Thursday, July 14
Is It Just Me??
It seems as though there are thousands of different opinions on how to deal with Diabetes, especially when it comes to eating or more specifically, what not to eat. There are so many websites with so many different reccomendations. I have never been one of those people who does something just because someone says so. I think it comes from my mother saying to me when I was young, in response to, 'But mom, EVERYONE else is doing it!' and she would say 'Well, if everyone else were jumping off a bridge does that mean you would to???' The same has been true with Diabetes. The doctor told me: 'No sugar, low fat, exercise, no fast food, no white flour'. I think we also have to take into consideration that I live in a country where I am not 100 percent fluent in the language and my doctor happens to be a Vietnamese gentleman speaking a mixture of heavily accented English and Norwegian. Gives a new meaning to 'lost in translation'. (The care is good, I just chose not to go the 'So, you've got Diabetes' course at the hospital because it was in Norwegian. Also, my doctor recommended taking the summer to adjust my diet, lose 10 to 15 pounds and monitor my blood glucose and come September we would decide if any medication needs to be added) So, I have depended less on the doctors here and more on information I gather on the internet. And I must say, the contradictions are shocking. Especially when it comes to diet recommendations. I am still in Diabetic Kindergarten, but I have a sneaking suspicion that just like DNA, Diabetes is individual. I want to know how individual foods affect MY blood. I don't want to read about how the 'experts' say those foods will affect it. I hope I don't sound cavalier about this, but for me, it is important that I understand MY disease. And for me, understanding comes through experimentation. I KNOW I am not supposed to have that pizza, but I want to see how it affects my glucose. I test before I eat it and then again 2 hours later. Ok. Crazy high glucose levels. Now I know. Now I can start developing new pizza recipes with a spelt crust and lower fat cheese and chicken. But at least I know! Does that make sense??? It's not like I do this EVERY night. I largely maintain a 'healthy diabetic' diet. I could just be naive, but I don't think experimenting like this will cause me to go blind or have a stroke or have fingers or toes chopped off. (Granted, I think, from what I have read, Type 2 diabetics have more lee way here.) So, those are my thoughts for today. All set off by one website where they SWEAR you should have margarine rather than butter after I just read a different website a week ago where they SWEAR you should have butter instead of margarine. Oi Vey.
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3 comments:
Hi, I'm 29 and I was diagnosed with type 2 in March and my husband is a type 1 (diagnosed 19 years ago). I had pre-diabetic levels for four years before the diagnosis (which was based mostly on a OGTT just like you). I'm managing it with diet and exercise for now - just had my follow-up appt and things are looking good.
Divide it into three philosophies. You can take the ADA approach--eat a carfeully limited but fairly high carb diet to prevent heart disease and take more medicine and aim for an A1c under 7. You can take the low-carb tight control approach (see http://www.geocities.com/lottadata4u/index.htm ) and achieve an A1c under 5.5 by diet and exercise (test both 1 hour and 2 hours after meals and adjust what you eat until you are under 140 at 1 hour and under 120 at 2 hours). Or you can take medicine and not otherwise change your life, as many people do.
I love the idea of "my body, my science experiment" so the low-carb tight control approach works for me. My doctor was a little dubious but can't argue with the results.
Where have you gone? I have an excuse for my absence, I was moving from Salt Lake to Mesa and didn't have access to the internet for a week.
I hope you're okay.
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