Why isn’t it working yet?

[Lilysun]

My lovely (now no longer with us) American aunt used to growl to herself "What do you want another bite for - tastes just the same as the first!"

She was very petite, and stayed that way with an iron will.

@Lilysun , yes, be kind to yourself in all this, I would say. You are doing all the right things now to turn your situation around.

I feel for you regarding the garlic bread and the cake. With an HBA1c at 97 - yeah - I don't know how motivation works for you. But I would use that very high blood glucose as incentive to not take those bites! Could your husband not overly tempt you by not bringing the cake home? It's not that it's criminal - just that with an overloaded, hugely overloaded glucose and insulin system - such food is toxic to you. Well, that's one way to look at it at any rate. (That's how I look at it.)

And I agree with those above - it can take a while for the low-carbing to really kick in, and all of our metabolisms are different. The same goes for any anti-diabetic medications - they can actually work on different folks in different ways, is my understanding, even if the basic chemical situation is the same, our bodies levels of ill-health aren't. With metformin they say to wait three weeks to three months to see how it is going to work for you, and what, if any, side effects you are going to have. But nothing beats 'diet and exericse' for really getting to the underlying cause of type two, emphasis on diet.

It took me five months of hard slog and newly to meds to get from low 60s hba1c to mid to high 40s (this is not my first time) - a longer time to bring blood glucose (and the insulin of course) down for insulin-resistance based type two can be how it is for you. Be patient with yourself and your blood glucose regulation system while you find out how your type two plays out? Is what I would recommend.

Thanks - you’re right about using my high BG numbers as motivation. I’ve told my husband that for the foreseeable he has to see me as allergic to carby and sugary food. And actually treat it like a real life threatening allergy because essentially to my system as it is right now, that’s exactly what it is. I find myself wondering wistfully if ever a day will come where I can tolerate things like garlic bread better. But for now my challenge is staying consistent with the changes I’ve already made.

 

[AloeSvea]

Thanks - you’re right about using my high BG numbers as motivation. I’ve told my husband that for the foreseeable he has to see me as allergic to carby and sugary food. And actually treat it like a real life threatening allergy because essentially to my system as it is right now, that’s exactly what it is. I find myself wondering wistfully if ever a day will come where I can tolerate things like garlic bread better. But for now my challenge is staying consistent with the changes I’ve already made.

That's the spirit Lilysun. The allergy/threatening model of excess-carb food seems like a really good idea.

It is likely to be a forever kind of thing - as your body is telling you now that it can't deal with excess glucose and therefore insulin without going into shut down and spill over mode. But - you never know! Some folks are able to go back to eating what for me would be excess carbs. It seems to be rare though, although you can do a search and find their stories on this forum. My guess it is folks that have a higher capacity to fill fat cells on safer parts of the body, and the sick fat cells get replaced rather quickly to being healthy ones. This would mean the insulin resistance is relatively short-lived, as was the amount of sick fat cells. Anyway.

With bread - it is more likely than not that ordinary ol wheat bread will always be too high in carbs for you to eat with gusto. But yeah - if it is sitting in front of you - toooo hard, sooooo hard to not at least have a nibble. (As I said - the difficulty for me with that kind of thing is making sure it is just a nibble!)

A really good way to look at your garlic loving future is think of low-carb bread/tortillas/nan bread substitutes and slather them in garlicky butter. There are far more store bought low-carb bread options now too - you don't even need to bake them yourself. Light at the end of the carb-intolerant tunnel - lying in substitutes if necesary.

 

[ajbod]

I think the simple way to look at it is.
As a type 2 diabetics when sugar levels are high, Insulin levels ARE high.
When Insulin levels are high, your body CANNOT burn it's own fat supply.
If your body CANNOT burn its fat, you CANNOT lose weight.
So is that treat etc REALLY WORTH stopping your fat burning for as much as 3 days, when you'll probably have another treat. Ergo you cannot lose weight.
It's all about keeping the Insulin levels as low as possible, via keeping the sugar levels as low as possible.
A simplistic way of looking at the problem perhaps, but it pretty much covers all the bases.