthier I looked at Easter compared to the last time she saw me (Christmas).

Stay strong.

When we last exchanged in conversation, you were extremely keen to undertake an oral Glucose Tolerance Test. Have you done that yet, and if you have, what were your results?

 

[Glitterbritches]

When we last exchanged in conversation, you were extremely keen to undertake an oral Glucose Tolerance Test. Have you done that yet, and if you have, what were your results?

Haven't done it yet - I need to ask my doctor if he'll order one (I want it to be fficial: and by the book if at all possible) but I don' t get to see him for another month.


Which I am kinda okay with - I want to be fully smoke free before the OGTT, and need to have acclimated my body to 150+ grams of carbs daily (and I'm already there). I expect the OGTT will either happen in the beginning of May or near the end of May - beginning if I do it myself, end if I get it from my doctor. End of May is my next lipid panel/A1C as well.

 

[AndBreathe]

Haven't done it yet - I need to ask my doctor if he'll order one (I want it to be fficial: and by the book if at all possible) but I don' t get to see him for another month.


Which I am kinda okay with - I want to be fully smoke free before the OGTT, and need to have acclimated my body to 150+ grams of carbs daily (and I'm already there). I expect the OGTT will either happen in the beginning of May or near the end of May - beginning if I do it myself, end if I get it from my doctor. End of May is my next lipid panel/A1C as well.

Thanks for getting back to me. How often are you monitoring your bloods, now you have moved forward to increase your carbs?

And finally, how has your weight been? Have you seen a slight increase, matching the water retention of the carbs, or something else?

 

[Alpaca]

It's so motivating reading your posts. Just had my first shake which was ok, nice actually with some ice. I found a half price offer in Boots on 'Celebrity Slim' shakes so bought a box of banana shakes, nowhere near as bad as expected. Can I eat fruit on this eating regime?

 

[Glitterbritches]

Thanks for getting back to me. How often are you monitoring your bloods, now you have moved forward to increase your carbs?

And finally, how has your weight been? Have you seen a slight increase, matching the water retention of the carbs, or something else?

I am burning through strips veerrrryyy quickly always test morning/fasting, and evening before I go to bed. Always do a baseline before one meal, then test at one hour (or sooner, depending on GI of the carbs) and again at 15-30 minute intervals until I get below 100 mg/dL or hit three hours. And honestly, I'm almost always in the 80's (or really **** close) at the two hour mark.

Weight has gone up several pounds, which may simply be additional fecal matter in my colon. I bottomed out at around 197, and now I am at about 200 lbs. But I'm netting 1600 calories per day (gross is between 2100-3000 depending on how much exercise I've done) so by all accounts I should still be losing weight - but I'm not. Today I upped my calorie goal from 1600 to 1800 to see if, strangely, I need to be eating even more than I have been. But just eating at all has been very weird - hard to explain, but the ND diet gets in your head after a while. I almost stayed on an additional month, and had to be talked out of it!

Finally, I know quitting smoking changes metabolism, so maybe (big maybe) my weight would still be going down if I still smoked. Nothing I am going to test; I suspect the ND just bent my metabolism out of shape.

 

[Pipp]

And I apologize for having gone missing - since "finishing" the diet almost two weeks ago I have been very busy. Having lost about 50 pounds I started pushing my body to test my ability to metabolize carbs.

The diet might not work for everyone, but it worked for me! Carb - heavy meals are not spiking like anything resembling my pre-diet spikes. Now, 60 - 80g of high GI carbs hit 130 mg/dL tops, before dropping below 100 mg/dL at two hours. I've now transitioned from weight loss/restoring beta cell function to the next phase: combating insulin resistance. I have not smoked in 10 days, and my exercise levels are through the roof (training for a triathlon, even though I have never, ever been athletic previously). I will come back periodocally, mostly too see all of your awesome progress. Based on what I've read, wanted to leave a couple points.

1. DO NOT OVER EXERCISE. Biking 20 miles a day is daft on these few calories - the only reason to exercise is to reduce the amount of lean muscle mass lost, you sure as hell are not going to get into shape on starvation levels of calories.

