Live Well While Managing your Health
Introduction
Your Doctor has just told you that you are Diabetic, so now what are you going to do? Read this article and understand the basics of this disease called Diabetes.
Most people do not realize that over 8%, or around 29-million Americans, of all ages, have Diabetes, either Type-1 or Type-2.
And, sad to say one in four diabetics are walking around and don’t even know that they have this disease.
Not a Diabetics Breakfast
This basic English Breakfast is a wonderful meal, but, it is not what a Diabetic should eat. | Source
What is Diabetes? The Simple Explanation
Simply put, diabetes is a disease, or actually a group of diseases where certain people have high Glucose levels that are caused directly by the body’s problems producing and using Insulin.
The scary thing about having long-term, untreated Diabetes is that it can lead to serious health problems and even premature death for some people.
The major causes of Diabetes in people are; being Overweight, having a Family History of Diabetes, and Gestational Diabetes (having Diabetes when pregnant, which is usually a temporary condition).
Are you Type-1 or Type-2
The difference between the two types of Diabetes is significant. Type-1 Diabetes is the condition when the body does not produce enough Insulin.
On the other hand, Type-2 Diabetes is the condition when the body cannot utilize Insulin properly.
Many of the people with Type-2 diabetes will eventually progress to Type-1 simply because their disease will progress regardless of what they do to control it.
The major reason for people progressing to Type-1 diabetes from Type-2 is that, even though they know that they have diabetes, the person does not take the necessary steps with their body, diet, and medications to ensure they have kept their Blood Sugar level under control.
Diabetes - Facts you need to know
Glucose - When people talk about blood sugar levels, they are referring to the Glucose levels in the blood. Glucose is a type of sugar in a person blood, derived from Carbohydrates, and the level of Glucose varies throughout the day depending on factors such as what is eaten and when along with levels of exercise.
The important thing to know is that organs of your body use glucose as their fuel to function properly. Too much Glucose and the body needs to store the excess, while too little Glucose makes the body convert body fat to Glucose as needed.
The transfer and management of Glucose levels are done by the Insulin in the blood.
Insulin – While Glucose is the fuel required for your body’s organs to function properly; Insulin is the chemical that helps the organs, including the brain, absorb the available glucose in the blood.
Insulin also keeps the blood vessels themselves healthy.
The Human Brain - The brain requires over twice the level of glucose than any other body organ, in order to function properly. If the body’s blood glucose level is either too low or too high, the brain will not function properly and the person will become confused or have trouble remembering things.
Inadequate levels of Insulin in the brain can lead to the buildup of unhealthy proteins in the brain which affects its overall function, and some brain cells can even become resistant to Insulin.
The buildup of these unhealthy proteins in the brain can cause a loss of memory, or even lead to Alzheimer’s disease.
Once you are a Diabetic, you are a Diabetic for life, accept it!
Once you become a Diabetic, you are different.
Once your doctor tells you that you have diabetes, the first thing you must do is accept this new reality into your life. Pretending the existence of Diabetes is not true will not work. Ignoring your Diabetes will cause it to get progressively worse and cause your body increasing harm over time.
You, as a diabetic, must accept this new reality about your body and manage a number of things in your lifestyle that you may have been taking for granted.
The good thing is that once you understand that your Blood Sugar levels can be managed and kept within safe limits and understand that you, and only you, can manage the things that will affect your Blood Sugar level, this should give you the confidence to live a long and healthy life as a Diabetic.
So, yes, you are different, you are a diabetic and you must do some things differently than a non-diabetic. But, you can run races, climb mountains, hike the hardest trails and physically do pretty much anything that you desire, right along with the best of those you might want to compete with.
It's not that bad, just accept your Diabetic limitations
Believe me, being a Diabetic is not that bad if you care enough to manage certain things in your life.
As a Diabetic, you can lead a normal life and do pretty much anything you desire, if you just learn to make certain minor changes to your lifestyle.
The major things that a Diabetic needs to manage are their Diet and their Exercise regimen.
