I tested after spaghetti for the first time tonight. I actually attempted spaghetti squash instead of noodles but ended up going back for a real plate, lol, as it was not good to me. Is it supposed to be crunchy?

Anyway, back to testing....at 2.5 hrs post prandial my reading was 153. That is too high right? 140 is the cutoff correct? So, I will try Dreamfields next time and if that doesn't work I might have to say goodbye to my favorite meal each week. (Just as an FYI I make my own meat sauce and it is lower carb than jarred sauces)

Carol Sue I agree with Shannon, please convince him to go the MedExpress or the ER. Pneumonia is no joke own of my sons had it. I pray for healing power.

Shannon, my husband self diagnoses also, big 6'6 baby. I have to tell the doctors everything because he will say anything is happening or tell them nothing is wrong, smh Shannon my spaghetti squash didn't come out crunchy. You'll have to try it again. I really liked it when I made it. I've bought Dreamfields but I now by the Shirataki noodles not bad at all taste wise, though chewy. I use to make my own sauce. I haven't done that in a very long time. Spaghetti use to be our every Wednesday meal before church, but after 6 years my husband said the sauce was too rich and made his stomach hurt so I don't make it as often. though the children love it.

Well I made it to the gym did 4.14 miles (hey my bday ) 65 minutes and burned 514 calories. Don't know what the scale will say since it says 165 now, I will probably not have much of a loss unless I happen to get a whoosh which I have yet to see

Carol Sue Sorry DH is ill. It does sound like something he needs to see a doc about. I hope he will decide to go.

Well, I share everything with you guys so I may as well fess up. No Atkins Induction to day. I ended up having a carby day, but stayed within my calories of 1537 so that was good. I had 79 g carbs minus 17 g fiber making my net carbs 62. I will check my bs before I go to bed. I did 25 minutes on the recumbent bike so that could have been the reason I was hungry plus I just didn't want to cook a meal for dinner.

Catch y'all tomorrow. Good night.

DH will not go to the doctor until he is ready. I'm now thinking it's not congestion. He is not coughing at all. Last night I checked his oxygen saturation and it was 98. If he had congestion in his lungs, wouldn't his oxygen saturation be affected? This morning he told me he will be dead in two weeks. I replied, if you aren't better by the week-end, I'm cancelling Easter dinner. He said Oh, I should be better by the week end. I said I thought you said you'd be dead? He doesn't want to get out of bed but wants me to stay in bed with him. When he starts snoring I figure he's asleep and start to get up, then he wakes back up. In my opinion, if he goes to the ER they will admit him, and that's why he won't go. I'm upset, but I can't make him do anything.

I had pneumonia in 2010. I was in the hosp for 5 days. I had a low grade fever and was very very tired. My husband has no fever, and he's not in bed because he's tired, he's in bed because of the pain. I think that's what's different from other times he's been sick. The pain. He just got up so we will see how he does.

Since we've having confession here, I gained 2 lbs. But this morning they were gone again. LOL

I had a victory of a sort yesterday, but I'm not sure why. This morning my FBG was lower than it was when I went to bed. That never happens to me. Fasting is always higher. I was 126 at bedtime and 121 this morning. I'm not sure what did it.

1. I didn't get to exercise in the afternoon, so I walked for 20 minutes in the evening, an hour or so after dinner.

2. I ate the beans in the chili, which is said to help BS.

3. I was not hungry and was not going to eat a snack at bedtime, but I wanted to get some edamame ready to snack on today, so I put some frozen edemame in a strainer and ran some water over it to defrost it and put it in a snack bag. When I did that, I ate several of them.

4. Then I remembered I hadn't had my walnuts I eat every day, so I ate 4-5 walnut halves.

5. Then I drank a glass of diet cranberry juice, which I try to have every day.

So one of those things, either the evening exercise or the snack items, did something. I also see a correlation between my blood sugar staying down overnight and the 2 lb weight loss.

RE the Kale discussion. I cannot eat raw kale. It is just too tough and prickley, and has no taste, but I don't think what I buy is baby kale. I can only eat it cooked. I am also the only one here who eats it so I buy the bunches that they sell by the pound, and I look for the smallest bunch. One time they only had huge bunches so I didn't buy it. But when I do buy it, I have to eat it every day so it won't go bad. I will look for the frozen kale. I've never seen it but maybe I just wasn't looking for it. That would be great to have on hand for times when I can't get the fresh kale. I did see frozen okra. It's not real common in this area, but I guess I never saw it before because I wasn't looking.

