Vegetarian and low carbs

[lobsang]

I know this might be a bit of a rant, but any advice is welcome.

I was diagnosed end of January, and had my first chat with the nurse today. That felt condescending or irrelevant and in general of no real help, the book recommended will I feel be of zero use, and the information leaflet says what I suspected low carb diet being vegetarian is challenging, and the 130g or less while eating enough calories to be a safe weight loss level i.e. 1,600 to 2,000 for just under 4kg loss to bring my BMI down, and then I'll need more.

Today I'm managed the carbs but nowhere near the calories, and I'm left feeling hungry. I can't see a way to I feel like throwing all the low carb stuff in the bin, reducing my carbs a bit and upping my activity levels that will be far easier and from what I'm seeing has a far better impact on my levels.

Just to add to the complications I already have hypertension and hyperuricemia so need to avoid some foods anyway due to medication.

 

[EllieM]

Welcome to the forums.

Look there are a lot of carnivores on here, but there are low carb vegans and veetarians.

Can you eat eggs and/or cheese? Low carb vegetarian is a lot easier than low carb vegan...

And can I just double check, your issue is that the low carb diet isn't giving you enough calories? And it leaves you hungry?

A lot of the T2s here use a blood testing meter to determine the level of carbs their bodies can tolerate (whether it's 20g a day or 120g) band then work from there. Carb cravings are normal when you frst reduce them, but there's no need to be hungry.

Here's a link to the site's low carb vegetarian forum

Vegetarian Diet Forum | Diabetes Forum • The Global Diabetes Community

Good luck.

 

[Goonergal]

Hi @lobsang and welcome

One of our members - @nutribolt - recently put together a very handy guide to vegetarian low-carb eating:

https://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/threads/list-of-some-low-carb-vegetarian-dishes.180146/

I feel like throwing all the low carb stuff in the bin, reducing my carbs a bit and upping my activity levels that will be far easier and from what I'm seeing has a far better impact on my levels.

Exercise can help, but it’s what you eat that will have the biggest impact on your blood sugar levels.

Are you taking any medication for your diabetes? That can also affect the advice people give here.

 

[lobsang]

Yes my issue with low carb is lack of calories, and protein, it hard enough getting enough protein anyway.

My main sources of protein are pulses and substitutes and they are inherently loaded with carbs, thus to reduce my carbs I just reducing what I eat.

I need about 2,200 to 2,500 kcals without exercise to maintain I'm aiming for 1,500 to loose a bit of weight but only got 1,300 yesterday and burnt and extra 300 due to exercise. Do that too often and it going to cause other issues.

By hungry I mean rumbling stomach for hours before bed, I when to bed with it and got up this morning with the same feeling.

I do have a meter and that is estimating HbA1c of 42.9 while the doctors reading a month ago was 57.

Exercise stops the hyper spike after eating, even a pathetic 400m walk seam to work 7.1 pre 5.9 post 2 hour, but same breakfast but at my desk to work and 6.6 and 6.3 to 12.5 and 12.1.

I will be on metformin, when I collect it, along with Losartan and Amlodipine for the HT.
I know I'm inactive as I average under 4000 steps a day.

 

[KK123]

Hi @lobsang, can you tell us a typical days meals? That can help people to come up with tips. x

 

[bulkbiker]

low carb diet being vegetarian is challenging

Which is true to an extent but it's far from impossible..
However can I just check are you vegetarian for moral reasons or for health reasons?
If the latter it might be worth reconsidering?

 

[OB87]

I think it is more challenging but it's not impossible. I'm a vegetarian and my blood sugars are under control. A lot of the meat substitutes are low carb if you go for the more plainer versions (quorn pieces, deli slices, fillets, linda McCarthy sausages etc) then you add items to it just like you would a meat dish. I use them in curries or anything really. The breaded foods are higher carb so best to use your meter and see what affects you.

Low carb bread is available and low carb wraps. I eat a lot of cheese and eggs too.

