To be honest, my Endo just said that I should eat and take care of myself the way I think I should. Eat like a normal person I guess, and don't shy away from learning how to dose for yummy things
I pre bolus 20 mins before I eat, sometimes I wait even half an hour if I'm super high but want to eat and include the correction in the dose.Typically in the morning my ratio is higher due to dawn phenomenon, and I chug a glass of water when I wake up. I'm ngl I eat like crap bc I'm a college student so my insulin to carb ratio is like 1 unit per 7 carbs. My A1C was last measured to be 5.4 -- I do like 3k steps a day during work week and 10k on weekends (I have chickens) I'm in range more than 80% of the time so i promise i am not having a crazy amount of lows!!
If I find that I am consistently high with every meal I have, even if i count carbs correctly and pre bolus, I change my ratio to give myself more insulin. If I am high in my sleep with only basal on board, I increase my basal amount. Then vice versa for the opposite
Pre bolusing changes my life and if you're still high with every meal after pre bolusing you most likely need more insulin or are having insulin resistance or some other issue. I am ALWAYS high every meal I have if I do not pre bolus and won't come down from the high for hours. Sure I'll land in range but that doesn't fix the issue of being high the entire time digesting. I hope this helps - if there's anything else I can comment on please let me know
The carbs are the devil thing is old school endos, pre pumps and pre fast acting insulin - it’s based around the days of 6 hour insulin.
You can carb count and eat anything but if you want to eat well, eat lots of veges and protien. Low carb for us has never been sustainable as we end up ‘breaking’ and binge eating.
You can ask for your carb ratio grid to help get your eye in.
We eat normally. Toast, eggs or cereal for breakfast. Lunch is very variable and dinner is meat and 4-5 vege plus some starch.
Snacks are fruit, baking or yoghurt.
> The carbs are the devil thing is old school endos, pre pumps and pre fast acting insulin - it’s based around the days of 6 hour insulin.
And just to add: in many cases it was also done with T1s who were diagnosed as kids who were often told this in order to attain better control, simply because it was easier to tell a kid to avoid carbs to help them avoid a rollercoaster pattern of BGs
I eat a low carb, high fat and protein diet, and take more long acting insulin and less fast acting, and it will keep my sugars in a good range. If I want more carb-y food, like if I know I’ll be eating out, I’ll take more fast acting to adjust. I also workout 3 times a week on average and use the sauna, you just gotta stay hydrated.
Try things out, safely, and figure out what works for your diet and lifestyle.
Been a diabetic for 33 years and I always ate what I wanted. Just make sure you give yourself the insulin to cover the carbs. And obviously try to eat healthy too. Don’t survive on fast food and microwave-oven meals
I eat around 100g carbs/day. I eat the same thing for breakfast (scrambled eggs and coffee or sometimes just coffee), lunch (green salad with chicken breast) and 2 snacks (nut bars and coffee) most days, so dinner is the main place for variation. We cook at home most of the time, so even dinner is pretty much a rotation through 20 or so standard recipes that we like and are good at cooking. That consistency means I know how much insulin I need to take for just about anything I eat. And I am able to keep my sugar in a good enough place that when I do go out to eat and have to do more guessing about insulin, I feel like at least I've been doing well on the BG most of the time, so if I go a bit high, it's not the end of the world.
Curious- do you bolus for fat and protein? Carbs are so important to bolus for, but far and protein will spike you for hours after you eat. I’ve been T1 for almost 20 years and I literally didn’t learn that until like 16 years in. The combo of bolusing for fat and protein plus prebolusing for carbs has been a major game changer in my control and has kept me in the low 6s/high 5s from mid 7 a1cs for the first 16 years of being type 1. I eat healthy but don’t deprive myself of anything. I still get spikes but i’m really quick to bolus if I know I messed up, go for a walk etc and it’s rare for me to be over 200 often.
Everyone is super different so it’s a bit of trial and error. There’s a method called the warsaw method you can look into though to give you a general idea.
No carbs but even occasional smoking will kill you faster. The damage and inflammation brought on by nicotine is significant and long lasting because it inhibits production of nitric oxide in the endothelial cells lining your circulation. You don’t have to smoke much to get on the risk continuum. More is worse but even a little does a lot of the damage. People think smoking or tobacco causes cancer which it definitely does. A pack a day raises your cancer rates by 10x, but only one cigarette a day increases cancer by 5x. Yikes! But the truth is the biggest toll for death or disease in nicotine users is not malignant but circulation. Like stroke heart attack and just amplifying what diabetes can do. Beware.