When I was googling my new med, I came across a discussion about glimiperide on another forum, so I signed up so I could post. These people are real downers compared to this forum. They were dead set against me trying to lose weight to get my bs down. They said it's more important to control your bs than to lose weight. Take your meds and stay fat. LOL Also, they were quoting studies and trials that PROVE that diabetes has nothing to do with weight and losing weight will NOT help my bs. They said that diabetes is a progressive disease and you just keep getting worse and taking more meds until you finally end up on insulin. Basically, I told them I will be back to report when I have lost weight and got off my diabetes meds. I think it's attitudes like theirs that keeps people from trying to improve their diet and their health. How can we be wrong when we see our weight and bs improve with exercise and dietary changes that produce the weight loss????

We ROCK!

Shannon, the first time I ate spaghetti squash my reaction was like yours. I didn't like it because I expected it to taste like spaghetti and have the same texture. I didn't eat it for years. I tried it again this past year, but instead of using a red pasta sauce, I made a butter sauce with sauteed onion and garlic. I loved that. BUT my bs was not good when I ate it, so I quit. I have not tried Dreamfields but I have used Ronzini Smart Taste. It's good, but I didn't notice it being any better for my blood sugar then regular pasta. Now my husband likes angel hair. I have heard that thinner pasta such as angel hair or vermicelli is as good for you as whole wheat pasta. If I ever get to the point that I am willing to try carbs again I will eat it in very small portions, adding lots of veggies and meatballs for protein.

DH stayed up for about a half hour and then went back to bed. While he was up, he coughed a couple times and I could hear congestion loosening up in his chest, so I'm back to thinking it's congestion. He has been running the vaporizer so that might be loosening things up. I told him that lying down is NOT good for pneumonia, but he says he feels terrible and wants to lie down. I can't force him. He's an adult, even though he acts like a child sometimes.

I had my breakfast of scrambled eggs with mushrooms. I sprinkled in some black beans. So far they haven't raised my BS.

Carol Sue, I pray your husband feels better soon Men are so stubborn . On that thread, my goodness. Some people are happy as they are and don't believe that there is a such thing as change. We are not those people thank goodness On the spaghetti sauce I love the sound of the sauce that you made. Can you go into detail on how you made the sauce

my fbs was 129 this morning. I know what my problem is and I just need to get my head back into the game of eating properly

Just quick flyby, but will be back later. Yesterday was just a blip. I am back on track although not really calling my way of eat Atkins. Just low carb. I do need to raise my fiber which will help with keeping the carbs low.

Weight was up only .4 lb this morning and fbs was 109 so I'm still good. So I'm just doing low carb. As long as I can lose weight and keep fbs/bs low, that is what I'm working for.

BBL

This is a bunch of hooey! So, I told you that my degree is in laboratory medicine. After I left the lab, the last 12 years of my career were in clinical trials. The last 8 of those 12 I spent at a company that specialized in cardiovadcular disease and diabetes trials. I promise you that weight loss does help and can even reverse diabetes. Bunch of old farts over there, lol!

[QUOTE]I don't date my strips when I open them, either, so if I'm not testing regularly they get old. I was told that unless you are on insulin, insurance won't give you more strips than one or two per day. The reason is because if you do get a high reading there's not much you can do about it besides exercising. It's not like a T1 who can inject insulin. Once you determine what foods spike your blood glucose you should not have to keep testing post-prandial. I know some type 2s who take Metformin and don't test at all.[/QUOTE]

I buy the Relion strips and meter from Walmart because the doctor only prescribed one strip a day. I got to the point where I thought, hey he doesn't care what my blood sugar is so... he also told me to limit sweets. I was already doing that so I had stopped using the Relion at other times of the day and pretty much only tested my FBS which was always good, under a 100 usually 80.

Imagine my surprise when I went for my A1c and was still at 7 which meant I had an average blood sugar of 154. Now I am back to using my Relion several times a day, eating to my meter. Recently I've found that even though I am eating low carb and gluten free the amount of food I eat can spike me- I found that out through testing. As my weight goes down I will constantly have to adjust that.