2. When the urge to cheat hit me, I reminded myself of two words - "Dedication" and "Motivation." Dedicate yourself to restoring your pancreatic function, and remind yourself that diabetes is what is motivating you to lose all this weight - you CAN do this, and you WILLL. Second thoughts have no place here, nor does excessive tinkering. This is a hard diet, just keep it simple, add some light exercise, and drink water nonstop.

Know that you are screwing up your metabolism too. I'm netting 1600 calories per day and not losing any more weight, despite a lot of exercise. It'll take at least another two months to get my metabolism back, so know that the ND diet is just the first step towards correcting your metabolism and shedding all that visceral/organ fat. YOU CAN DO THIS. KEEP IT SIMPLE. STAY DEDICATED, STAY MOTIVATED.

I love all of you that are putting yourselves through this hell in order to bring some normalcy back to your bodies. I can say that even if I hadn't seen the BG results that I did, it still would have been worth all the pain to see my mom crying when she saw how much healthier I looked at Easter compared to the last time she saw me (Christmas).

Stay strong.

Brilliant. Excellent results and advice.

Now you have a duty to stick around Mr Motivator!

The difficult time is just beginning. Maintain that attitude and control.

(Coz that is where I stalled a bit)

 

[Living-by-the-beach]

And I apologize for having gone missing - since "finishing" the diet almost two weeks ago I have been very busy. Having lost about 50 pounds I started pushing my body to test my ability to metabolize carbs.

The diet might not work for everyone, but it worked for me! Carb - heavy meals are not spiking like anything resembling my pre-diet spikes. Now, 60 - 80g of high GI carbs hit 130 mg/dL tops, before dropping below 100 mg/dL at two hours. I've now transitioned from weight loss/restoring beta cell function to the next phase: combating insulin resistance. I have not smoked in 10 days, and my exercise levels are through the roof (training for a triathlon, even though I have never, ever been athletic previously). I will come back periodocally, mostly too see all of your awesome progress. Based on what I've read, wanted to leave a couple points.

1. DO NOT OVER EXERCISE. Biking 20 miles a day is daft on these few calories - the only reason to exercise is to reduce the amount of lean muscle mass lost, you sure as hell are not going to get into shape on starvation levels of calories.

2. When the urge to cheat hit me, I reminded myself of two words - "Dedication" and "Motivation." Dedicate yourself to restoring your pancreatic function, and remind yourself that diabetes is what is motivating you to lose all this weight - you CAN do this, and you WILLL. Second thoughts have no place here, nor does excessive tinkering. This is a hard diet, just keep it simple, add some light exercise, and drink water nonstop.

Know that you are screwing up your metabolism too. I'm netting 1600 calories per day and not losing any more weight, despite a lot of exercise. It'll take at least another two months to get my metabolism back, so know that the ND diet is just the first step towards correcting your metabolism and shedding all that visceral/organ fat. YOU CAN DO THIS. KEEP IT SIMPLE. STAY DEDICATED, STAY MOTIVATED.

I love all of you that are putting yourselves through this hell in order to bring some normalcy back to your bodies. I can say that even if I hadn't seen the BG results that I did, it still would have been worth all the pain to see my mom crying when she saw how much healthier I looked at Easter compared to the last time she saw me (Christmas).

Stay strong.

Folks

I can speak to the cycling & weight loss. Personally the ND was (& still can be) an exercise to mimic bariatric surgery designed by Professor Taylor. With the study Taylor found a majority of his patients experienced a large weight loss, and the loss of T2 too. That we now use ND to get our health under control is I feel a different situation. When one stops with ND then what do you do? We have to transition to a better quality of selection of food choices in the long term. ND is (was) just for 8 weeks to get un-diabetic BGs via weight loss. I've personally followed the spirit of ND but consistently gone for healthier choices of avoiding potatoes rice bread cereal and pasta & cutting back severely on my alcohol consumption. Upping my exercise regime has also been part of the plan. I am way better health to enjoy the rest of my life.

I've not lost the weight with the speed of other people but over 1 year I've lost 53lbs so on average about 1 lb a week. I came down fast on 35-40 lbs of weight then slowly on the rest. Yet for me now I continue to do the same thing that I've been doing for the last year. No massive change of diet or some such. Last night I had cauliflower with cheese sauce & 7oz steak. Just healthier choices from where previously I'd have had a helping of potatoes as well as the steak and cauliflower.

