On the verge of giving up

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On the verge of giving up

Postby Siamese » Sun Jul 17, 2022 9:58 am

Hi everyone. I am new here so hopfully I am doing things right. I am in a mess at the moment re my diabetes and am on the verge of giving up.

I have been a type 2 diabetic for over 10 years. I have lost weight and have for many years followed a mainly vegetarian type diet. I mostly avoided oil and eggs. I have lost a good amount of weight with a BMI of 25. I’m 6’2” and weight just a fraction under 14 stones (196lb). I do not take insulin.
Please can anyone advise me. At the moment the whole diabetes situation is getting me down. My morning figures are between 8 and 9 mmol (144 – 162 mg/dl). I have tried having a snack at night and tried not eating after 6 or 8 pm. Nothing works to get my morning figures down. Obviously, anything I then eat throughout the day is elevated.
The second problem is that I tried eating some of the whole food plant based recipes and sticking to them rigidly for a couple of weeks. For example, oats feature in many recipes but they send my blood glucose up by about 5 or 6 mmol. After about 2 hours they very slowly come down. My body is obviously not processing them. I love bread but just one piece of good quality wholewheat sourdough (and any other type of bread) plays havoc with my blood sugars. A number of recipes on the McDougall sites and other use wholewheat flour! Rice sends my blood sugar high and yet again rice features quite a lot in the recipes. If I ate all these things for say 2 months, will my body adapt? Will my blood glucose levels come down after these eating the things mentioned, especially my morning figures?
I took a test to see if I was producing enough insulin and apparently, I am. So, it’s just a case that I am insulin resistant.

Please forgive me for my many questions but I genuinely am at my wits end and on the verge of doing and eating what I want. While I am happy for the people I read about on McDougall’s and others websites it just seems that it’s only me struggling. I reasonably sure that this is not the case.

I am also confused when it comes to what figures should be after 1 and 2 hours

Your help is much appreciated and thank you in advance. I happy to share more info about my situation if you need it.
Siamese
 
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Re: On the verge of giving up

Postby michaelswarm » Wed Jul 20, 2022 5:07 am

You might want to set your expectations

Your goal should be to reduce your insulin resistance, and improve your insulin sensitivity, by getting the fat out of your cells. Hopefully, you are already aware that insulin resistance is caused by extra fat in cells that are not designed to store fat, primarily muscle and liver cells.

What you are seeing is result of your insulin resistance. This is to be expected. It will reduce and disappear as the insulin resistance goes away. Don't expect to see this immediately. This could take months. But you should be seeing progress in weeks, including weight loss and normalization of blood pressure and blood cholesterol, for example.

Cure your Type 2 Diabetes - Brand New Lecture by John McDougall, M.D.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWr3_FY6VRQ

You've had your diabetes for 10 years. Have patience.

Take opportunity to learn everything you can about your diabetes from Dr McDougall and other like him, like Dr Neil Bernard.

Don't get confused by simply lowering numbers. You can do that by eating only fats, for example. But the underlying insulin resistance remains, easily seen when resuming normal carbohydrate intake or an insulin challenge.

You want to make sustainable healthy lifelong change.

I've been doing this 12+ years now. Lowered weight and cholesterol and many other small improvements. You can do this too.
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Re: On the verge of giving up

Postby Siamese » Sun Jul 24, 2022 9:18 am

Thanks Michaelswarm

Your words seemed hard hitting at first but as I reflected on them they make sense. I get annoyed at the tons of conflicting advice, even from my Diabetic Nurse. I like the way of eating that McDougal and others promote but it just seems to go completely against convention. I have strictly followed his way of eating now for about a week and have lost two pounds. I have not looked at my glucose meter and have decided that I will not until I have been on this way of eating for a couple of months. If I look at my meter now I know that the readings after eating oats etc will be high and will get me down. I have been feeling a little more tired on this way of eating but I guess that is to be expected at first.

I appreciate your help and advice. Thank you.
Siamese
 
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Re: On the verge of giving up

Postby michaelswarm » Sun Jul 24, 2022 1:54 pm

Siamese

Dr McDougall outlines the evidence logically. And he, Dr Barnard and many others, have clinical results that confirm. That so many doctors, dietitians and industry go the other way is the greatest puzzle to me.

Doug Lisle (clinical psychologist of Mcdougall Program and co-author Pleasure Trap) seems to think human nature, including motivation, personality and ego, combined with modern food technology, pretty much undermine natural human motivation and cause most people to follow false signals.

Sorry for bluntness. That's kind of part of my personality. Few words to get important message across is challenge.

Weight loss will be outward sign of positive progress. Slow and sure wins the race.

Keep us posted of your progress.
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Re: On the verge of giving up

Postby Siamese » Sun Jul 24, 2022 3:59 pm

Much appreciated Michaelswarm. I'll definitely let you know how things are going.
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