Carbohydrates and Calories, COUNTING
Diabetes and Exercise
Not only can you do pretty much anything you might want, Walking is an exercise option that Doctors recommend for all Diabetics, from the youngest to the oldest.
A simple regimen of walking several times a week is excellent for a persons heart and blood circulation. Everyone should take the time to walk a reasonable distance every day.
For a Diabetic, it even more important to exercise regularly. A walk of a half an hour or even an hour or more, three or more times a week, even at a slow pace will burn some of those extra calories generated by the Sugars and Carbohydrates in your foods.
And, regular exercise gets your heart pumping a little harder and makes it stronger and healthier.
Also, for those of you that want to run marathons and hike mountain trails or any other type of strenuous exercise, there are simple things that the diabetic athlete can do to manage their blood sugar and still enjoy their favorite sports.
You don’t normally see much about it, but even for the disabled diabetic, there are exercises and even specialized exercise machines that they use to increase their heart rate to some extent and improve their overall health.
Diabetes and your Diet
The obvious statement here is that everyone should watch their diet, eat the proper foods and eat them in the proper portion size.
In reality, the sad thing is that there would be a lot fewer people with diabetes if more of them had followed a healthy eating regimen in their life.
Probably the most insidious thing about being a diabetic is the fact that, say you do eat a piece of cake. Your blood sugar will go up until your body had gotten rid of the excess levels of sugar, but you don’t just keel over and pass out, at least not from one bite or slice of cake.
So, the average diabetic can fall into the trap of thinking that eating "just one slice of" cake is OK, for them at least.
But, the cold hard truth is that even though the occasional "sugar excess" might be OK, constantly eating foods with higher levels of sugars will damage your body in the long run.
Eating Time for Diabetics
The American Diabetic Association (ADA) recommends that a Diabetic eat three meals of 45-60 grams of Carbs each along with two small snacks in between, every day.
The fact is that after eating a meal a persons blood sugar level will climb and it will typically take the body about two hours to digest the meal and for the person's blood sugar level to drop back to normal.
By eating a small snack in between the meals, the blood sugar level will climb again, and not drop as far over the next two hours, at which time you would eat your next meal.
By eating the two snacks in between the meals, the average diabetic can maintain a more balanced blood sugar level throughout the day.
Sugar, Fructose, Sucrose, Carbohydrates? What are these things?
Some Food Facts for the Diabetic
The seriously concerned diabetic will become a label reader.
You really do need to know just how much sugar is in everything you eat. All packaged foods, sold commercially, will have the level of sugar “per serving” on its package.
But, the diabetic needs to understand that there are other ingredients in many packaged foods that they must check for and manage also, and not just the simple food called sugar.
Fructose, Sucrose, etc.
These are other names used for certain sugars that are added in some foods during the cooking or packaging process. And these chemicals are typically not included in the total sugar level on the Nutritional Information label of the package.
Fructose (ie. High Fructose Corn Syrup), a Carbohydrate, is the name often used for the Fruit Sugar in a plant. It will not take you long to find that there are far too many prepared or canned foods with Fructose added to them, so be sure you read those labels closely.
Sucrose, also a Carbohydrate, on the other hand, is just another name for table sugar.
Carbohydrates
So many people don’t understand what Carbohydrates are, or especially, how to manage them in their diet. Carbs come from foods labeled as Sugars and Starches.
Carbs are important for energy transportation in living organisms. They have involved in the body’s immune systems function as well as blood development and clotting, and even in disease development.
For the diabetic, counting their Carbohydrate intake is very important. Your body converts Carbs to Glucose so the serious diabetic should try to maintain a certain level of carb intake per meal. Typically, for an adult, this would be from forty-five to sixty grams per meal.
Remember, the diabetic who knows how many Carbs they are consuming in a meal also knows which way their Blood Sugar level will be heading after the meal. So ideally, it is a good idea to try to eat close to the same number of Carbs for each meal daily.
