Welcome to our newest diabetes educator, Lucia Feito Allonca! Lucy is a lawyer in Health Law, Bioethics & Patient Rights, and is holds a Diabetes Educator Certificate through IDF. She’s also lived with type 1 diabetes for more than 30 years. Lucy is providing type 1 diabetes education for optimal blood sugar management in Spanish.
For each of the next 6 weeks, we'll feature an interview with a person with Type 1 Diabetes who follows Dr. Bernstein's plan for low carb eating and diabetes management. We're asking their diabetic history, their thoughts/feelings about eating low carb, and what changes they've seen in their lives since switching how they eat.
This is not just about low carb eating. Diabetes management includes insulin dosage and timing, along with a whole group of other factors. Here we discuss a few of Dr. Bernstein's recommendations for insulin therapy, and how these can be translated to use with rapid-acting insulin.
Is being a control freak really a bad thing? What if I say that i don't really "control" my Type 1 Diabetes, but because of my controlled diet and corresponding small amounts of insulin, T1 Diabetes is somewhat self-regulating? Absolutely impossible? Read more....
For weeks, I suffered from varying degrees of dizziness, body weakness, headache and confusion. I had trouble finding the right words and concentrating on my writing. I felt absolutely helpless.
Of course I was thinking my problems were really serious. I was convinced I had a brain tumor or degenerative neurological issue. SOMETHING had to explain the symptoms I'd been experiencing.
What I eat on a daily basis has been documented both the diaVerge Facebook page, here in the food gallery, and within the post What I Eat- A Typical Day. Until now though, I've never published the exact metrics of my daily food consumption, or a week's average.
For the past 7 days, I weighed and tracked everything I ate.
diaVerge has been featured in Diabetes Daily! First with my story and again yesterday with an article I wrote specifically for the Diabetes Daily audience. You will see us writing for other resources in the future, all in an effort to spread the word about the practical, every day implementation of the low carb way of eating for diabetes management, Click here to see links to the articles and let us know your experiences with low carb
We all encounter times when we have no low-carb support: your workplace, a relative's house, a restaurant.... even in your own home. Everywhere we go, we're faced with other people's eating habits. This time of year is particularly bad. Between Halloween and New Year, it's a constant barrage of high-carb foods and the common practice of Celebration = Treats.
The Whole30 re-set program, based on Paleo principles, helped me tremendously in understanding that grains have a negative affect on my body. While I didn't achieve the blood glucose stability following the Whole30 as I do with Dr. Bernstein's low-carb program, reading the book It Starts With Food, and following two months of Whole30 protocol before starting low-carb were invaluable experience for me.
Why should I focus my energy on the negatives of this world when there are so many INCREDIBLE things? Why do I want such a heavy, negative thoughts to drag me down?
The whole spirit behind this site is to maintain a positive voice, and focus what we can do to help ourselves.
The song "Verge" by singer/songwriter Owl City is a perfect example illustrating how I feel making the decision to eat low carb. This is not some small choice. This is a commitment to take control of your life back from Diabetes. "We're on the verge of the rest of our lives tonight." Watch the video, read the lyrics here and let me know what you think. Do you agree?
Eating a low carbohydrate diet can get expensive. Here are 15 tips to help you make the most of your food budget every month. Some of the tips are common sense, while others are based on traditional food prep and storage techniques that our grandparents may have used.
For several years (during both of my pregnancies and the time in between) I maintained A1c levels of 5.8% to 6.3% (this falls within the ADA's recommendations of "Tight Control") and my doctors were thrilled. BUT these levels were due to dramatic daily highs and lows, which lead to a lot of danger, uncertainty and stress. I often had no idea what was causing high blood glucose levels and would blame my pump, or my calculations, or myself.
I ask my girls to use their words frequently. They might be having trouble expressing their emotions, or telling a story, or trying to figure out what to say to friends in certain situations. Together, we talk about how to talk about things.
Then about a week ago, I read this beautiful post from Momastery.com about how to help your kids choose the right words to avoid peer pressure. Because, as she writes, when we're put on the spot, we panic.
This applies to our low-carb lifestyle, too. As people who eat very differently from the general population, we face pressure every day and need to have responses ready those times we feel pressure.
Eating nuts can be a challenge for many people because it's so easy to overeat. I struggle with this on a regular basis, as written in the previous post, Perfection is A Myth.
We justify it by saying, "I'm just going to grab a handful," but then we don't stop at just one. Well, what actually is a handful of nuts? How much does it weigh? How many carbs and how should we better control this seemingly uncontrollable habit?
If your single goal is perfection, you're going to stumble, not live up to your own expectations and/or drive yourself crazy trying. This is nowhere more apparent than with Type 1 Diabetes.
I do my best every day, I read as much as possible, I write, I post. Diabetes is on my mind 24/7 but I'm not perfect.
Lows are to be respected, not feared.
A great benefit of low-carb eating is that a diabetic will no longer experience crashing lows like they did when they were eating large amounts of carbohydrates and using large amounts of insulin. When eating low-carb, lows tend to be very gradual, and since you are following the Law of Small Numbers, your body only requires a very small correction to get to the ideal blood glucose level of 83 mg/dL.
The primary Diabetes management concept Dr. Bernstein recommends to achieve normal blood glucose numbers is "The Law of Small Numbers." Dr. B explains it like this:
"Big inputs make big mistakes; small inputs make small mistakes.” Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution (p. 108)
So, what does this mean for your everyday eating plan and blood glucose control? What should you do?
Before the introduction of food science/food technology, before the development of 90% of the grocery items we have available today, we had food. Real food. There were whole foods that you had to prepare and cook at home.
There were few restaurants and fewer packaged goods, so everyone cooked: with meat, butter, lard, full-fat cream, and a ton of fresh vegetables, many grown at home.
With consistent commitment to better health, you WILL see results. The very first day eating low-carb, your insulin needs will decrease. As you refine your insulin needs (for a Type 1 Diabetic requiring insulin) and your food, you will see improved blood glucose numbers. You will no longer have to fear surprise high or low blood glucose levels.
Here are 10 tips that will help you achieve long-term success with the low-carb way of eating:
The path to self discovery and self improvement is often difficult and paved with boulders. We must persevere. We must keep going. There is help along the way, so don't give up. Your struggles are not unique. Help is nearby and is on the same path. They will catch you when you stumble and buoy you up when you need. They are your tribe....