As for the cycling I usually do about 12-14 miles 3-4 times a week and on the other days I'll go to the gym to give the legs a rest. Yet I do mix it up a bit too. I've a small hill locally which is about 150 yards long. I've done sets of 8 Tabata hill sprints on my bike that take all of 8 minutes to do and give one excellent time / effort benefits http://fitness.mercola.com/sites/fitness/archive/2013/04/12/tabata-workout.aspx. One doesn't need to cycle to John O' Groats and back every day, to be a winner

JM

 

[Alpaca]

Day two, feeling a loss of energy this morning and hunger pangs. I'm going with it as I expected to feel like this for a few days, the first hurdle to overcome. Will try some gentle excercise today and keep busy to distract me from thinking about food. BG reading 7.8 after 10 hour fasting, I was hoping for a lower result but maybe expecting to much after one day! Trying to stay positive and focus on the end result.

 

[brettsza]

@Alpaca have a glass of sparkling water, if you are not feeling cold then add some ice in it too, it helps,
After a few days I started feeling very cold and I still am feeling so dropped all the ice off the menu but I keep a bottle of sparling in the fridge all the time.

 

[Pipp]

I am one week in to an adapted VLCD.

Not just shakes but a mixture with a low calorie meal in the evening.

Except for the sneaky cornetto last week, and the 2glasses of red wine. (Must do better.)

I weigh 4kg less than last week, and happy with that.

 

[brettsza]

I worry about you, you know.

For a man, consuming 370 calories in a day, back to back with other very low calorie days, your body must be trying to shut down. I think you're, personally, pushing this VLCD envelope to breaking point. Surely, you should be trying to at least consume the calories the ND suggests. That's brutal enough.

Your HbA1c is already in the non-diabetic range, so striving for that is a non-goal. Striving to be able to eat more carbs is going to be a lottery anyway, in my view. You may already have enough tolerance to do that without this starvation, and if you don't, malnourishing yourself (which I can't help think must be happening on 370 calories, whilst active) isn't going to help with that, except for a tiny window of time as your body potentially recovers.

Please think long and hard about this one.

Hi @AndBreathe
I had a few bad days so could not take 800 cals (easter holiday and forgot my shakes home) but I hover around 600 normally, not playing up at all as I think its not something you can really toy with, I did have chicken last night and believe me that was absolutely awesome, I will put some pics later, I also made carrot and leek soup and measured each and everything and calculated that at 200 cals for the whole pot so I had 2 bowls of it which was about 100 cals.

 

[Alpaca]

@Alpaca have a glass of sparkling water, if you are not feeling cold then add some ice in it too, it helps,
After a few days I started feeling very cold and I still am feeling so dropped all the ice off the menu but I keep a bottle of sparling in the fridge all the time.

I'm heading to the fridge now! Thanks for the tip @brettsza it helps to be forewarned about feeling cold as well.

 

[brettsza]

@Pipp I remember you asked me where I read no dairy or no chicken, I think I saw it on the pdf doc on the newcastle diet link
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/magres/research/diabetes/documents/StudyRecipes.pdf

Dont know if this has been updated after that.

 

[brettsza]

I'm heading to the fridge now! Thanks for the tip @brettsza it helps to be forewarned about feeling cold as well.

Not everyone is same though, even with crisp sunshine yesterday I was wearing a jacket and believe me a thick one too.
At times I am home and still need a hood on all the time and I used to be in a tshirt only before but I am a bit skinny and getting skinnier now.
3 weeks in and cant wait for 8 weeks to finish and head to nandos for a chicken, one I cooked last night was a bit boring, I like my spices but I cant add them now, not coz ND does not allow it but coz if i dont put oil with the spices, they will burn completely.

 

[AndBreathe]

Not everyone is same though, even with crisp sunshine yesterday I was wearing a jacket and believe me a thick one too.
At times I am home and still need a hood on all the time and I used to be in a tshirt only before but I am a bit skinny and getting skinnier now.
3 weeks in and cant wait for 8 weeks to finish and head to nandos for a chicken, one I cooked last night was a bit boring, I like my spices but I cant add them now, not coz ND does not allow it but coz if i dont put oil with the spices, they will burn completely.