Doctors try to keep the insurance company happy, the insurance company cares about their bottom line. We have to care about our own blood sugar. Another forum I use consistantly tells us Type 2 diabetics to eat to your meter, know what and how much food spikes you and make corrections. We can take control but we can't rely on insurance companies or our doctors to always have our backs.

Trish good numbers there, keep up the good work

I promise you that weight loss does help and can even reverse diabetes. <--- Shannon I thought I had read this some where, but my memory is bad and these are certainly my hopes

Donna I agree ---> Doctors try to keep the insurance company happy, the insurance company cares about their bottom line. We have to care about our own blood sugar. Another forum I use consistantly tells us Type 2 diabetics to eat to your meter, know what and how much food spikes you and make corrections. We can take control but we can't rely on insurance companies or our doctors to always have our backs.

Shannon I have read (in fact have two book) that say you can reverse diabetes with diet and exercise. They both stress the point of eating more fiber. However, I just realized the New Atkins book says that you can relerse it with their diet as well. The interesting thing is that if you follow Atkins as suggested you would eventually be adding more fiber. I guess I am proof that following it proves that is true. I was diagnosed with diabetes back in the 80s and I was able to get rid of diabetes and live without any meds for a good 10 yrs or more. When I regained weight over 200 lbs, the diabetes returned with it. So I know from experience that losing weight and exercise can and will reverse diabetes. At least it does for me.

Y'all are talking about the problems with the meters makes me not want to change my meter. I had planned to get the new one because it is cheaper, but my bs is always in line with my A1c readings. However, the few times they were off was when I was having high reading on my home meter and I expected a bad A1c only to find that my average was better. So I'm not sure I should get a new one since mine I evidently have a very good one.

Carol Sue I have tried the fiber pills, the psyllium and other powder for constipation and they did nothing but bloat me. Seems they just laid in my belly. So I can't take them either. They work great for DH and my sister. But I seem to have to eat my fiber in foods. I think I need to focus more on protein, fiber and try to keep the carbs as low as possible although my carbs won't be Atkins low and fiber won't be extremely high either. I thought about eating edamame for a snack. I love the taste so I think I'll fix a bag for snacks. Do you keep the bag in fridge once thawed? Do you just eat a serving or what.

I ended up wanting cookies last night, but I really think what saved me was I ate 2 oz of nuts (fiber/healthy fat) with them. Plus I didn't pig out on them I just ate a serving of 2 different kinds. It wasn't a binge, but a planned type meal. I remember my doctor telling my DH that I could have ice cream if I wanted sometime in place of a meal. So that is why I made it a planned meal. This is a learning process and I found that I they didn't taste as well as I thought they would. I keep the cookies here for DGS when he is here on weekends, but he hasn't been here on weekends since he lost his license so I'll put them in the freezer for him. You know "out of site out of mind".

Donna My doctor gave me a prescription for my meter etc but only for 1 stick a day. When I asked if I could get more, he told me that since I'm on medicare that I would be required to keep a record to be shared with medicare. I decided to start purchasing the sticks on my own. I don't even get a prescription for them any more as I think government gets too involved in our business as it is. IMHO. I didn't want it on my record because 1) my diabetes isn't bad enough to have more sticks. It is my choice to stick after some foods to see how it affects my spikes. This is how my step-sister's DH got control of his diabetes. 2) I don't plan to live with diabetes for the rest of my life since I know losing the weight will reverse it. The difference this time is I'm doing this to find out what I can and cannot eat so that when I reach goal that I will know how to maintain and never gain any of this weight back. Thanks for sharing here. Also something you said made me realize that I was about to goof up on my plane today. I have learned that eating small meals rather than large meals work better for me.

I did have my high fiber bread with my breakfast. The rest of the day will be just regular low carb meals and snacks. I make my plans out on MFP because it shows my fiber count when I make the print out. I believe one of the things that causes weight gain and high fbs and other bs readings is eating too much at one time overloading my tummy. I made my lunch plan too high for today. What I have planned to eat isn't bad, it just needs to be spread out over the day, not so much of it in one meal. I would never have realized it if I hadn't read your post Donna. So thanks again.

