Last week I talked about my recent Type II diabetes diagnosis. One thing I didn’t dwell on was just what a huge change in lifestyle it required. In the space of an hour-long doctor’s appointment, I went from eating the same way I had been for my entire life to an almost entirely different way.
That morning, I could have a bagel. A bowl of cereal. A blueberry muffin.
You know… civilized food.
Later that morning, all of that was on the Forbidden List.
Bagels especially. I think that one hurt the most.
I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye.
When you have a A1C that’s over 14, you need to make a sudden and radical change because you’re already in pretty grave danger of organ damage. And my then-diet wasn’t doing me any other favors. (My organs are fine. We caught it just in the nick of time.)
What prompted the doctor’s visit, to begin with, was a frequent case of fatigue. Hey, high blood sugar does that. It explains why after eating a big ol’ bowl of ramen I promptly slept for several hours.
That’s no way to live.
So in the space of an hour, all sorts of carbohydrates were off the Approved List. No rice. No pasta. No grains. No potatoes. No corn. Obviously no sugar.
That was a huge change for me. This meant most of the Chinese and Indian foods I enjoyed was forbidden. No potato chips. No broiled potatoes. No boiled potatoes. No cake. No candy. No linguini with clam sauce. Okay, the clam sauce is okay, but without the linguini, why bother?
What was left?
Well, there was some good news. Meat was still okay, as was cheese. I could have green vegetables and many nuts as my black heart desired. While I’m not a big fan of greens, I’ve been choking down a little more salad when the need arises.
Essentially, I’m on a version of the keto diet now. Low carbs, high fat. Replace the energy once produced by carbs with energy produced by fats. This method has allowed many people to lower their A1C fairly quickly, and even lose significant weight.
I don’t know how much weight loss I’ve had. People react to insulin and metformin different ways, but I don’t think I’m gaining weight. And as I mentioned last week, my energy levels are improved. It helps that I’ve added a multivitamin.
After three months of this, my estimated A1C is now 5.8.
Not bad. Heck, it’s just about normal. All that work resisting temptation has been paying off.
Was it a hard change to make? The diet, that is.
Surprisingly, it hasn’t been as hard as I thought it would be. Having my meats and cheeses has kept me sane. I think it’s a worthy topic for getting into more detail with, so I’m going to save the actual challenges faced for another blog post.
Now… all of this said… I’m off to my three-month follow up. It’s in less than an hour, in fact.
How will it go?
I’ll let you know.
Cheers!
–John