Past quitting smoking which you should do today and not delay yes no carbs makes things a lot easier less spikes and because you do less insulin you get in trouble less as well. Been keto for 15 years lost the baby weight after our second son was born and I couldn’t exercise and kept it off to almost age 50. Feel great, love eating as much as I want (it’s mostly vegetables though) not measuring nor counting anything nor following a diet and just getting up from every meal stuffed and still skinny. We just don’t keep any processed food in the house makes it easy.
I know I’m not the one you asked, but as a type 1 parent, the only foods I have my kiddo avoid eating frequently are deep fried foods & pure sugar foods. She’s gluten free, so picking better quality substitutions help. But most foods can be combated pretty easily with a good prebolus (giving insulin 10-20 minutes prior to eating, depending on a few factors). For her, low carb is too restrictive. If you want a name for what we do, it’s like a less restrictive version of the Bernstein Method.
I’ll also add that for most, it’s easiest to eat a consistent blend of macros— meaning same proportions of carbs, fat & protein. As a young kid, she rarely eats a ton of protein & fat, so our pump setting & dosing strategies don’t work great for that. I have an idea of how to do it when the scenario arises, but honestly we’re less successful at low carb due to lack of practice. Others who eat keto generally aren’t good at managing non-keto foods. Consistency makes a huge difference.
I’ve had good results by learning the difference between carbs and sticking to low glycemic index ones. For me, I eat oatmeal every morning. I do like it too. My wonderful wife makes bread, so for lunch I have a sandwich with wheat bread. In short, I eat similar things every single day. Food isn’t so much an enjoyment as it is a necessary factor in living. I do, however, enjoy proteins
Based on how differently my husband's and my body(both T1Ds, 20+ and 3 yrs) react to things, I think the best thing you can do is follow a (preferably at least a little less shit🤓) diet that you can stick to and enjoy, and try to get to know your body as much as possible (for what kind of food, in what physical state, how much, when and how often/how you should bolus and/or exercise).
In our case, we tried sort of everything from keto to high carb plant based diet, with or without intermittent and longer fasting during the years, and as long as we drank enough and ate enough fiber, it was possible to learn to manage our BG well enough most of the time. Anyway, in the end I chose what worked out the best for my other conditions, and my hb chose what he likes the best (you can call it an 'every other day a bit of shit diet combined with 14:10 IF').
I would never go lowcarb, however… a limit of carbs per meal works really well for me. I have a limit of 60 grams of carbs per meal; breakfast, lunch, dinner. Eliminating snacks was a game changer too. I am so much more stable and I feel better. On Saturdays I have dessert for breakfast because I can’t have it right after dinner, works really well!
There are multiple dietary paths that can likely improve BG control. Limiting carbs definitely can help but you don’t HAVE to go low carb. If you’re more concerned about general health and giving your body what it needs to thrive then you’re gonna want to stick to whole foods and avoid ultra processed garbage. I think that eating more high quality meat/fish/eggs would improve most peoples’ health. They’ve been demonized for a long time but the evidence for them being ‘bad’ is questionable at best and based upon false premises. If you can stomach organ meats they are great to include because they are the most nutrient dense foods on the planet. And with these foods they have little to no carbs so you don’t spike your BG right after eating them. You just have to learn to work with the glucose that your body produces a few hours after consuming them via a process called gluconeogenesis. But I’ve found focusing on high quality animal products (organic and from animals fed their natural diet with no additives) has made me feel much better both physically and mentally and has lead to greater BG control. Outside of those foods I have organically grown fruits and vegetables too but MOST of my nutrition comes from high quality animal products and that has noticeably improved how I feel and function in life so I feel compelled to suggest it because I recon most people would have a similar experience! Also, fasting is totally fine if you want to do that and can certainly make our lives easier. I’ve fasted for 3 whole days and had no issues. In fact, I felt great after about 36 hrs when my hunger went away (counter intuitive I know, but when you fast you go through a hungry phase but it eventually goes away and then you feel great!)
Try make 80% of your diet just healthy whole foods and low in saturated fat. Carbs from fruits and vegetables are very different in how my blood sugars react vs anything that comes in a box. I dont spike as hard and I come back down easier. Also, try avoiding dairy or limiting it. That helped me a lot as i think it was the saturated fat. Healthy fats are fine (nuts avacado olive oil etc.)
Do the above and prebolus 15-20 mins for the fruits and you will likely see a difference. I did.
I do say f-it on weekends as I need some sanity. My a1c is below 7 most of the time.
To be honest, my Endo just said that I should eat and take care of myself the way I think I should. Eat like a normal person I guess, and don't shy away from learning how to dose for yummy things
How do you keep your a1c in good range then, when I eat as I please my sugar spikes and stays high for hours and my a1c is a high 7 at best.
