Type 2 Diabetes and Dining plan

[jodywgirl]

we are DVC members and will be headed home in a few weeks. I had planned on adding dining plan before we go to take advantage of snacks at food and wine and we are eating at some nicer places.

I was just diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes and was wondering how many good sugar free desserts or substitutions I will be able use.

We are eating at following
Le Cellier
Ohanas
Flying Fish
Raglan Road
kona breakfast
Sanaa
Cape May Dinner

Lunches at food and wine
Flame tree
Captain cooks.

if any one has experience eating at Disney with Type 2 diabetes it would be greatly appreciated.

 

[sharonabe]

I'm pretty sure all the TS have a sugar free dessert in their selection. As to substitutions, you'll just have to ask. Each restaurant decides what, if anything, they will sub for the dessert.

 

[KronkHere]

I was diagnosed last December '16 and I have a trip coming up in June '17. I have done a lot of research on this very subject as well as my on life style dieting changes. Please be aware that just because something says 'sugar-free' doesn't mean that it has zero carbs. Candy, sweets, cookies...traditional sugar filed items are no different to the body than is bread, rice, potatoes, flour..etc. You must account for sugar and carbs or else you are only fighting half the battle. It looks like you may have already come and gone on your trip, hope it was great. Hopefully, this will help someone else who is/was/am as confused about the T2D as I am...

 

[Faldred]

Some (though not all) of the signatures offer a cheese plate that can be had as appetizer or dessert; that could be an option in those cases (but keep an eye on the accompaniments!)

 

[Nancyg56]

I was diagnosed last December '16 and I have a trip coming up in June '17. I have done a lot of research on this very subject as well as my on life style dieting changes. Please be aware that just because something says 'sugar-free' doesn't mean that it has zero carbs. Candy, sweets, cookies...traditional sugar filed items are no different to the body than is bread, rice, potatoes, flour..etc. You must account for sugar and carbs or else you are only fighting half the battle. It looks like you may have already come and gone on your trip, hope it was great. Hopefully, this will help someone else who is/was/am as confused about the T2D as I am...

Thank you for posting this. My oldest son who is 40, and pretty darn smart I might add, was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. Holy smokes! It took a while for him to differentiate "safe" carbs from "sugar free" food. I had asked him to go to the seminars offered at the hospital so he could get a handle on how to account for his carbs, as well as teh difference that whole grains vs processed grains make, ( he said his "whole grain" waffle at breakfast was tasty!) but he had decided no to. His first followup the Dr gave him a A for effort.....B- for implementation. After the dressing down he received at that checkup he studied this with the same zeal he puts into his job.

Had he gone on vacation so soon after his diagnosis I would have been worried the whole time. The learning curve is difficult on it's own, never mind adding in all of the choices one must make while dining out for an extended period of time. It has been several months now, and he has turned the "choices" into life style changes, so ordering in a restaurant or touring the parks and and snacking would not be the effort in self control that it woudl have been one month out.

I will also add that as a family, if we vacationed together, we would make a contentious effort to look at our choices differently, as I do when he and his wife join us for dinner at home so that we did nto inadvertantly sideline him.

 

[Sadie22]

Sugar free foods may have as many or more carbohydrates as the "regular" recipe food, and/or may have more fat, so they may not be suitable for people with type 2 diabetes. The sweetness may have been replaced with sugar alcohol, which is a laxative. I highly recommend diabetes education with a certified diabetes educator and a nutritionist. Some physicians don't know about this so they don't know to prescribe this for the newly diagnosed. Through diabetes education you can learn about portion sizes and how to guesstimate a balanced meal. Disney does not provide nutrition information.

DH and I share meals whenever possible when traveling. Disney portions tend to be large, so this is easy to do. He's a big eater but there's still plenty for both of us. When we share we can right-size portions and still fit in a little dessert. We do not do the Disney dining plan as that would be too much food and food which is not healthy for me.