Diabetic Diet & Blood Gluecose

besides taking too much insulin can this happen naturally? it never happend to me before but my uncle who is type 2,without insulin,had to go to the ER for severe hypoglycemia.

So i’m little confused since diabetes is "usually" high blood sugar.. correct me if i’m wrong please!

You are absolutely correct, my friend, diabetes mellitus IS about high blood glucose (sugar) levels.

Insulin is NOT the only way that a diabetic patient might experience hypoglycaemia [hypoglycemia, if you prefer the American spelling]. Certain anti-diabetes drugs (tablets) can also cause blood glucose levels to fall to the point that hypoglycaemia is experienced, as can missing meals (or being late with them), and harder than ‘normal’ amounts of exercise/work.

Does your uncle not get ‘warning signs’ when his blood glucose level is falling? (Some of these warning signs could include feeling nauseous, a jittery or nervous feeling, a rapid heartbeat, mood changes, blurred vision, and difficulty walking. Severe hypoglycemia can lead to loss of consciousness, seizures, coma, and may be fatal. He may experience some, but not all, or none of these symptoms.)

If your uncle does NOT experience any of the symptoms mentioned, it MAY be that he has become hypoglycaemia unaware. That’s something worth mentioning to his doctor though, often, there’s very little that can be done about that situation. It would mean that your uncle may need to test his Blood Glucose levels more frequently.

Whatever the outcome, I do hope that your uncle makes a speedy recovery.

Be well.

All vets in the area are closed until monday. My older dog became very lethargic tonight and has been drinking/urinating excessively. After she vomited a few times tonight, I decided to take her blood glucose and found it is alarmingly high. Is there anything I can do to help her before Monday? I’ve read mixed reports on using cinnamon to bring it down… any experience with this? Thanks everyone

Very often, dry grain based foods are to blame for diabetes in dogs and cats.

If her blood sugar is very high, she still needs to see a vet now. She also needs a completely different diet because what she is eating now is NOT working.

Carbohydrates work just like sugar to a dog or cats system. Just like in humans, there’s only so many times you can spike your blood sugar with too much sugar before eventually the system that regulates blood sugar in your body just breaks. Obviously, that’s oversimplifying, but, that’s the basics of what happens. Now that it has happened, there will always be a need to monitor and manage her blood sugar.

What you want is a canned dog food only, NOT dry. It would be best for it to be grain free, though even good canned foods usually have some potato. BUT, the first ingredients should ALL be meat.

Merricks makes some good canned foods, so does Blue Buffalo. They are both available at stores like Petsmart and Petco.

Once you change her food, it will change how much insulin she needs! It is very important to keep testing and working with your vet to modify her dose. Otherwise, you risk her going hypoglycemic which is also very dangerous!

No treats at all for her either, most of those have tons of sugar and carbs in them.

But, I would call the vets, many of them have a 24 hour answering service that will call them for an emergency and high Blood Glucose is an emergency.

My blood sugars have been so bad for a while now that my doctor recommended the continuous Blood Glucose monitor. It’s the Minimed version I believe.

So what are the pros and cons of this? I will be trying it out eventually obviously but won’t be getting it for about another month now. What do you think of it?

Thanks!

Pros-It will help keep track of your numbers more often but you still need to check your sugar 4x a day so the sensor is calibrated correctly. It alerts you when your blood sugars are going out of range.

Cons-Its really expensive, especially if insurance won’t cover it and it is still pricey if they do. You can call Minimed and ask them about what you would be paying. You would have a second device hooked up to your abdomen, not sure how you feel about that.

I am in the same situation about getting one but the thing stopping me is the price because I am on tight budget because I am going back to school in a month. At my doctors office they had a CGM and I was able to try it for a week to see if I even liked it.

The recipes must be wheat gluten free and are carb free. My cat is diabetic.

This site has excellent information on cat nutrition, feline diabetes (read!), and on making cat food.

http://www.catinfo.org/

Do not be dismayed if you do not have a grinder. I do not grind my cats’ raw food. It is important that your cat does eat the recommended amount of bone so you’ll have to get him or her used to eating them if you can’t grind.

This commercial site has almost the identical recipe to Dr Pierson’s above:

http://www.felinefuture.com/?p=1299

If it all seems too much at first you can order their premix supplement and use it to make raw cat food from ground meats from the supermarket. It is a good product but not cheap!

My own cats are not fussy. I don’t grind anything. The basis for their raw food works out to 10%-15% bone, 10%-15% organs ( including liver!), the rest meat/skin/fat. With meats like chicken, turkey, and rabbit it is really easy because I merely need hack it up, my cats eat bones readily.

Other meats I feed less often because they should be supplemented with bone meal or chicken necks since cats can’t handle the bones - beef, goat, venison.

Don’t change your diabetic cat’s diet from one with carbohydrate to one without without supervision. The cat’s insulin requirement could be much less and the excess insulin could put the cat in a coma.

There is a feline diabetes expert on this site. I will email him for you.