Counting Carbs – Counting Carbs should become a habit for the diabetic, and really, after a while, you will automatically know what the Carb level is in a serving of most of your favorite foods and just make your food selection decisions without thinking.
For those foods that you have to look up, one quick trick is to assume the carb level to be 15-grams for certain groups of foods as shown below;
Dried Beans – 1-cup
Fruit – 1- cup
Grains, Cold Cereal – 1-ounce
Grains, Cooked Cereal – ½ cup
Grains, Cooked Rice – ½ cup
Low-Fat Dairy – 1 cup
Starchy Vegetables – ½ cup
Foods and Carbs, Facts and Tips
What is Diabetes? The Simple Explanation
Simply put, diabetes is a disease, or actually a group of diseases where certain people have high Glucose levels that are caused directly by the body’s problems producing and using Insulin.
The scary thing about having long-term, untreated Diabetes is that it can lead to serious health problems and even premature death for some people.
The major causes of Diabetes in people are; being Overweight, having a Family History of Diabetes, and Gestational Diabetes (having Diabetes when pregnant, which is usually a temporary condition).
Are you Type-1 or Type-2
The difference between the two types of Diabetes is significant. Type-1 Diabetes is the condition when the body does not produce enough Insulin.
On the other hand, Type-2 Diabetes is the condition when the body cannot utilize Insulin properly.
Many of the people with Type-2 diabetes will eventually progress to Type-1 simply because their disease will progress regardless of what they do to control it.
The major reason for people progressing to Type-1 diabetes from Type-2 is that, even though they know that they have diabetes, the person does not take the necessary steps with their body, diet, and medications to ensure they have kept their Blood Sugar level under control.
Diabetes - Facts you need to know
Glucose - When people talk about blood sugar levels, they are referring to the Glucose levels in the blood. Glucose is a type of sugar in a person blood, derived from Carbohydrates, and the level of Glucose varies throughout the day depending on factors such as what is eaten and when along with levels of exercise.
The important thing to know is that organs of your body use glucose as their fuel to function properly. Too much Glucose and the body needs to store the excess, while too little Glucose makes the body convert body fat to Glucose as needed.
The transfer and management of Glucose levels are done by the Insulin in the blood.
Insulin – While Glucose is the fuel required for your body’s organs to function properly; Insulin is the chemical that helps the organs, including the brain, absorb the available glucose in the blood.
Insulin also keeps the blood vessels themselves healthy.
The Human Brain - The brain requires over twice the level of glucose than any other body organ, in order to function properly. If the body’s blood glucose level is either too low or too high, the brain will not function properly and the person will become confused or have trouble remembering things.
Inadequate levels of Insulin in the brain can lead to the buildup of unhealthy proteins in the brain which affects its overall function, and some brain cells can even become resistant to Insulin.
The buildup of these unhealthy proteins in the brain can cause a loss of memory, or even lead to Alzheimer’s disease.
Once you are a Diabetic, you are a Diabetic for life, accept it!
Once you become a Diabetic, you are different.
Once your doctor tells you that you have diabetes, the first thing you must do is accept this new reality into your life. Pretending the existence of Diabetes is not true will not work. Ignoring your Diabetes will cause it to get progressively worse and cause your body increasing harm over time.
You, as a diabetic, must accept this new reality about your body and manage a number of things in your lifestyle that you may have been taking for granted.
The good thing is that once you understand that your Blood Sugar levels can be managed and kept within safe limits and understand that you, and only you, can manage the things that will affect your Blood Sugar level, this should give you the confidence to live a long and healthy life as a Diabetic.
So, yes, you are different, you are a diabetic and you must do some things differently than a non-diabetic. But, you can run races, climb mountains, hike the hardest trails and physically do pretty much anything that you desire, right along with the best of those you might want to compete with.
It's not that bad, just accept your Diabetic limitations
Believe me, being a Diabetic is not that bad if you care enough to manage certain things in your life.
As a Diabetic, you can lead a normal life and do pretty much anything you desire, if you just learn to make certain minor changes to your lifestyle.