It is wonderful how we learn from each other. Sometimes I just share what I'm going through so that it might help someone else. I know y'alls sharing sure does help me.

Have a good day!!!

Donna - A while back you posted that you made a muffin in a mug recipe in your waffle iron. I would like to see that recipe if you don't mind sharing it.

My doctor told me that in order to write a script for more strips he would have to document that my glucose was out of control, which at the time, it wasn't. For me, it is just cheaper and easier to use the ones from WalMart.

Trish, if you are happy with your meter and strips, stay with it. I remember before I went for my A1c I predicted it would be a 9 based on the average readings I was having and I was right. It was 9.7. If I get it down to 7 or below I will be happy, and I hope the doctor is too.

I think we will always have to exercise and watch carbs, even if we lose weight and are able to get off the meds. That's just my opinion and I know I could be wrong. I think that's why some people don't like to hear the word "reversed." It's not really reversed, but controlled. I'll take "controlled!!"

Trish, I have a snack size bag of edemame in the refrigerator. For lunch I cooked some baby carrots and brussels sprouts and threw in some edemame for protein. I will just pull the bag out and have a few in between meals. I defrost the amount that would fit in my cupped hand.

Another thing I do for fiber is eat pitted prunes. Usually only 1 a day, sometimes 2. We buy them in Aldi's in a big canister and we both eat them. Very rich in fiber.

Rennie - There is no actual recipe for my butter sauce. I just melted some butter in a small frying pan, added some chopped onion and garlic and simmered it to flavor the butter. Then mixed the butter in with the spaghetti squash strands. I didn't measure anything. Sometimes I would add some frozen mixed vegetables in with it. Whatever I wanted in there. If it made too much I just kept the leftovers for the next day. I was eating this at lunch time. Lunch seems to be the only time I can do my own thing. Supper is usually something that DH will eat, and he won't eat any of my weird foods. LOL

I did very well today so far, so I will post my menu.

Breakfast
Scrambled eggs with mushrooms

Lunch
Wilted Kale and Spinach with sauteed onions and garlic
I still felt hungry after that so I cooked some baby carrots and brussels sprouts and added the edemame to it.

I am satisfied, but not stuffed.

For dinner I am planning on some grilled salmon with asparagus and whatever starch DH wants. If he doesn't want salmon I will cook a hamburger for him. He is feeling a little better, but I don't want to force him to eat something he doesn't want. (like I could!LOL)

Shannon, I think some people prefer to be able to eat what they want and just inject the insulin, so they let themselves believe that it has to be that way. I will be having labs done again at the end of June to see if my A1c went down. He is also checking my lipids, and I'm hoping they are improved, too! It will make this all worthwhile.

Muffin in a mug

The basic recipe is 1/4 cup flax meal, (or 2 TBS Flax and 2 TBS almond flour)1/2 tsp baking powder, pinch of salt, 1 egg, stevia to taste, and either 1 TBS coconut oil, butter or olive oil.

I sub a TBS of nonfat greek yogurt (sometimes 2 TBS) for the oil and pour it into a sprayed, hot waffle iron.

Today I had a cinnamon roll in a mug, which was yum!!

2 TBS almond meal
2 TBS flax meal
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2-1 tsp cinnamon
1 egg
1 TBS Butter

mix together in a mug or a glass bowl and microwave for 1 minutes 15 secs.

pop it out of the mug and spread with sweetened (I use stevia or xylitol) cream cheese.

The basic recipe can be made savory with olive oil, garlic, a TBS of parmesian cheese and what ever other spices you like. I make mine in a 4 cup glass measuring cup and cook in the microwave for 1-2 minutes . Pop it out and slice it in the middle, it makes a nice bun for a breakfast sandwich or a burger. I just do whatever goes with what I'm eating it with. Sometimes I leave it plain and just toast it in the toaster oven and eat it with butter.


For pasta dishes, I sub sliced cabbage or zuchinni, not crazy about the texture of spaghetti squash the cabbage and zuchinni have a more neutral flavor..

Carol Sue thanks for the details for the butter sauce

Thanks Donna that's the recipe I have minus the almond meal which I just added. Maybe the cream cheese or the parmesan garlic will give it more flavor. I am sure gonna give them a try Thanks ... PS you've made me hungry (in my mind) but I'm full and done eating for the day