Diabetes Diagnosis, In Shock

I might suggest you look into the success stories with a Whole Food Plant Based diet. Forks Over Knives has a website. Dr. Joel Fuhrman has a book called The End of Diabetes. Dr. Neal Barnard has a video about it. There are many, many success stories out there. This way of eating has been endorsed as the best diet by Kaiser Permanente Healthcare in California. There are also many bloggers like Chef AJ, Hello Nutritarian, Nutmeg Notebook. Also, my guru at Nutritionfacts.org is Dr. Michael Greger. His book, How Not to Die was a NY Times best seller. The most important thing to do is loose weight because the lipids within your cells create the insulin resistance. You can rapidly loose weight by eliminating meat, dairy, eggs and oil and embracing grains,legumes, fruits and veggies. I've been getting mailings from two people who are Type I diabetics under control with WFPB. Their program is called Mastering Diabetes. Read up and let the evidence speak to you. It's a big change but it will work if you follow the plan.

Thank you so much for these resources. It's hard to know where to begin, but I know Whole Foods (and in my case, paleo) are effective ways to get the weight off.

Babette- I strongly urge you to take what I suggested seriously. DITCH THE MEAT. Read up on why whole food plant diets are the healthiest. You've got orthopedic issues, neurological issues and now a life-threatening endocrine issue. What you have been doing has not worked. Paleo is unbalanced and harmful.

I was taught in physiology class that paleoacidosis was a serious condition caused by an unbalanced diet. I do eat less meat, however, to better balance my diet and it is working. I had a veggie pizza last night and normal blood sugar test of 104 this morning. My diabetes is under good control. Dorisena

Sorry, I used the wrong term. I meant to say "ketoacidosis" which can be harmful to the body function. Dorisena

I will positively look into this. Many thanks!

Also, what is the typical way to take glucose readings? I'm driving myself nuts taking them too often and I don't see a good pattern yet!

I hope you understand that glucose readings go up and down like a roller coaster over a twenty-four hour period and then also rise and fall depending on what you eat and drink and sometimes what meds are taken or the degree of stress in your life. Basically glucose rises for two hours after a meal, and then drops and slowly rises again, with the changes also depending on how much you exercise. Basically your want to know the fasting number first thing in the morning upon rising so you know your daily limits on carbs and can plan your amount of activity. In the evening you might want to check the glucose rise two hours after dinner to see if you have eaten too much carbs and not enough veggies, etc. If you regularly have numbers over 200 in the evening you could be causing health problems and need to change your eating accordingly. Eating a light dinner should cause the morning number to be lower over time. Some nutritionists recommend a tiny bedtime snack like peanut butter to get you through the night without waking up terribly hungry. It helps to eat by the clock so the body gets used to a desirable pattern. I eat three times a day, for instance with maybe a snack but not every day. I prefer early dinner but often I am hungry during the night. I am working on that issue. It takes time and planning to get the numbers lower and losing some weight helps the effort. For those whose numbers are higher and those who have other health issues, listen to the advice of a doctor about helpful medicines. I hope this helps. Dorisena

I remind others that I have worked on my eating program for more than fifteen years to beat back the diabetes and am finally happy with my results and glucose readings. It feels easy now but was a struggle in the beginning. I do miss having homemade ice cream and only have cake on my birthday which causes a huge spike but goes away in a couple of days. My granddaughter recommends that I quit having birthdays. She quit counting the years. Dorisena

@babette - Welcome to Mayo Connect! I know you are in shock- I was there too. After 60 it seemed as if the warranty on my body ran out! I had also tried to live a healthy, active life. Genetics play a large role. I realized that I had inherited many of my father’s health problems, diabetes one of them.
After spending 10 years dealing with autoimmune and other issues I was well enough to deal with the diabetes. I knew I had to lose weight. My daughter had lost a lot of weight doing a low carb, high protein diet. I joined a program locally. It was very tough the first 2 weeks. I craved my carbs so bad! It got much easier and the pounds disappeared. I was never hungry. I ate a fairly similar diet as I did before minus all my beloved carbs! 45 lbs in a few months. My blood sugar was much lower and steady so I could go off my diabetes medicine and continue controlling it through my diet. You measure your fasting blood sugar- after you wake up. Keep a record.
There are many ways to eat to reach the same result- I was happy to like my diet since it did not vary much from my regular diet.
What does your doctor say?
My doctor told me that nowadays diabetes is considered a cardiovascular illness..that scared me.
The local hospitals usually have diabetes educators- check it out.
Moderate physical activity is important too.
Don’t wait! You can do it!