 

[TriciaWs]

You should not need to count calories if you are controlling carbs and not feeling hungry.

I, like many others, lost loads of weight on a low carb diet while eating plenty of unprocessed/low processed fats. I eat cheese, double cream, full fat milk, eggs, etc. and put oil on salads and butter on green veg if I want.
I have some nuts but not a lot as they contain carbs. However, I do make 90 second bread with ground almonds or use ground almonds instead of flour in low carb cake.
I eat more calories than I ever could while trying to lose weight by calorie counting. Your body will burn fat instead of carbs as it adapts to low carb eating.

I didn't even exercise, due to other health conditions! But I started on 100g then down to 85g at which point my meter showed my blood sugar was fine - you might be ok on 130g or need to go lower.
I used to keep packs or 20/25g cheese for bedtime snacks, and also hardboiled eggs if I was hungry in the day. But on 85g I could also have a couple of squares of dark chocolate at bedtime.

 

[lucylocket61]

Yes my issue with low carb is lack of calories, and protein, it hard enough getting enough protein anyway.

My main sources of protein are pulses and substitutes and they are inherently loaded with carbs, thus to reduce my carbs I just reducing what I eat.

I need about 2,200 to 2,500 kcals without exercise to maintain I'm aiming for 1,500 to loose a bit of weight but only got 1,300 yesterday and burnt and extra 300 due to exercise. Do that too often and it going to cause other issues.

By hungry I mean rumbling stomach for hours before bed, I when to bed with it and got up this morning with the same feeling.

I do have a meter and that is estimating HbA1c of 42.9 while the doctors reading a month ago was 57.

Exercise stops the hyper spike after eating, even a pathetic 400m walk seam to work 7.1 pre 5.9 post 2 hour, but same breakfast but at my desk to work and 6.6 and 6.3 to 12.5 and 12.1.

I will be on metformin, when I collect it, along with Losartan and Amlodipine for the HT.
I know I'm inactive as I average under 4000 steps a day.

Hello lobsang, and welcome.

What proteins are you happy to eat, and what fats? Are you vegitarian or vegan?

 

[nutribolt]

That felt condescending or irrelevant and in general of no real help

I can relate to that from my past and am sorry you had to undergo that kind of behaviour on top of your new found Diabetes. I have had my fair share of patronising and condescending NHS staff. Guess ignoring such people is a skill we develop dealing with while also trying to tackle the BG fluctuations.

I already have hypertension and hyperuricemia so need to avoid some foods anyway due to medication.

This does complicate matters I guess and while I do not suffer from hypertension not so long back I was being classed as very high risk to becoming one. Intermittent Fasting combined with low carb seems to benefit hypertension patients as well so maybe that is an added advantage.

I need about 2,200 to 2,500 kcals without exercise to maintain I'm aiming for 1,500 to loose a bit of weight but only got 1,300 yesterday and burnt and extra 300 due to exercise. Do that too often and it going to cause other issues.

Now I would highly recommend reading the book "The diabetes Code" from Dr Jason Fung or checkout some of his videos on youtube and you will realise that loosing weight does not necessarily mean you have to restrict calories on a given day to a point it makes us unhappy. The key is to eat what keeps us full and this is where the HF part - "Healthy / High Fat" of the LCHF fame fits in. If you eat a diet low in carbs but high in healthy fats you will have satiety and you will eventually feel less hungry thus making fasting easier which in turn will allow calorie restriction resulting in faster and sustainable weight loss. (Check my signature to see this in action.)

Now I must admit I was vegetarian by choice not due to religion or any ideology but to be completely honest mainly because my wife is a vegetarian and I did not want her to feel uncomfortable at food time. I am also fortunate to have a taste for all foods of Indian Origin and Indian food has lot of variety in vegetarian options which are very tasty indeed and most of the dishes on the pdf on my blog @Goonergal refers you to are therefore of Indian origin.

