Repeat of a good Lanie tip on lowering carbs

From a may 2017 post:

"Lanie, I don't learn from reading. I've heard that some people learn from their eyes, some people learn through their ears.

I learn through my ears, but not sitting in a classroom. I learn from one on one, where I can ask questions. I might also learn through my senses, where I sense the person is not only knowledgeable but also compassionate.

I also have a learning disability.

I also learn from brevity. Don't tell me the history of the world. Tell me specifically what I need to do. Today I came across your tip of May '17 which I had printed out and is in my kitchen. It says:

"We need to have a food plan and also do some sort of exercise on a regular basis. Food with carbohydrates will raise our blood sugar. The more bread, potatoes, rice, food made with flour and sugar that we eat, the higher our blood sugar will go. You will know this because if you test your blood sugar right before you eat and then about two hours after you finish, you will see how your blood sugar rises when you eat any of that food.

"What can you eat? Meat, chicken, fish, vegetables (but not potatoes or corn), lettuce and other leafy greens, peanut butter, eggs, milk products with no sugar added, cheese, nuts. Corn is a grain and has a lot of carbs.

"A good meal could be a piece of chicken, some sauteed bell peppers with some slices of onions, a small salad. Other dinners could be a different piece of protein and different vegetables like mushrooms, eggplant, zucchini squash, small portion of green beans. Instead of a salad, have a little plate of salad type food you can pick from like pieces of: celery, radishes, a slice of tomato, a small cucumber, a piece of cheddar.

"Chicken salad or tuna salad wrapped in a couple of lettuce leaves can be lunch.

(Let me, Tim Tam, add here on 8-20-2019, a low carb breakfast might be: an egg [but high in cholesterol, 70% of what you'll need all day) so one egg every other day might be a good suggestion], meat, a tomato and/or lettuce for vitamins, and a "wrap" [5 mg. of carbs instead of bread, c. 25 mg. of carbs]. Wraps are found in bread department, round and slim like pizza pie, make sure it's low carbs {5 mg.})

"When I eat out, I've asked for a substitute for the potatoes that come with the meal and the servers are happy to do that. Nowadays, there are a lot of people who eat low-carb so they are used to people not eating bread or potatoes.

"If I order a hamburger, I tell them to put it on the plate with everything but no bun.

"Two hours after a meal, a non-diabetics reading of 120 is a good goal," she said.

"Hi Tim Tam. You can eat more than that for lunch. You could eat two tuna salad (or chicken salad) lettuce wraps and some pieces/slices of cheese that you like and maybe some peanut butter smeared on some celery pieces. When I buy celery, I clean up the stalks and cut them into eatable lengths and store them in a plastic bag in the fridge so I can just take them out when I need them. Celery lasts pretty well that way. Add some low-salt or non-salted nuts to nibble on along with your lunch. That will help you stay full. And - you can also have a snack or two about 3 or 4 hours after lunch to keep you until dinner. The whole point of this is to control the blood sugar with your food choice while eating fresh and nutritious food."

(The "wraps" Lanie mentioned are found in the bread department, are round like pizza, and have about 5 units of carbs [check back of package], can wrap around food like bread, but without the higher carbs. I put mayo on wrap to give it more moisture.)

----Lanie, wanted others to be reminded of your wisdom and good works. 8-18-2019.

Post Edited (Tim Tam) : 8/21/2019 10:49:08 AM (GMT-6)

Good evening Tim Tam and Ms Ouchie! And thank you for your kind words! Sometimes words can be a matter of life or death, or a healthier life rather than an unhealthier one. I'm just a diabetic who learned something simple the hard way, so passing it on to people here is my goal.

Tim Tam, you wrote about how you learn and that's a good point. I've always been a visual learner. I like to see things in front of me. Maybe that's why I'm also a list-maker. Of course here it's only by written words, not pictures, that we can talk but how we use the words can make a big difference. For example, some people just prefer a list of what they can eat, 1., 2., 3., etc. Others don't need that and do fine with NO CARBS. Period. Others ask, "What's a carb?"

And of course I am not a doctor so make sure you run what I suggest by your doctor to see what he/she says. However, no, we do not need the carbs from bread and potatoes for energy. There are carbs in broccoli, cauliflower, all veggies, nuts, seeds, beans, yogurt, cheese and of course all fruit.

If you're going to run a race or participate in sports then obviously you should eat differently while you monitor your blood sugar. The demand for energy is different than your every day life in those cases.

I hope you all have a good week and not too hot!

You're absolutely correct! I don't know if you had read one of my posts about my visit to a nutritionist several years ago referred by my doctor. She brought out a booklet Diabetes Management for Type 1 and Type 2. Food servings state 45 to 60 grams of carbs per meal or 200 grams a day. For men it's 60 to 75 gr per meal or 300 grams a day. When she went over this with me, I looked at her and said if I ate like this my blood sugar would be sky high! I'm only only 1,000 mg of metformin a day (500 morning, 500 evening). I went on to tell her how I ate. We made an app't for me to come back the following week and she wasn't in her office. (Her office is in a hospital.) I sent her an email and she never responded. She was clueless about blood sugar and what high levels can do to the body over time.