The major things that a Diabetic needs to manage are their Diet and their Exercise regimen.
Carbohydrates and Calories, COUNTING
Diabetes and Exercise
Not only can you do pretty much anything you might want, Walking is an exercise option that Doctors recommend for all Diabetics, from the youngest to the oldest.
A simple regimen of walking several times a week is excellent for a persons heart and blood circulation. Everyone should take the time to walk a reasonable distance every day.
For a Diabetic, it even more important to exercise regularly. A walk of a half an hour or even an hour or more, three or more times a week, even at a slow pace will burn some of those extra calories generated by the Sugars and Carbohydrates in your foods.
And, regular exercise gets your heart pumping a little harder and makes it stronger and healthier.
Also, for those of you that want to run marathons and hike mountain trails or any other type of strenuous exercise, there are simple things that the diabetic athlete can do to manage their blood sugar and still enjoy their favorite sports.
You don’t normally see much about it, but even for the disabled diabetic, there are exercises and even specialized exercise machines that they use to increase their heart rate to some extent and improve their overall health.
Diabetes and your Diet
The obvious statement here is that everyone should watch their diet, eat the proper foods and eat them in the proper portion size.
In reality, the sad thing is that there would be a lot fewer people with diabetes if more of them had followed a healthy eating regimen in their life.
Probably the most insidious thing about being a diabetic is the fact that, say you do eat a piece of cake. Your blood sugar will go up until your body had gotten rid of the excess levels of sugar, but you don’t just keel over and pass out, at least not from one bite or slice of cake.
So, the average diabetic can fall into the trap of thinking that eating "just one slice of" cake is OK, for them at least.
But, the cold hard truth is that even though the occasional "sugar excess" might be OK, constantly eating foods with higher levels of sugars will damage your body in the long run.
Eating Time for Diabetics
The American Diabetic Association (ADA) recommends that a Diabetic eat three meals of 45-60 grams of Carbs each along with two small snacks in between, every day.
The fact is that after eating a meal a persons blood sugar level will climb and it will typically take the body about two hours to digest the meal and for the person's blood sugar level to drop back to normal.
By eating a small snack in between the meals, the blood sugar level will climb again, and not drop as far over the next two hours, at which time you would eat your next meal.
By eating the two snacks in between the meals, the average diabetic can maintain a more balanced blood sugar level throughout the day.
Sugar, Fructose, Sucrose, Carbohydrates? What are these things?
Some Food Facts for the Diabetic
The seriously concerned diabetic will become a label reader.
You really do need to know just how much sugar is in everything you eat. All packaged foods, sold commercially, will have the level of sugar “per serving” on its package.
But, the diabetic needs to understand that there are other ingredients in many packaged foods that they must check for and manage also, and not just the simple food called sugar.
Fructose, Sucrose, etc.
These are other names used for certain sugars that are added in some foods during the cooking or packaging process. And these chemicals are typically not included in the total sugar level on the Nutritional Information label of the package.
Fructose (ie. High Fructose Corn Syrup), a Carbohydrate, is the name often used for the Fruit Sugar in a plant. It will not take you long to find that there are far too many prepared or canned foods with Fructose added to them, so be sure you read those labels closely.
Sucrose, also a Carbohydrate, on the other hand, is just another name for table sugar.
Carbohydrates
So many people don’t understand what Carbohydrates are, or especially, how to manage them in their diet. Carbs come from foods labeled as Sugars and Starches.
Carbs are important for energy transportation in living organisms. They have involved in the body’s immune systems function as well as blood development and clotting, and even in disease development.
For the diabetic, counting their Carbohydrate intake is very important. Your body converts Carbs to Glucose so the serious diabetic should try to maintain a certain level of carb intake per meal. Typically, for an adult, this would be from forty-five to sixty grams per meal.
Remember, the diabetic who knows how many Carbs they are consuming in a meal also knows which way their Blood Sugar level will be heading after the meal. So ideally, it is a good idea to try to eat close to the same number of Carbs for each meal daily.
