Diabetes aka "The Sugar": Part 2, Food and Blood Sugar

Food! Some people hear this word and start salivating thinking of where they want to eat or their favorite place to eat or what they ate last night or what they are going to eat tonight or how they need that piece of chocolate because it is 3:00 and you have 30 more minutes of work and that little piece of chocolate is going to make all the difference! Okay, maybe the 3:00 person is just me, but you get my point! People say that love makes the world go round....I think the same could be said about food! Food is what brings us together. Most relationships (in my opinion) start over food. It makes us comfortable and helps us open up. We share our favorite recipes. We talk about places where we eat. When we have a work day at work our conversations always start with "Hey! Where are we going to eat lunch?" even though it is still 8:30 in the morning and lunch is three hours away! FOOD! I can't say enough about it!

FOOD!!!

Well, when you have diabetes or having to consider someone with diabetes, you see food a lot differently. I mean I still go for the chocolate and wonder where to eat on work days, but when it comes to eating at home or even planning to go out I always have Klint's blood sugar in the back of my mind. I am pretty sure Klint  does too. I know that sometimes he will order things that make me shudder thinking about the havoc it will reek and later on he will say he shouldn't have ordered that, but by that point the damage is done!

After Klint's diagnosis, we went to a class to learn how to eat and be mindful of Klint's sugar. I went back through my notes and found several things of importance. I also found some great resources online I want to share too.

The teacher of our class stressed that meal planning is key in helping to maintain a healthy blood sugar level. Her were her points that she made to us.

1. Limit Total Carbohydrates (Not just sugar!)
Carbs of any kind will eventually break down and turn into sugar. Carbohydrates  are starches and starchy vegetables, fruits and fruit juice, milk or yogurt, and any sweets. Hearing that some vegetables were starchy was news to me because in my mind a vegetable was a vegetable. It was so strange to hear that some of the things I thought were okay (corn, beans, potatoes) were really starches and could hurt Klint's sugar. For the first two months of Klint's diagnosis he would have to remind me that I was cooking two starches or what a starch was. It took some  time to retrain my brain! Generally you should only have 2-4 servings of carbs per meal and 1-2 servings in a snack. They showed us a chart that illustrated how carbohydrates effect sugar and it raises it 100 % almost immediately and it takes about an hour and a half for it to leave your system.

Wheat products are still considered a carb, but it takes longer for the body to break it down thus taking longer to raise your sugar and it doesn't raise it as significantly as regular products do. Wheat bread, pasta, and brown rice are things they told us we definitely needed to incorporate into our diets. Wheat pasta is not for everyone. A few tricks we learned: 1. Angel hair pasta is the best way to break into the wheat pasta thing. You can't tell it is wheat because it is so thin. Start their and go bigger. 2. Don't try half and half. The reason I say this is wheat pasta takes a little longer to cook because it is whole wheat. If you do half and half one will cook quicker than the other. You can try it, but I wouldn't recommend it. 3. Baked wheat pasta taste just like regular pasta. I think this is because you are cooking the heck out of it! Brown rice is tricky too. You can cook it and cook it and it always seems to have a crunch. Not sure what the answer to this is. I have tried cooking in the microwave and boiling it and it comes out the same. My mother-in-law recommened the Success Rice you boil in a bag. It is wonderful and not crunchy! My only problem is I have to cook two  bags per meal because one bag isn't enough, but  I highly recommend it! You won't regret it!

2. Limit High Fat Foods and Friend Foods
You should not have fried food more than once a week. Fried foods and those high in fat raise your blood sugar by 10%, but it last in your system over 12 hours! That is a long time to let it have control of your body. This rule wasn't too hard for us because I hardly ever fry anything and if I do it is panned fried and not deep fried. Our teacher said to bake, grill, boil, broil and microwave.  I know you are thinking, "microwave?", but it can be done. You can microwave the obvious...popcorn, can of soup, rice, etc. But I have found products that let you cook full meals in the microwave. These are through Pampered Chef. One is the Deep Covered Baker. You can cook just about anything in this stone baking dish and you can do it in the microwave. I have made lemon pesto chicken in it and it is wonderful! The other product is the Small Ridged Baker. This pan has ridges that keeps your meat from sitting in the grease that cooks off. You can cook bacon, chicken, just about anything.  I also love my Micro Cooker! It is so easy to cook hamburger meat or sausage for recipes. And the grease strains off. I love all three of these items and they make cooking so much easier!

Her other points were to use low-fat or nonfat dairy products and to choose lean meat. All of this will help cut down on fatty foods!

3. Limit Salt and Salty Foods
The teacher told us to use salt sparingly while cooking and to not salt at all when we are at the table. This one is hard for us. I don't use and have really never used a whole lot of salt when I cook. Klint in return will definitely use salt. He has gotten better, but we still use salt. Using frozen or fresh veggies does help with our sodium intake. Canned veggies or anything canned has such a high sodium count that it is scary. If I do used canned good I try to find ones with no salt or low sodium.We use fresh or frozen vegetables whenever we can. I was shopping one day shortly after this class and a lady commented on how young I was and how she was impressed I had so many fresh vegetables. It made my day! I still buy a lot of fresh vegetables and part of it is in hopes that I can inspire someone who might see me at the store. We are also good about staying away from TV dinners or frozen pizzas. We never eat them!

4. Limit Portions and Have Balance
We have a huge portion disorientation when it comes to our food! I can remember when the drink you get from Wendy's that was a medium is now considered a small. We want everything large! Bigger steak! More Fries! Loaded baked potatoes! More! More! More! Portion size is huge when you are diabetic.

As a general rule 1/2 of your plate should be non-starchy vegetables. I found a list of these vegetables to guide you.

1/4 of your plate should be meats/proteins. In general, your meat should be the size of a deck of cards or the palm of your hand. How does that fit into a 14oz. steak? If your hand is that big, you have other issues! Protein also raises your blood sugar by 50% over the spance of several hours. It stays in your system longer than the carbs.

1/2 of your plate should be carbohydrates or starches. In general, the amount should be the size of a baseball. Remember that breakfast can take the place of starchy veggies because it is very hard to eat a breakfast without some kind of carb (cereal, oatmeal, toast, fruit, fruit juice, etc.) Something I wrote down was a serving size of carbs is 12-18g. I also wrote a note to buy a scale (that didn't happen).

Below is a guide for how your meal should look. I loved this illustration! I am thinking about printing it and hanging it on the fridge!

I loved this image because it is so nice to have a visual when thinking about food!

5. Eat a variety of Foods
This includes eating fruits and non-starchy vegetables. I know you are thinking "Fruits have sugar!" but fruit also have vitamins and other healthy things and in moderation, they are okay.

6. Eat about the same time everyday.
You should eat about three times a day and have snacks as needed. Your meals should be spaced 4-6 hours apart. Keeping on a schedule is good because it keeps you regular with your medicine and checking your glucose levels.

One last thing I wanted to post was an image from the FDA website. It is a guide on how to read the Nutrition facts on products. This was something they gave us and it was helpful.

Sorry it is a little blurry! You can print the pdf here!

My next post on diabetes will be about eating out. A lot of information can be found on the American Diabetes Association website. We received and Exchange Lists for Meal Planning Guide from them through our class and it is great!

Images source Google Images