Diabetes Diet Help

ottoluv

minimom

kpwlee

From our experience - do not start the drug - get exercising, lose weight and change diet.  If that doesn't work then down the road you can look at drugs.  The numbers aren't terribly high.

Thanks!  That really was my gut instinct as well. 

 

 

 

Sorry, but this is BAD advice.  IMPO, He should start the drug and get the sugars under control IMMEDIATELY.  Diet modification and exercise are not something that works overnite and pretty much NEVER is able to adequately control diabetes.  If your husband is able/willing to loose weight and start an exercise program, he can go down on the medications as his sugars become better controlled.  Prolonged elevations of sugar will kill you by causing irreversable damage to many organ systems (heart, kidneys, etc.).  The treatment of both diabetes and hypertension have changed over the last 10 years and although we used to advocate trying diet and exercise first, it has been shown that these modifications are almost never successful and you do your patients harm by allowing them to persist with high sugars/blood pressure when you can be controlling it.  Please follow the advice of your doctor and not people on the internet.   I think it is a great idea as stated above to see a diabetes educator/nutritionist.  They are very experienced on diet modification.  My dad has type II, he had a Hgb A1c of 17% at diagnosis.  He was started immediately on medications and over about three months was weaned off almost all his medications.  Now he is well controlled on only one agent at a small dose.  I actually manage patients simmilarly to his endocrinologist.  

Please follow Kelly’s advice and start the meds.  You can always decrease of go off the meds if the diet and weight loss help enough… but it is  wise to get the sugars under control and get him regulated first.  My mother has been a Type 1 diabetic for over 50 years now AND worked for many years as a diabetic educator and she would be the first to tell you that you need to follow Kelly’s advice…. Don’t mess with this.. take this very serious and if it was serious enough to put him on drugs in the first place, please follow through with it.   

good luck!

Not all the advise given has been to not start the meds......and she DID say that DH is going to call the doctor before he doesn't start the meds right away.

Right now, immediately post diagnosis is a pretty frustrating time.  All the research  is pretty darned confusing and frightening coming right on the heels of "being told".  And even more frustrating is having to wait to see the nutritionalist.  They've just found out that something pretty serious is "broken" and not having the tools NOW to fix it is very frustrating.  And reading about the high carb foods that are also high fiber so maybe don't count as much as a "normal" carb, and trying to make a food plan, and trying to figure out what to buy and how to acclimate a person who won't touch whole grains to actually eat and ENJOY said food plan....well, that's tough.

I think that everyone, with any condition, needs to remember that a pill alone isn't going to fix anything.  There has to be some behavior mod going on to optimize the results of any medication......eating plan, exercise, etc.   The folks I know who are type II truly didn't have to really try to loose weight.  Once they were eating properly for their bodies needs, the pounds just started to melt away.  Hopefully this will be the case for the OP's DH.

I absolutely do agree with Kelly that starting the meds is crucial, but I had already said that.  Right now, more than anything, our OP needs some moral support.

glenmar

Not all the advise given has been to not start the meds......and she DID say that DH is going to call the doctor before he doesn't start the meds right away.

Right now, immediately post diagnosis is a pretty frustrating time.  All the research  is pretty darned confusing and frightening coming right on the heels of "being told".  And even more frustrating is having to wait to see the nutritionalist.  They've just found out that something pretty serious is "broken" and not having the tools NOW to fix it is very frustrating.  And reading about the high carb foods that are also high fiber so maybe don't count as much as a "normal" carb, and trying to make a food plan, and trying to figure out what to buy and how to acclimate a person who won't touch whole grains to actually eat and ENJOY said food plan....well, that's tough.

I think that everyone, with any condition, needs to remember that a pill alone isn't going to fix anything.  There has to be some behavior mod going on to optimize the results of any medication......eating plan, exercise, etc.   The folks I know who are type II truly didn't have to really try to loose weight.  Once they were eating properly for their bodies needs, the pounds just started to melt away.  Hopefully this will be the case for the OP's DH.

I absolutely do agree with Kelly that starting the meds is crucial, but I had already said that.  Right now, more than anything, our OP needs some moral support.

 

My apologies if I some how came off as not being supportive on this thread?? and TBH, I was in a rush yesterday when I saw it and have had very little forum time lately so I did not read every single post in here.  I saw the last one and wanted to assure that the OP understood the importance of staying with the meds, while doing modification of diet, etc.

For the op, please know that you do indeed have my moral support if that didn’t come across in my previous post.  I have not only lived with a mother with Type I Diabetes my whole life, but have had 3 family member get Type II, so I understand what it is like.

Again,

Good Luck. .   

My husband is also a Type II diabetic.  It's very difficult to get him to eat the right things.  I buy him lots of things like nuts, beef jerky and high fiber foods are good too. He eats a lot of meat with veggies.  But, cereal is tough, he loves cereal!   We try to stay away from those snacks with "no sugar" because they contain sugar alcohol which can give you cramping and diarrhea if you have too much of it or if you are sensitive to it. 

 We went to a nutritionist too.  It was very frustrating for him.  The portions are so small.  But, they will show him what he can have and how much.  Where we went they had pretend food portions to show visually what the amounts should look like. 

Walking helps a lot too--even though it's very hard to get him moving.  And, Weight Watchers now has a low carb diet that would probably be good for him too.  They don't limit your portions on this version-you can eat as much as you want as long as it's on their approved list--you eat until you are full.  And, you are allowed so many carbs per day/week. 

I will find out the brand for you tomorrow.  One of the girls I work with gets frozen low carb meatballs all the time and they smell sooooo good.  My husband gets those low carb wraps and puts his sandwich stuff on them.