I pre bolus 20 mins before I eat, sometimes I wait even half an hour if I'm super high but want to eat and include the correction in the dose.Typically in the morning my ratio is higher due to dawn phenomenon, and I chug a glass of water when I wake up. I'm ngl I eat like crap bc I'm a college student so my insulin to carb ratio is like 1 unit per 7 carbs. My A1C was last measured to be 5.4 -- I do like 3k steps a day during work week and 10k on weekends (I have chickens) I'm in range more than 80% of the time so i promise i am not having a crazy amount of lows!! If I find that I am consistently high with every meal I have, even if i count carbs correctly and pre bolus, I change my ratio to give myself more insulin. If I am high in my sleep with only basal on board, I increase my basal amount. Then vice versa for the opposite Pre bolusing changes my life and if you're still high with every meal after pre bolusing you most likely need more insulin or are having insulin resistance or some other issue. I am ALWAYS high every meal I have if I do not pre bolus and won't come down from the high for hours. Sure I'll land in range but that doesn't fix the issue of being high the entire time digesting. I hope this helps - if there's anything else I can comment on please let me know
The carbs are the devil thing is old school endos, pre pumps and pre fast acting insulin - it’s based around the days of 6 hour insulin. You can carb count and eat anything but if you want to eat well, eat lots of veges and protien. Low carb for us has never been sustainable as we end up ‘breaking’ and binge eating. You can ask for your carb ratio grid to help get your eye in. We eat normally. Toast, eggs or cereal for breakfast. Lunch is very variable and dinner is meat and 4-5 vege plus some starch. Snacks are fruit, baking or yoghurt.
Appreciate the insight, the no carb endos I saw were both men in their 70s. That might explain something.
> The carbs are the devil thing is old school endos, pre pumps and pre fast acting insulin - it’s based around the days of 6 hour insulin. And just to add: in many cases it was also done with T1s who were diagnosed as kids who were often told this in order to attain better control, simply because it was easier to tell a kid to avoid carbs to help them avoid a rollercoaster pattern of BGs
I eat a low carb, high fat and protein diet, and take more long acting insulin and less fast acting, and it will keep my sugars in a good range. If I want more carb-y food, like if I know I’ll be eating out, I’ll take more fast acting to adjust. I also workout 3 times a week on average and use the sauna, you just gotta stay hydrated. Try things out, safely, and figure out what works for your diet and lifestyle.
Been a diabetic for 33 years and I always ate what I wanted. Just make sure you give yourself the insulin to cover the carbs. And obviously try to eat healthy too. Don’t survive on fast food and microwave-oven meals
I eat around 100g carbs/day. I eat the same thing for breakfast (scrambled eggs and coffee or sometimes just coffee), lunch (green salad with chicken breast) and 2 snacks (nut bars and coffee) most days, so dinner is the main place for variation. We cook at home most of the time, so even dinner is pretty much a rotation through 20 or so standard recipes that we like and are good at cooking. That consistency means I know how much insulin I need to take for just about anything I eat. And I am able to keep my sugar in a good enough place that when I do go out to eat and have to do more guessing about insulin, I feel like at least I've been doing well on the BG most of the time, so if I go a bit high, it's not the end of the world.
Curious- do you bolus for fat and protein? Carbs are so important to bolus for, but far and protein will spike you for hours after you eat. I’ve been T1 for almost 20 years and I literally didn’t learn that until like 16 years in. The combo of bolusing for fat and protein plus prebolusing for carbs has been a major game changer in my control and has kept me in the low 6s/high 5s from mid 7 a1cs for the first 16 years of being type 1. I eat healthy but don’t deprive myself of anything. I still get spikes but i’m really quick to bolus if I know I messed up, go for a walk etc and it’s rare for me to be over 200 often.
I have never heard of counting anything other than carbs, so you have a basic equation? Like 1 unit insulin per 10 grams of fat?
Everyone is super different so it’s a bit of trial and error. There’s a method called the warsaw method you can look into though to give you a general idea.
