OT Pre-Diabetes

[B&Bforever]

HI Disers

My dh was diagnosed with pre-diabetes. The doctor told him to watch his carbs but I'm not sure how we should deal with this. I am the cook of the house so I'm not sure how and what I need to change for him.

Any advice or ideas would help tremendously.

Thanks

 

[Snappy in OK]

You can check the carbohydrates in the various things you use. The general rule is 15 gram of carbs equals one serving, and my doctor has said to limit it to 3 servings per meal. I was on insulin while pregnant, and am pre-diabetic.

When I was first "diagnosed", I pretty much eliminated carbs from my diet. I would have a piece of toast, oatmeal or Cheerios for breakfast. I would eat proteins, veggies - basically. anything that had very few carbs during the day. I lost 30 pounds in about 5 weeks. From there I was able to eat small portions of carbs (breads, pasta, fruits) and maintain my reduced weight. Losing the weight really helped with the pre-diabetes. I was on insulin while pregnant - hormones just wreak havoc with the glucose levels.

Good luck with everything!

 

[Anniegirl]

Just to get the ball rolling, eliminate any white bread (this includes bagels rolls, croissants etc...), white pasta, white rice & potatoes. Buy only whole grain breads, pastas and rice. That will get you started without having to think about looking at numbers and keeping counts. Having a lean & green dinner is also helpful. (grilled marinated chicken breast over a big salad with extra veges, dressing on the side to dip into) etc

Get ride of soda in your house as well. Keep a pitcher of ice water with a wedge of lemon in the fridge, Crystal Light lemonade, sugar free ice tea......

If he's looking for a swwet treat, those sugar-free Fudgcicles are really good

 

[Colleen27]

It is hard to give advice without knowing your starting point and his habits (like for me, giving up sweets was nothing, but I had a hard time cutting back on overly starchy snacks/meals), but in general cutting out or cutting back on the white rice/potatoes/pasta/bread and reducing/eliminating sweetened beverages is a good start.

 

[apnep]

HI Disers

My dh was diagnosed with pre-diabetes. The doctor told him to watch his carbs but I'm not sure how we should deal with this. I am the cook of the house so I'm not sure how and what I need to change for him.

Any advice or ideas would help tremendously.

Thanks

Hi, my DH was diagnosed at borderline diabetic years ago and so we decided to go to a nutritionist so they could teach us and help us with nutrition.

I would highly recommend going to one. She taught us how to read the nutrition labels and monitor his carb intake. He lost like 30 pounds and now I just cook healthier for everyone.

I would cut down alot on breads, pastas, and white rice, sweets, sodas, and just eat lots of good protiens and veggies and fruits. Monitor portion sizes as well and have him check his blood sugar levels 3X/day. He should be eating 3 light meals and 3 snacks a day. Actually, everyone should.

Good luck!

 

[AmongMadPeople]

I agree, it's hard to make suggestions when you don't know what someone's bad habits are

I know you didn't ask, but when my husband was told to lose weight because of a high A1C, he started eating plain oatmeal with cinnamon and real maple syrup for breakfast (previously ate nothing for breakfast) and walking on a treadmill for thirty minutes every other day (previously the only activity he did was walking to/from cars for work). He only lost a few pounds, but after three months his A1C was back to normal levels and his cholesterol dropped for the first time in five years since being on Lipitor.

 

[MEM]

Hi, my DH was diagnosed at borderline diabetic years ago and so we decided to go to a nutritionist so they could teach us and help us with nutrition.

Anyone can call themselves a "nutritionist" - the OP wants to make sure to see a Registered Dietitian.

 

[PatsMom]

A diabetic diet is basically just good healthy eating. I find it easiest to count my carbs and consider no food as forbidden. If I want to have some dessert, I will tend to eat an entree that has no carbs or very few carbs.

A session with a nutritionist can be very valuable.

If your DH is overweight, encourage him to lose. Being more physically active and thinner will help a lot with A1C levels.

The American Diabetes Association has a pretty good web site with tips and message boards that can be very helpful. www.diabetes.org

 

[Vijoge]

The BEST advice I can give you is to read labels!

One of the best (and easiest) plans is Dr. Peter Gott's no-flour-no-sugar diets. It's really simple-you just don't eat anything that contains flour or sugar, which essentially makes the diet naturally low in carbs.

