June update: I became alarmed watching my fasting blood glucose (FBG) rise over the last month from May to June - it’s gone from 5%s to 6s i.e. 90-110 mg/dL, to mid to high 6s - 115-125, and then in one week I had a 7.6, or 138 mg/dL reading, and 8.3-8.6 a couple of times (150-155 mg/dL) ((Yeah - bummer indeed!). High FBGs mean higher daytime BGs, and no more lower readings that reflected more efficient dealing of my BG as in earlier in the year. Now I see in my mind’s eye my liver pumping out glucose in the wee hours, misreading the glucose level already in my blood (already too high in other words) - the dreaded dawn phenomenon when there is a misfiring/misreading in my liver (or so it looks at any rate).
Then a couple of weeks ago I got my latest HBAIC and was very disappointed to see it has risen up to 44, again. A 4 point rise in two months, after leaving home on an extended trip.Egad. And my first rise after 10 or so months of lowering HBA1Cs.
I’m still away from home so managed to get to a scales (in-store! Don’t ask!) (OK, it involved standing on tippy toes to get all my weight on the scales whilst still in packaging - what a hoot.) Anyway, as I had suspected, I had indeed gone up in weight - from 66kg post deviated-newcastle-diet, for a few months, to 69-70kg now.
I worked like a starving dog to get my liver and pancreas functioning better by doing the DND (documented in here and other various threads in the forum) for a couple of months earlier in the year. A month later with an HBAIc of 40 in April, with tight BG control, leapt off on a plane on a transglobal flight, ate the on-flight food, got an infection somewheres halfway that took over a month to go away, had a couple of days of eating wonderful middle eastern and Indian restaurant food in the middle east (no opportunity to be in control of my food ingredients as I have been doing but gee the food was good) (I just love middle-eastern and Indian food), experienced a hormonal muck up as a middle aged woman, caused by circadian rhythm changes care of transglobal travel (I won’t go into the details, but trust me on this one), then been on a motorhome trip for a month (no regular resistance exercising, no long walks, no multiple flights of stairs, nor mild but regular weight lifting as I had been doing), lots of friends and family which was wonderful but stressful at times (the way that traffic, family relations and even friendship can be) (stress definitely affects my BG). More bread, even though still very little but more than none, even the odd slice of cake, and my once a year McDonalds breakfast treat (post-diagnosis) to add to the long list. Still eating healthy homemade food most of the time, but way more eating out and eating at others’ tables than I had done in the previous 8 or 9 months post-diagnosis. My metabolism, for whichever reason from above, couldn’t take it, it seems. Sigh.
And it would seem, as I said coming back from the in-store weighing - Prof Taylor would be pleased! As this chapter in my own diabetes journey is a confirmation of Prof Taylor’s personal fat threshold theory - and mine seems to be borderline at a bmi of 22 (when my HBAIc was at 40 - the highest end of long-term normal blood glucose), and gluconeogenesis provoking/fatty livered at 24.5 (as expressed in FBGs in the 7%s and 8%s). Groan.
I am imagining very damaged mitochondria cells (after reading Dr Barnard’s description and sighting the pic of the dear little things in Dr Neal Barnard’s program for reversing diabetes ), I am imagining a liver massively misreading or not getting signals about my BG levels, still. My triglycerides are fine I believe - sitting at 1. Thank goodness for that.
Coming to terms with my fragile health based on a tight control that is not constitutional, it would seem. VERY dependent on tight control on my diet and exercise. My goal then is to get down to 66kg again, and check my FBG, and maybe even lower it so I have a sickness and travel buffer, ie so I can gain a couple of kilos without a big jump in blood cell glycation. (Hey! What a drag it is to be diabetic! :-(.) So I am ultimately going for 62-65 kg I guess.
Am targeting my liver health, and getting my muscle cells firing up again, and began the 14/10-16/8 intermittent fasting regime (and starting a new thread for that), taking bitter melon, for liver support, and steeping up resistance exercise and reinstating the long walks. (I am out of the motorhome at least!) I am also eating fibre - glucamannan in the mornings so I can stretch the fasting period to 15 hours without biting my poor partner’s head off. (When hunger combines with fatigue - poor man!) (I binge watched youtube last night.) (Yeah - I know - diabetics on the decline should not lose sleep!) And I must change my forum profile stats again - groan. But all part of the journey I guess! Writes Aloe, still groaning.... still sighing (and not in a good way). Oh well!