We found out my dad was diabetic recently so we’re looking for some good recipes that we could try out. My dad isn’t very good on a diet, so instead we’re all going to start eating better (hopefully) and would like to try some dinner recipes.

Go to http://www.food.com/

In the search box at the top type in diabetic. They have over 500 recipes and you can narrow your search to find what you’re looking for

Best wishes to your dad and his new lifestyle.

My brother has type 1 diabetes. What’s the most accurate Blood Glucose meter available that has a usb connector and s reasonably priced?

All of the presently available glucometers are equally accurate. Your brother should base his choice on the price of the strips not the price of the glucometer as he will be using the strips for the rest of his life. You are correct that some glucometers have USB ports and as a physician I prefer that patients use these. These glucometers will print out 5 pages of data analyzing averaging and charting readings. I ask patients to email their results. The computer is not used by physicians as often as it should be. It improves communication and reduces cost. I wish you both the very best of health and in all things may God bless.

i am doing 50 sit ups ,50 push ups twice and 5 minutes of skipping a day but i am not loosing any weight so does anyone know what a good diet or even a few recipes for a healthy but filling meals/snack (i have to eat every 2 hours).

Try South Beach Living phase 2, not for a weight loss diet (a very dirty 4-letter word) but for a lifestyle change to keep the weight in control for the long run. And walk an hour every day as fast as you can.

SBL books have loads of lovely menus and recipes in them.

I lay out the foods allowed for a day on the top shelf in the fridge and graze all day from that shelf, nothing else other than water. I try to keep my total carb intake to 100 grams per day. This way my bolus insulin injections are less so there is less of it to pack on the pounds on my tummy area (the only place I seem to gain any weight)

Ive noticed that when i go through my day and don’t have any sugar i get severe headaches… There not the normal headaches, as pain radiates all over. However all it takes is a piece of fruit or a soda and im fine within a matter of minutes. Is this a symptom of diabetes?

"If I go WITHOUT any sugar…. symptom of HYPERglycemia"? Babe, if you get these when you go WITHOUT sugar, how could you POSSIBLY conclude that you are diabetic, or have issues with TOO MUCH sugar?
The human body requires a certain amount of sugar per day in order to survive. If you get these headaches from LACK of sugar, what you’re experiencing is HYPO glycemia, not HYPER glycemia.
Your body needs some sugar for energy, it needs sugar in order to absorb any water you consume. If you go WITHOUT any sugar, even (especially, rather) if you are dieting, your body will suffer from low blood sugar levels and dehydration. Other symptooms of hypoglycemia may include dizziness and lethargy.
If you’re trying to diet, find sources of complex carbohydrates and complex sugars that your body can break down. Complex carbs do not go straight to fat cells and breaking them down into a usable energy source burns calories.

Okay I have a meter to watch my sugars so i dont end up with a sugar issue….can someone tell me what my fasting levels should be and every other time during the day ??? my fasting level on sunday was 84 and today it was 115 help would be appreciated

I have complimented micksmixxx before and I will do so again. There is a great deal of confusion in this forum as to what the normal range for glucose is. Part of the reason is that respondents tend to rely on personal opinion, personal experience, or an internet search. An internet search will yield a wide variety of reference ranges and non-physicians are really not in a position to evaluate their validity. There is one ‘Top Contributor’ who cites a research study - not a clinical trial - suggesting very ‘low’ normal glucose values. Thus it is common to find competing opinions which adds to the confusion of the person answering the question. Based upon the most recent clinical trials nearly all physicians agree with the following. A non-diabetic’s fasting glucose is typically 70 to 100 mg/dL or 3.9 to 5.6 mmol/L. A non-diabetic’s post-prandial (after meal) glucose typically does not exceed 140 mg/dL or 7.8 mmol/L. This is essentially what micksmixxx has stated. Note that I say typically as there is some variation in glucose from day to day. In addition no single reading should be used to establish the diagnosis. It is best to obtain both fasting and 2 hour post-prandial glucose readings. It does not sound as if you have diabetes so I would suggest that testing once a week should be more than enough. I ask my patients to create a spread-sheet on their computer and to email me their readings once a month. There is also a glucometer with a USB port that when plugged into the physician’s computer prints out 5 pages of data. These are the glucometers that I prefer my patients to use. The goal for glucose readings in a diabetic is similar to those for a non-diabetic but not necessarily identical. I must wonder why you are checking your glucose. Is your physician concerned that you may have diabetes? I answer any and all health questions free of charge as a public service - all I ask is that you provide me with detailed information - johnerussomd@jhu.edu. I wish you the very best of health and in all things may God bless.

I had gestational diabetes and am overweight. I would like to start the diet again. I can’t remember the carb breakdown….
I think it was something like
bfast-15
snack-30
Lunch-45
snack-30
dinner-45
snack-15

this seems like a lot of food to me…..
Am I remembering it wrong?

it really depends on your height, weight, age.. but typically, for females, it should be broken down as follows:

brkfst-45g
lunch-45g
supper-45g

snacks 15-20g but limit snacks to 2 a day