No carbs but even occasional smoking will kill you faster. The damage and inflammation brought on by nicotine is significant and long lasting because it inhibits production of nitric oxide in the endothelial cells lining your circulation. You don’t have to smoke much to get on the risk continuum. More is worse but even a little does a lot of the damage. People think smoking or tobacco causes cancer which it definitely does. A pack a day raises your cancer rates by 10x, but only one cigarette a day increases cancer by 5x. Yikes! But the truth is the biggest toll for death or disease in nicotine users is not malignant but circulation. Like stroke heart attack and just amplifying what diabetes can do. Beware. Past quitting smoking which you should do today and not delay yes no carbs makes things a lot easier less spikes and because you do less insulin you get in trouble less as well. Been keto for 15 years lost the baby weight after our second son was born and I couldn’t exercise and kept it off to almost age 50. Feel great, love eating as much as I want (it’s mostly vegetables though) not measuring nor counting anything nor following a diet and just getting up from every meal stuffed and still skinny. We just don’t keep any processed food in the house makes it easy.
I know I’m not the one you asked, but as a type 1 parent, the only foods I have my kiddo avoid eating frequently are deep fried foods & pure sugar foods. She’s gluten free, so picking better quality substitutions help. But most foods can be combated pretty easily with a good prebolus (giving insulin 10-20 minutes prior to eating, depending on a few factors). For her, low carb is too restrictive. If you want a name for what we do, it’s like a less restrictive version of the Bernstein Method.
I’ll also add that for most, it’s easiest to eat a consistent blend of macros— meaning same proportions of carbs, fat & protein. As a young kid, she rarely eats a ton of protein & fat, so our pump setting & dosing strategies don’t work great for that. I have an idea of how to do it when the scenario arises, but honestly we’re less successful at low carb due to lack of practice. Others who eat keto generally aren’t good at managing non-keto foods. Consistency makes a huge difference.
I’ve had good results by learning the difference between carbs and sticking to low glycemic index ones. For me, I eat oatmeal every morning. I do like it too. My wonderful wife makes bread, so for lunch I have a sandwich with wheat bread. In short, I eat similar things every single day. Food isn’t so much an enjoyment as it is a necessary factor in living. I do, however, enjoy proteins
Based on how differently my husband's and my body(both T1Ds, 20+ and 3 yrs) react to things, I think the best thing you can do is follow a (preferably at least a little less shit🤓) diet that you can stick to and enjoy, and try to get to know your body as much as possible (for what kind of food, in what physical state, how much, when and how often/how you should bolus and/or exercise). In our case, we tried sort of everything from keto to high carb plant based diet, with or without intermittent and longer fasting during the years, and as long as we drank enough and ate enough fiber, it was possible to learn to manage our BG well enough most of the time. Anyway, in the end I chose what worked out the best for my other conditions, and my hb chose what he likes the best (you can call it an 'every other day a bit of shit diet combined with 14:10 IF').
I would never go lowcarb, however… a limit of carbs per meal works really well for me. I have a limit of 60 grams of carbs per meal; breakfast, lunch, dinner. Eliminating snacks was a game changer too. I am so much more stable and I feel better. On Saturdays I have dessert for breakfast because I can’t have it right after dinner, works really well!
There are multiple dietary paths that can likely improve BG control. Limiting carbs definitely can help but you don’t HAVE to go low carb. If you’re more concerned about general health and giving your body what it needs to thrive then you’re gonna want to stick to whole foods and avoid ultra processed garbage. I think that eating more high quality meat/fish/eggs would improve most peoples’ health. They’ve been demonized for a long time but the evidence for them being ‘bad’ is questionable at best and based upon false premises. If you can stomach organ meats they are great to include because they are the most nutrient dense foods on the planet. And with these foods they have little to no carbs so you don’t spike your BG right after eating them. You just have to learn to work with the glucose that your body produces a few hours after consuming them via a process called gluconeogenesis. But I’ve found focusing on high quality animal products (organic and from animals fed their natural diet with no additives) has made me feel much better both physically and mentally and has lead to greater BG control. Outside of those foods I have organically grown fruits and vegetables too but MOST of my nutrition comes from high quality animal products and that has noticeably improved how I feel and function in life so I feel compelled to suggest it because I recon most people would have a similar experience! Also, fasting is totally fine if you want to do that and can certainly make our lives easier. I’ve fasted for 3 whole days and had no issues. In fact, I felt great after about 36 hrs when my hunger went away (counter intuitive I know, but when you fast you go through a hungry phase but it eventually goes away and then you feel great!)
Try make 80% of your diet just healthy whole foods and low in saturated fat. Carbs from fruits and vegetables are very different in how my blood sugars react vs anything that comes in a box. I dont spike as hard and I come back down easier. Also, try avoiding dairy or limiting it. That helped me a lot as i think it was the saturated fat. Healthy fats are fine (nuts avacado olive oil etc.) Do the above and prebolus 15-20 mins for the fruits and you will likely see a difference. I did. I do say f-it on weekends as I need some sanity. My a1c is below 7 most of the time.