But, doesn't the latest ND work suggest a spoonful of oil, albeit primarily as a preventative measure against gallstones? Surely that could be deployed with the spices?

 

[Pipp]

@Pipp I remember you asked me where I read no dairy or no chicken, I think I saw it on the pdf doc on the newcastle diet link
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/magres/research/diabetes/documents/StudyRecipes.pdf

Dont know if this has been updated after that.

Right, so you are following the original study. That worked for me too in September 2011. With that the only food intake is the meal replacement products and veg. What confused me into thinking you were doing the version with real food was your mention of eating eggs.

Some people have since used the model of severe calorie restriction to under 800 a day using real food, and achieved the same result as the original study with meal replacement. (Apparent reversal). I thought that was what you were doing.

The concern I have is that you have mentioned going as low as 370 cals intake. That can't be good. Also, that other, vulnerable, people reading may think this is ok. It really isn't. We are not a pro-anorexia site, after all. Another concern I have is that you say you have a good HbA1c and BMI ( unless I am confusing you with someone else, forgive me and correct me if I am).

Sorry if this sounds like I am trying to dictate how you should manage your nutritional needs. But I mention these concerns because I do not want you to harm yourself.

 

[AndBreathe]

Hi @AndBreathe
I had a few bad days so could not take 800 cals (easter holiday and forgot my shakes home) but I hover around 600 normally, not playing up at all as I think its not something you can really toy with, I did have chicken last night and believe me that was absolutely awesome, I will put some pics later, I also made carrot and leek soup and measured each and everything and calculated that at 200 cals for the whole pot so I had 2 bowls of it which was about 100 cals.

Am I right thinking you're saying you didn't have any shakes at home, so you ate less?

I'm sorry, but the more you write, the more and louder the alarm bells ring in my head for you. Im no longer seeing a healthy fight with diabetes when I read your posts on this thread.

That's not meant to be insulting or provocative, except to provoke your thought processes. Right now, I would be with your Doctor in absolutely not supporting your ND activity.

 

[Pipp]

Not everyone is same though, even with crisp sunshine yesterday I was wearing a jacket and believe me a thick one too.
At times I am home and still need a hood on all the time and I used to be in a tshirt only before but I am a bit skinny and getting skinnier now.
3 weeks in and cant wait for 8 weeks to finish and head to nandos for a chicken, one I cooked last night was a bit boring, I like my spices but I cant add them now, not coz ND does not allow it but coz if i dont put oil with the spices, they will burn completely.

Nandos chicken?

How many calories?

You could make your own, healthy, version!

Even on a VLCD

 

[brettsza]

But, doesn't the latest ND work suggest a spoonful of oil, albeit primarily as a preventative measure against gallstones? Surely that could be deployed with the spices?

Hi @AndBreathe
Yes I am taking the oil everyday.

 

[brettsza]

Right, so you are following the original study. That worked for me too in September 2011. With that the only food intake is the meal replacement products and veg. What confused me into thinking you were doing the version with real food was your mention of eating eggs.

Some people have since used the model of severe calorie restriction to under 800 a day using real food, and achieved the same result as the original study with meal replacement. (Apparent reversal). I thought that was what you were doing.

The concern I have is that you have mentioned going as low as 370 cals intake. That can't be good. Also, that other, vulnerable, people reading may think this is ok. It really isn't. We are not a pro-anorexia site, after all. Another concern I have is that you say you have a good HbA1c and BMI ( unless I am confusing you with someone else, forgive me and correct me if I am).

Sorry if this sounds like I am trying to dictate how you should manage your nutritional needs. But I mention these concerns because I do not want you to harm yourself.

Hi @Pipp

Yes you are right, I intended to do the original study but the calories i get from shakes is 133 I think so I was not getting to 800 cals a day which is when I added an egg and yesterday had chicken, I measure the food to make sure I dont go over 800 calories either.

That 370 calorie day was a one off day when I went outside thinking I will be back soon and instead ended up staying there all day and could only have two shakes and nothing else so that is about 370 calories, and no I would not recommend anyone either to do that, its hard already to just do it, dont want to make it further worse