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Newly Diagnosed

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Sanjwolves

Newbie
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1
Hi. I am newly diagnosed and trying to control my blood sugar levels. I tested my sugar levels this morning and the reading was 8.9 (which has dropped in last few days). I bought some Diablo range sugar free biscuits from Holland & Barrett and some diabetic ice cream. I’ve had 2 biscuits and some ice cream after my tea which included half a sweet potato. I tested my blood again and it’s now reading 12. Is this normal? Should I reduce amount of biscuits or ice cream further? I’m just concerned with it being this sensitive it will be a nightmare to control.
 
Anything labelled diabetic is generally no better than the normal stuff I'm afraid, whilst it may have less sugar in it it will have about the same amount of carbs (or maybe more) which are just as bad.
I'm sure some others will be along to help with diet suggestions though.
 

Hi there - It can take a while to get things under control, after diagnosis. What type of diabetes have you been diagnosed with?

I tend to be with @Rokaab on the "diabetes" foods. I tend to avoid them, simply because often they have a lot of unnatural ingredients I'd rather avoid.
 
Hello and welcome.

I agree also with @Rokaab that foods that are labeled diabetic are usually things a diabetic should avoid.

I've posted a link to a post by @JoKalsbeek below- it is a great place to start. But this place is full of awesome people so after you read it ask questions and read. Most importantly keep testing. You meter will not lie to you and has no biases at all.

https://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/blog-entry/the-nutritional-thingy.2330/

Welcome
 
Also newly diagnosed just over a month ago type 1.

I have found that the stuff labelled diabetic such as the stute jams and marmalades, gullon brand sugar free biscuits etc are very carb heavy and require (for me) 1 unit of novorapid per 10 grams of carb. The penny dropped when someone gave me a packet of sugar free cola bottle sweets just after I got out of hospital and I naively ate the whole pack asuming sugar free would be ok. Bg reading of 14.4 and 1 ketone test to settle my concern showed me that stuff marked diabetic is not to be trusted.

What I have tried as a relatively naive diabetic is to reduce my carb intake and it seems to work, if I feel like a sweet treat I go for Hartleys sugar free jelly which is also virtually zero in carb, about 80p a pack from Lidl.

You'll get it sorted, I was all over the place with bg readings from 4 to the mid teens a month ago. Now waking about 5 and going no higher than 8.5 as a spike an hour after eating.
 


Sugar free usually means they haven't added sugar to the mix, but flour and many other things contain carbohydrate. Depending on your diabetes type (T2s generally just reduce the carbs in their diet until they achieve the readings they want) or T1 (you have to balance the insulin with your food and it will take a while to learn to do this) you should be looking at the total carb on the packaging.

And assuming you are T2 (I know I shouldn't but you haven't mentioned insulin) your after tea result may not be so bad if your before tea result was also high - you're aiming to keep the rise after 2 hours to less than 2.

Good luck.
 
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