Other foods to avoid (or to consume in very controlled moderation) are white potatoes, corn, peas, beets, carrots, orange juice (most fruit juice, actually), pineapple, ripe banana, and before buying any "diet" products, check the labels. These things are often as high or higher in carbs than their non-diet counterparts. Yogurt is one of those things that people often find can be extremely high in carbs. Sugar-free popcycles are another. I was amazed.

Exercise is one of the best (and definitely least expensive) means of lowering blood glucose levels. Just walking is fine. Bike riding is good, too, and very effective.

Good choices are lots of green vegetables -broccoli, green beans, spinach, asparagus, brussels sprouts, zuccini, and leafy salad greens (except iceberg, which has no nutritutional value at all) and lean meats, sugar-free jello, cheese, including cream cheese, peanut butter.. Some people do well with oatmeal-others find even 1/4 c causes their BS to spike. Rye bread is often well tolerated, whole grain breads, too-whole wheat bread not so much. Berries are the best fruit-blackberries, raspberries, strawberries, a little cantaloupe, avoid watermelon except in small quantities as it has a high glycemic index.

There's a lot more but these are just what I have found to be the basics. I'm sure others will have a lot more to add.

If you need help, suggestions,recipes, or support the people over here http://www.diabetesdaily.com/forum/ are very knowledgeable.

 

[bumbershoot]

Definitely go to a nutritionist. Does your insurance cover classes of any sort? We have Aetna, and by going to MultiCare places DH was able to take a series of two classes. Very helpful.

Is he going to be monitoring this with just checkups? Or does he get a monitor? DH skipped the "pre" diagnosis (had really good blood sugars for years until suddenly he didn't, but...it turned out that there were other things going on with him, and it's totally possible the blood sugar stuff was just a symptom of that, b/c there's no way he could be diagnosed with diabetes at this point, every sign and symptom is gone without medication) and got a monitor, and that was nice (though painful for him!) b/c he could see what HIS body did with specific foods.

For DH, cinnamon is a wonder drug. I was having a really hard time in the first year of the blood sugar stuff, and at one point I cracked and made pumpkin muffins from disneyland's recipe. I didn't want DH to have one, but he did. Despite lots of sugar and even cream cheese frosting, he woke up with a LOWER blood sugar than he went to bed with...there was cinnamon ALL in it, even in the frosting. So I try to sprinkle a bit into everything I think of.

For DH, cane sugar is basically OK, but when he gets into the corn type syrupy sugars, he's toast. Corn syrup, HFCS, and probably even corn syrup solids just destroy him (he will fall asleep where he is, 5-10 minutes after ingesting it), though his blood sugar only hits 120 or so (he is now in the 80s most of the time...has hit the 70s but that makes him feel weird).

And so on. So your hubby needs to find the foods that work for him. They like to make it sound like "one size fits all", but hubby's experience really shows that it's not. Oh, by the way, apart from a flirtation with stevia products, DH doesn't use artificial sweeteners. At first he didn't use sugar at all in his coffee, but now he puts a blip of it in...doesn't seem to cause a problem *for him*.

Good luck and have fun!

 

[Sparkleshine]

It's all about reading labels. There are things that have high amounts of sugars and carbs that you would never think. Like Milk for example - not really a healthy drink for a diabetic! Who would have guessed?!

 

[betmust]

I was found to be pre-diabetic also. I had very high insulin levels so the endocrinologist started me on Metformin. I have a very strong history of type 1 and type 2 diabetes in my family. Was told if I could lose about 15 lbs I would be fine. Well I met with a dietician and did a meal plan. I lost 25 lbs in 6 months. Blood work is all good but still on very low dose Metformin. Also, exercise is very good. I walk for 40-60 minutes almost every day.

I agree, do not eliminate any food group. Sometimes a little bit of the "real" thing instead of "sugar-free" is not bad. I found that sometimes calories and fat are higher in the sugar-free product. Always look at carb servings and decide if it works out for you.
A good dietician will give you loads of help and advice based on what you like to eat and generally will give you follow up appointments so she can track your progress and answer questions and concerns that come up.

Now is the time to do something about it before it turns to diabetes.

Good luck...