Counting Carbs – Counting Carbs should become a habit for the diabetic, and really, after a while, you will automatically know what the Carb level is in a serving of most of your favorite foods and just make your food selection decisions without thinking.
For those foods that you have to look up, one quick trick is to assume the carb level to be 15-grams for certain groups of foods as shown below;
Dried Beans – 1-cup
Fruit – 1- cup
Grains, Cold Cereal – 1-ounce
Grains, Cooked Cereal – ½ cup
Grains, Cooked Rice – ½ cup
Low-Fat Dairy – 1 cup
Starchy Vegetables – ½ cup
Foods and Carbs, Facts and Tips
Foods and Carbs, Facts and Tips
Below are a number of facts about certain popular foods, their Carb levels and comparisons
Sugar – Sugar is a type of carbohydrate (about 4-grams of Carbs to a teaspoon of Sugar) and it contains no nutrients useful to the body.
Vegetables – All vegetables have Carbohydrates and a standard serving is ½ cup of cooked vegetables and 1-cup of uncooked vegetables.
Non-Starchy Vegetables contain around 5-grams of Carbs per serving and are foods such as; Asparagus, Summer Squash, and all Leafy Greens.
Starchy Vegetables contain around 15 grams of Carbs per serving and are foods such as; Cassava, Corn, Peas, Potatoes, and Yams.
Free Foods – Free Foods are those that are so low in Carb content that you can eat as much of them as you want. Some of these free foods are; Arugula, Chicory, Endive, Iceberg Lettuce, Romaine, and Spinach or essentially any Salad Green.
Food Reference Books – Every diabetic should purchase a Food Reference Book. These books include thousands of foods and even prepared dishes along with their nutritional content and their Carbohydrate levels.
The newbie diabetic as well as the "old pro" will use it until they build up a personal database in their heads for their favorite foods.
Ongoing Diabetic Health and your A1C level
A1C Level - One thing that a diabetic should keep up with is their A1C level. A person's A1C level is a measurement and calculation made using blood testing techniques that gives an indication of a person's average Blood Glucose level over the past 2-3 months.
Unlike the blood sugar test that all diabetics use every day which indicates blood sugar levels in the blood at that point in time, the A1C level is a long-term indicator or a persons blood sugar level. Normally, for diabetics, their A1C level should be below 7%.
To prevent the onset of Type-2 Diabetes a person should do three things; lose excess weight, eat healthy foods, and exercise regularly.
To manage your Diabetes, you must; work with a health professional such as an Endocrinologist, who will monitor and manage your personal plan, and of course, you also eat healthy foods and exercise regularly. I know I keep repeating this "diet and exercise" theme, over and over, but if you want to live a long life as a Diabetic, you must manage these two things. It's your Life!
Diabetes is a complex disease which results in halting the process of production of insulin in bodies. Insulin is important as it allows our bodies to consume and store the energy that our body gets from carbs present in food. It is a commonly known disease but there are facts that are unknown to many. There are few facts about diabetes which is unknown to many so here I am sharing a few of the eye-openers. In older days, diabetes testing was a weird job. Doctors would taste the urine to check if it was sweet. People were hired to taste urine to see if diabetes were there. Starting from eyes to toes, it can affect each and every part of your body. Our furry friends can also suffer from the same disease if they are not given proper exercise. Diabetics are most likely known to develop depression wherein they lose their confidence and endure a number of mood swings. Developing Diabetes is preventable if there is a planned diet program and 30-45 minutes of physical activity in moderation along with a healthy diet. Frequent urination is experienced along with fatigue and restlessness. It can also lead to various health complications like kidney failure, skin dryness and sensitivity, blindness and blurred vision, damage to the blood vessels that carry blood to the nerves, ulcers and in severe cases amputation. As of now, there are 3 known types of diabetes and there are so many which are not yet discovered. Diabetes cannot be cured but it can surely be prevented by good exercise and keeping the weight in control. Have organic and whole grain food and fruits as well.
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