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Which carbs do you count?

L

LornaFarrell

Well-Known Member
Messages
72
Hi everyone, I have been keeping my carbs lowish and counting everything. Then a couple of weeks ago I did the DAFNE course and was told not to count veg or pulses. So, just out of curiosity really, when you say “20-100g a day” are you counting veg?
 
Personally, I count everything... A carb is a carb.
 
I count everything, too. I can't do pulses or legumes but I am T2 (I'm guessing you are T1 with having done the DAFNE course?).
 
I count all carbs that raise my BG.
My understanding is some carbs do not raise BG of everyone because they are not digested and "pass straight through". Carbs in pulses are an example of this.
 
I learned from here to count net carbs. I am counting every single one as I’m not 6 months into this WOE yet. Have not had my favorite black beans and quinoa lunch in that whole time.
My brother doesn’t count carbs at all, and enjoys veggies at every meal. I do too, but count them anyway.
 
Hi, @LornaFarrell , the thinking behind it is that as pulses are relatively low on the glycemic index, and tend to break down into glucose quite slowly and steadily, then there's a risk that if you bolus for them as you would for any other carbs, the insulin will be getting to work before the pulses have turned to glucose, so you might drop.

To give an example, I'll occasionally have a slice of quiche at the sandwich shop next to my office, with some feta salad and some mixed beans, I'll bolus for the quiche crust, and maybe just a smidgen more, but not much, for beans depending on the portion size.

That way, I've got the bolus onboard and dealing with the fast crust, and a combination of the tail end of the bolus along with my basal will take care of the beans ok.

If not, and it's looking like the beans are contributing to a rise further down the line, another unit or two will pin that, easy enough to keep an eye on with cgm.

If there's a larger amount of beans, I'll maybe increase the bolus but with a shorter pre-bolus timing so that there is a better chance of matching the slower absorption with the insulin peaking, but a lot depends on the other components of the meal.

I've often found pulses can be very useful for smoothing out lines.
 
JoKalsbeek said:
Personally, I count everything... A carb is a carb.
Click to expand...

I believe the op is T1, so it's more complex than that!

See my post to her, it gives an idea of the additional factors we need to take into consideration when trying to match insulin patterns to food. It's more to do with absorption rates and how those play with the way injected insulin operates over a 3 to 5 hour time frame.
 
The question is what do I do, and I didn't see type specified anywhere, plus I added "personally"... Well, that's what I do. But I'm a T2 who can't count worth *****, so I just go as low as I can while still enjoying the grub. *shrug*

For a T1 it's a whole different, more complex ballgame. I just wing it.
 
Yes I count everything because everything counts. There was a member here that used to count the ground black pepper he used at breakfast, I dont go into such detail.
 

Not having a go at you, Jo, honest!

The way I was reading the OP's post is that she's a recently dx'd T1, about 4 months in if memory serves, and is looking for advice on whether to carb count pulses with a view to whether or not to bolus for them.
 
Yes, I’m T1.

As Scott-C says, it’s all about the GI of different foods, so you don’t need extra insulin for peas and carrots. Which took a lot of getting used to as I’d always counted them but there you go!

Putting insulin doses aside, would you count the extras if you wanted to keep track of how low your low carb diet was? So you might have a meal that had 25g of carbs from potato, and take insulin for that, but be aware that there was another 20g from other veg. If you’re aiming for weight loss then that might be relevant? Or if you don’t have the control you would like.

I realise I’m making it a lot more complicated than it needs to be, just when I hear people on here say that have a certain number of carbs a day I wonder if they usually mean total carbs, net carbs (as defined in Keto recipes) or “DAFNE carbs”. Or something else! ‍

It doesn’t actually matter, just a nice to know sort of thing. Sounds like most people mean total carbs.
 
Scott-C said:
Not having a go at you, Jo, honest!

The way I was reading the OP's post is that she's a recently dx'd T1, about 4 months in if memory serves, and is looking for advice on whether to carb count pulses with a view to whether or not to bolus for them.
Click to expand...
I just work really hard not to put my foot in my mouth again (even if it is a low carb foot), when it comes to T1's, haha. happened a few times too often I did my little carb talk to someone who had absolutely no use for it, and I should've seen it too. But yeah... I believe I'd kick the bucket in no time if I ever had to bolus for anything... I'm hopeless. I'd try, but I wouldn't get very far, I don't think.
 
As a T1 I tend to count most things, however anything that is "good" for you like veg, pulses and chocolate I don't.

Actually, I'll take that back if there isa meal with a high amount of lentils in then I will split dose because usually they take for ever to work into my system.
 
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JoKalsbeek said:
But yeah... I believe I'd kick the bucket in no time if I ever had to bolus for anything... I'm hopeless. I'd try, but I wouldn't get very far, I don't think.
Click to expand...

Lol, Jo, a lot of us T1s just wing it a bit too!

I've lost track of the number of times I've had to make a bolus decision, and there's been no complicated arithmetic, it's been more or less, "meh, 6 or 7u seems about right for that..."
 
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