I agree that pulses cannot be in a low carb diet but if you eat by meter you could include some very good alternatives which will complete your protein quota for the day. If you can eat egg it will be even easier but if not tofu and paneer are very good sources of protein and suggestions from @OB87 will be useful too.

Exercise stops the hyper spike after eating, even a pathetic 400m walk seam to work 7.1 pre 5.9 post 2 hours, but same breakfast but at my desk to work and 6.6 and 6.3 to 12.5 and 12.1

Now you are right in finding out that walking helps. In fact nothing helps in getting BG down quicker than walking but trust me if you go for heavy weights or something similar you may be surprised to see the BG rising because it does rise... in my case after heavy weights I have seen it go as high as 16. That is not to discourage you from taking up high strength training as it does help in long run to stay in shape, but it is to say that what you see with exercise really is temporary and the best form of exercise for reducing BG really is walking - rest of it while good may not directly help you any further - in other words training harder may infact have opposite impact. So be careful there.

I hope you find the right combination of food groups that works for you but all I can say is while a bit difficult it is achievable to be on a low carb diet that is filling and once you find the dishes that work for you the life does get easier.

Best of luck!!!

 

[lobsang]

Which is true to an extent but it's far from impossible..
However can I just check are you vegetarian for moral reasons or for health reasons?
If the latter it might be worth reconsidering?

Initially moral and now health reasons, protein from meat and seafood is a bad combination with hyperuricemia, and that is possibly the root cause of both the hypertension and now diabetes, and from what I have read it is also linked to complications with diabetes so controlling both is important. Also the end result of not controlling it is a gout attack and you can forget any exercise then.

 

[lobsang]

Hello lobsang, and welcome.

What proteins are you happy to eat, and what fats? Are you vegitarian or vegan?

First I'm vegetarian I don't think I would manage vegan.

That's complicated I can eat limited amounts of vegetarian proteins especially cheese, whey protein, and micro proteins (quorn), my best bet to avoid other complication are beans and pulses as well as eggs.
I can happy eat butter (not that's a sensible thing to do), I prefer olive oil, doesn't work for fried eggs just any veg oil will do there.

 

[lobsang]

This does complicate matters I guess and while I do not suffer from hypertension not so long back I was being classed as very high risk to becoming one. Intermittent Fasting combined with low carb seems to benefit hypertension patients as well so maybe that is an added advantage.

It the hyperuricemia and managing that the complicates thing, and not controlling that can lead to other problems including impacting HT.

Now you are right in finding out that walking helps. In fact nothing helps in getting BG down quicker than walking but trust me if you go for heavy weights or something similar you may be surprised to see the BG rising because it does rise... in my case after heavy weights I have seen it go as high as 16. That is not to discourage you from taking up high strength training as it does help in long run to stay in shape, but it is to say that what you see with exercise really is temporary and the best form of exercise for reducing BG really is walking - rest of it while good may not directly help you any further - in other words training harder may infact have opposite impact. So be careful there.

I hope you find the right combination of food groups that works for you but all I can say is while a bit difficult it is achievable to be on a low carb diet that is filling and once you find the dishes that work for you the life does get easier.

Best of luck!!!

Thanks.

 

[Geordie_P]

Gout is bad news, but surely pulses, beans, brassica and cauliflower are as bad as anything? I was even warned off nuts and peanuts when my uric acid levels were looking a little high.

 

[Ledzeptt]

Hi @lobsang

I saw this article today by coincidence and I would class 7/10 items as edible (not meat):
'10 Dietitian-Ranked Healthy Proteins' - https://blog.myfitnesspal.com/dietitian-ranked-healthy-proteins/

 

[lucylocket61]

What does the article mean by "a cup"? How big is the cup?

 

[Goonergal]

What does the article mean by "a cup"? How big is the cup?

A cup is an American standard measure. I use these converters if working from a US recipe:

https://www.goodto.com/food/cups-to-grams-converter-87833
https://www.allrecipes.com/article/cup-to-gram-conversions/