Good for you for speaking up! Too often patients are afraid to ask questions to find out why doctors make certain decisions or even to find out more information about what they're being treated for.

I'm thankful to be living today with all our sources of information - although we have to be careful and filter through the junk.

Hope your summer hasn't been too hot!

On her 8-22-2019 post, msOuchie said:

" Even before Insulin was discovered, the Doctors knew that high calorie diets would kill Diabetics in short term. That smart idea seems to have gotten lost along the way."

I'm trying to watch carbs, sugar, salt, and now msOuchie is saying I've got to watch calories.

Whoa! The mind boggles. I'm having a difficult time keeping up with all of this. I eat peanuts to avoid carbs and sugar, but that throws me into calories if I eat too many.

One of my problems is, I take medicine for bipolar and high blood pressure, and some of those medicines increase my appetite and weight. So in a way I'm fighting a difficult battle. I'm thinking some of those medicines make me starve, so that if I cut back on calories, I feel so shaky I can't do anything.

To reduce carbs, I've recently decided to quit eating oat cereal for a snack, and switch to Rice Crispies, which has little or no carbs, although rice has carbs but no wheat to which I have a slight allergy. So, it;s like maybe cancel that order of Rice Crispies.

Oh No....sorry Tim Tam!!

I meant back then Doctors and people counted calories. Although, I believe the UK did carb counting which eventually many other countries caught on to.

When I was age 8 at Camp Banting here, we were taught to count calories. It was in 2005 or 6, that a lad came onto another site that I was on. He explained about carb counting. Slowly but surely most of us started using that type of dieting instead of the calory program. We found it much easier to understand and do.

So again Tim Tam, I,m sorry for the confusion. We do either the calory or carb program. Not both at the same time.

You seem to be doing just fine with the carb counting. Way to go! Take Care!

Post Edited (msOuchie) : 8/22/2019 11:39:59 PM (GMT-6)

Life is difficult enough as is, then add diseases to it, That makes life doubly difficult, scary and sometimes unpredictable. As the saying goes, “Fix what we can, one step at a time”.

All we can do is our Best Tim Tam. Often, we need to relax cuz the stress is too much and that’s okay. If people expect perfection, then they should try our life for a month and see how well they do. They would be surprised at how complicated our lives are. Sometimes it is hard to be positive also. I still keep smiling when it’s my turn up to bat and just hope that I succeed most of the time.

All the best to you especially when it’s test time. Enjoy your day!

Post Edited (msOuchie) : 8/24/2019 10:32:28 PM (GMT-6)

msOuchie said:

"Sometimes it is hard to be positive also. I still keep smiling when it’s my turn up to bat and just hope that I succeed most of the time."

As far as positive, I used to be unconsciously negative, until I read an item which told about the importance of being positive going into a problem that you can solve it. I didn't realize it, but unconsciously I was negative going into a problem, and looking for ways to lose, to match my attitude.

When before even looking into the problem, I had a positive attitude that I could solve the problem, my mind then started looking for ways to solve it, and I often did with the new attitude.

I have made some horrendous blunders because of my negative attitude, which I realized later, I could have solved those problems with a positive attitude going into the problem. I don't know how I made it this far with a negative attitude for so long.

The "Diabetic Resources" of this forum, at the top of the list of posters, discusses this also and I would recommend it.

Lanie: I'm not saying, just be positive going into a problem that you can solve it and don't do anything to solve the problem. I'm saying it helped me tremendously to have a positive attitude going into a problem ("Think positive, think positive, think positive") that you can solve it because it got my brain looking for positive ways that I could solve it.

When I was unknowingly negative going into a problem, because that's how I was raised or because of my bipolar or both, I was unknowingly looking for ways to fail, to make my thinking (negative) the correct way to think.

I hurt some people because of that, I couldn't get them or me out of trouble, and it was crushing.

You saying be a "realist." But prior to being a realist, from reading, I first now tell myself, "be positive" before I start trying to solve the problem to erase any hidden negative. Otherwise, as a negative person, which I can't see for it's in my unconscious, I will have programmed my mind for ways to lose and it will.

That's why I was able to take your suggestions to lower carbs and b/s numbers with an attitude that I could do that, but only by having a positive attitude first in you and your suggestions and in myself that I could do that.

Which is what the "Diabetic Resources" at the top of the list of posters suggests. It wants you to know that in addition to other approaches to helping with medical conditions, you need the right frame of mind, or CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy).

Hellow Zichm and welcome. I have read through that website and sorry to say they follow what the ADA suggests and that is to eat grains. We don't need to eat grains to be healthy or for complete nutrition. If we eat a variety of different vegetables and greens, we will get all the nutrition we need when we eat them with protein and maybe some dairy.