Bette

 

[Colleen27]

Is he going to be monitoring this with just checkups? Or does he get a monitor? DH skipped the "pre" diagnosis (had really good blood sugars for years until suddenly he didn't, but...it turned out that there were other things going on with him, and it's totally possible the blood sugar stuff was just a symptom of that, b/c there's no way he could be diagnosed with diabetes at this point, every sign and symptom is gone without medication) and got a monitor, and that was nice (though painful for him!) b/c he could see what HIS body did with specific foods.

For DH, cinnamon is a wonder drug. I was having a really hard time in the first year of the blood sugar stuff, and at one point I cracked and made pumpkin muffins from disneyland's recipe. I didn't want DH to have one, but he did. Despite lots of sugar and even cream cheese frosting, he woke up with a LOWER blood sugar than he went to bed with...there was cinnamon ALL in it, even in the frosting. So I try to sprinkle a bit into everything I think of.

For DH, cane sugar is basically OK, but when he gets into the corn type syrupy sugars, he's toast. Corn syrup, HFCS, and probably even corn syrup solids just destroy him (he will fall asleep where he is, 5-10 minutes after ingesting it), though his blood sugar only hits 120 or so (he is now in the 80s most of the time...has hit the 70s but that makes him feel weird).

And so on. So your hubby needs to find the foods that work for him. They like to make it sound like "one size fits all", but hubby's experience really shows that it's not.

Monitoring worked the same for me. My glucose challenge test numbers came back within a point or two of the official threshold for gestational diabetes, so while I didn't technically get the diagnosis I did get the referral to the staff nutritionist and the monitoring requirements "just in case" (I have a strong family history of both gestational and type 2 diabetes). I figured out pretty quickly which things worked and which were too much, and sometimes that didn't necessarily agree with the labels.

For me, tea was the wonder drug. Just plain old unsweetened brewed black tea, hot or iced didn't seem to matter. I started drinking it as a substitute for my Diet Dew, because I was pregnant and didn't want the artificial sweeteners any more than the sugar. It didn't take long for me to notice that my post-meal readings were lower if I had tea with dinner than if I had water with the same meal.

I noticed the same thing as your husband with corn syrup vs cane sugar, though I can't say for sure whether it is the type of sweetener or the amount - sugar sweetened products seem to use less sweetener than corn syrup sweetened products, and in some cases corn syrup is used in products that don't need any sweetening at all.

 

[apnep]

Anyone can call themselves a "nutritionist" - the OP wants to make sure to see a Registered Dietitian.

Well, we went to a nutritionist and they showed us how to read labels, watch DH's carbs, portion control and things to cut out. We successfully changed his diet, he exercised more, and lost weight. He has been successful in keeping both his cholesterol and blood sugar levels down and reversed his symptoms. So, I don't care if we saw a nutritionist or a registered dietition because we learned alot and it worked. Honestly, it was so long ago I don't really know if we saw a dietition or a nutritionist or not but the doctor recommended them and insurance paid for it. We were given that booklet that had the food exchanges and a plan for how and what he should eat to track his carbs. The thing is to gain knowledge and then use it properly.

 

[bettymae1121]

Eliminate "white" starches. White bread, white rice, sugar, potatos are the biggies. Replace with whole grain breads and brown rice. They are still carbs but the whole grains digest slower, add more fiber, keep you "full" longer and don't spike your blood sugar.

My DH (type II insulin dependent) also finds that processed foods spike his sugar more than cooked-from-scratch foods. That's just his experiance though, I don't have scientific data on that!

 

[mrsklamc]

The other stuff people said too, but...Fish oil and south beach diet.

 

[betmust]

I think that everyone has things that work or don't work for them and you (or hubby) have to find that out yourself. I saw a diabetic nutritionist and thru trial and error found what helped me.
Be armed with all the info you can get and see what works.
Keep a log of what you eat and how it affects your blood sugars - that is a sure way to know...

Bette

 

[claudia]

if he is a pasta lover then give Dreamfields a try....

 

[MrsPete]

My husband's in the same boat, and he's pretending that he's not.

Please talk to me about how his his big downfall fits into this equation: BEER.

 

[Vijoge]

My husband's in the same boat, and he's pretending that he's not.

Please talk to me about how his his big downfall fits into this equation: BEER.

http://www.livestrong.com/article/83338-beer-diabetes/