[geoblewis]

Just curious if any type 2s have tried intermittent fasting.

I was doing it for a few weeks and succeeded to lose about 25 lbs, but I've hit a wall with it. I ended up doing it incorrectly, saving calories for later in the day when I was actually hungry, then totally overeating. I was playing it really sloppy with the carbs too, avoiding sugar, fruit and starchy veg but still overeating whole grains on occasion. I hadn't tracked bg for a long time but recently started doing it again. I found that any grains and legumes were keeping my bg too high. I'm currently limiting my carbs to less than 15 net grams/meal.

I'm trying to get back to eating a small breakfast, lunch and dinner, with a 24-hour fast thrown in once or twice a week. But the fasting seems harder to stick to now.


If you're diabetic and doing IF, please share how it's going for you.

[fatmad]

Unlike people with insulin dependent diabetes, it seems people with type 2 can safely fast. But a 36 hour fast, (as opposed to meal skipping) I mean from supper one night to breakfast the day after next, is what seems appropriate.
I didn't find anything about blood sugar problems doing that.
On the other hand, skipping meals then eating later may cause what you have described, feeling too hungry, and over eating, and making bad choices, which can spike sugars a lot. Has lots of potential for causing blood sugar problems.

Is this the only thing you are doing to lose weight? or have you explored other options?
THis is an interesting new topic. thanks for sharing.

[geoblewis]

This is not the only thing I've been doing. I've been successfully working at losing weight over the last five years since being diagnosed with type 2. I also struggle with PCOS, and food sensitivities, so I've had to clean up my diet a lot. I do a combination of things, a Paleolithic Diet (no dairy, grains, legumes or processed foods and I eat a lot of organic greens and wild-caught fish and pastured meats and eggs), a low carb diet (under 15 gm carbs/meal), and the IF (one or two 24-36 hour fasts/week).

I still overeat calorically, so that's what I'm working on now. I'm a big, tall gal and I exercise a couple hours a day, mostly Pilates and weight training. I get HUNGRY!

Thanks for sharing!

[geoblewis]

I ate a small breakfast yesterday with only 1 gram of carbs and 24 gm of protein plus fats. Two hours afterward, and nearly 30 minutes after my Pilates class was over, my blood glucose was still in the 140s. I decided to skip eating till my blood sugar got below 100. The lowest I got was 104. I felt hypo, but I've come to realize that my body was accustomed to the higher blood glucose levels. I need to cut back on how much I'm eating and stop relying on a false sense of hypoglycemia as a clue on when to eat. Because I wasn't actually feeling hunger in my stomach when I thought I was hitting a hypo state.

I'm one of those feed-a-cold/feed-a-fever...oh heck! I'll just eat! sort of people.

I'm going to stick with IF and combine it with the bg monitoring to let myself know when it's okay to eat.