Hi all. Went off plan Thursday night, out for Indian food and had a cocktail too. HOWEVER, I successfully went back on plan Friday and have been on target today too. I haven't weighed since, and will wait until tomorrow am.
Overall, quite happy to have successfully had a "planned" cheat and able to get back to plan. I often have gone off plan for several days when I do this, and getting right back is the key for planned or unplanned times off plan, I think.
Enjoying reading the posts. Trish (sorry for the typo earlier) I haven't watched the video yet either. No free wifi opportunities yet!

Madeleine That's ok about the typo. I saw it and chuckled. I have decided there are always going to be off plan days or meals and I also believe that it is good to just make it a planned cheat meal or day with a plan to get right back on ASAP. Today's lunch was like it is every Saturday a carby meal. So now I just plan around it. all other meals were and will be low carb.

Shannon Congratulations on the weight loss. Appears that the off times are not hurting you. You are making good progress. I'm looking forward to seeing how your BG is doing. I always loved planning fun times with my kids and grandkids. I know Olivia will or did thoroughly enjoy the tea. Sounds like such fun.

Carol Sue I too am interested in how to get our insulin to respond quicker. It makes sense, that the quicker the insulin responds the less of it you need, and insulin would store fat. Please share what you learn from it, as I too need to quit storing so much fat! LOL

I am planning to start a VLC using Atkins as a guideline tomorrow. I am partially on it now. As I said, Saturday at lunch is always carby, but think I can do it with an occasional off meal. It will also be easier to do an Intermittent Fasting of an 8 hr window. Obviously the 4 and 5 window isn't working for my BG. I know doing the VLC/IF will. My FBG has been high some days. It went back up to the 120s and I even had a 162 reading this morning. So it is time to re-think the situation.

Since I know from having done more of an Atkin's or VLC plan in the past that it will help me to lose weight and normalize my BG. And I am going to do whatever I can do to get my BG and the weight to go down. Only thing is that this time, I have to remember that this is the way I have to eat for the rest of my life to keep my weight and BG down.

I hope everyone has a Very Happy Valentine's Day.

well, weight hasn't budged from the high after the Thursday cheat, so Trish, there's what a carb day can do to your plan! argh
Sticking to my WOE though, and hoping I get a change soon.

Trish, the main thing the book suggests for getting an early insulin response is to make sure you always eat some protein with a carb. The protein seems to make the beta cells release insulin sooner. If your get an early insulin response, you don't need as much insulin because it is more efficient than if you body waits for a higher blood sugar to release the insulin. I am paraphrasing, and I hope you can understand what I'm saying.

Here is something else I wanted to share. The book lists and explains things you can do to block the starch in your meals. Then it gives a synopsis, a list of the 8 things you can do when you eat a meal containing starch.

1. Have a fatty snack 10-30 min before your meal. They suggest cheese or nuts.

2. Start your meal with a salad.

3. Use a vinegar based salad dressing.

4. Include a serving of vegetables with your meal.

5. Include protein with your meal.

6. Consider having a glass of wine or a shot of alcohol with your meal.

7. Eat sweets for dessert only.

8. Go for a walk after your meal.

And most important of all, never eat refined carbs on an empty stomach. Of course, it might not be realistic for you to incorporate all of these sugar blockers with every meal. But remember combining sugar blockers works better than relying on just one kind. As a rule of thumb, use 3 types of sugar blockers for each serving of starch.

Other pointers they mention.

It only takes a little fat to slow stomach emptying. 5 gm.

It takes 2-4 Tbs of vinegar to slow starch absorption...about the amount you would use on a salad.

A 4 oz serving of protein will boost the first phase insulin response to starch.

Fiber requires 10 gm to do it's job to reduce your after-meal blood sugar surge by 25%. Choose foods that are not only high in fiber but have a Glycemin Load of less than 50. They provide a list of GL of different fruits and vegetables but you can find that online.

They also list some fiber supplements that can be used.

Daily exercise is emphasized, too, as helping to lower blood sugar.

I am going to keep all these things in mind. What I'm doing is not working, so I have been reading up on some other plans to get some ideas. I looked into Slow Carb, and there are some good points, but also some bad points. I do very well with breakfast and lunch and usually have great blood sugar before dinner. But dinner has to be based on what DH will eat and there comes the problems. Also, I have to work on shutting down my eating after dinner. Other than that, I don't know what else I can do.

Carol Sue Thanks for the information. Today has not been a good eating day for me. Reading what you just shared makes me realize why I did better following the Dummie's for Low Carbing book we we read. I didn't get these moments of wanting to eat all the time. Also my fbs came down to 108 in just a few days. So I think I need to go back to eating that way. It also solves my problem of cooking for DH and me. After watching the Dr. Fung videos, I understand that the important thing is to get the insulin down first and then the weight will come.

He also mentioned a medicine that my doctor told me about that causes you to pee the sugar out. If I need to, I just might have him prescribe it if I need it at least long enough to get this all under control if I don't get it back down before my next visit. I know it worked.

I was talking to a friend today at church about the shingles shot. Did you have any of the side effects from the your shot that she told me about? Her sister refused to have the shot one because it cost $400 without insurance and she read the side effects were more painful than having the shingles and even breaking out in rashes. My skin is very sensitive, I sure don't want any more rashes and I don't think I could handle any pain worse than I had when I had the shingles. You are the only one I know besides the 2 of us who has had the shot so I thought you could tell me how it affected you. TIA.

Trish, I didn't have any side effects from the shot. Not even a sore arm where they injected it. I know about 10 people personally who had it and did not have any side effects, but everyone is different. My doctor told me that thousands of people take Cipro and don't get any side effects, but the package inserts said it can cause tendonitis in the shoulders, and my tendonites started 3 days after starting the Cipro. There can always be some people who get side effects from any drug. I heard that the shingles shot costs $200 without insurance, but I thought Medicare covered it nationally. I have a medicare supplement and it cost me $40. I got mine at Rite Aid. I heard it costs more if you get it at the doctor's office.

EDIT: Here is a link I found online that says it's covered by Medicare Part D, the prescription drug plan.

http://www.medicare.gov/coverage/shingles-vaccine.html


My doctor told me about the med that makes you pee out the sugar, but it was brand only, and brand is higher cost with my insurance, so I chose not to get it and took the generic Glimiperide instead. I really don't know if your doctor is going to prescribe any of that for you, Trish. You might be having some slightly higher blood sugar readings, but all in all yours have been much lower than they were before. If your A1C is good, I don't see him prescribing meds for you. It's worth a try to mention it, though if you really feel that you need it.

Today I made hot sausage and vegetables for dinner. DH ate his sausage on a bun, and as much as I wanted it, I ate mine without the bun. Good girl!

When I went shopping today I bought some baby dill pickles. That was another thing the book mentioned to help you get some vinegar in before a meal. I don't eat pickles much but I will if they are going to help me.

For now, I am going to stay away from carbs as much as I can, and when the situation arises where carbs are included, I will just do the best I can to use some of the starch blocking techniques. Right now I still feel a little bit hungry but I will drink some water and maybe the hunger will go away. It might not be real hunger, because my body is accustomed to me eating until I am stuffed, so eating until I am satisfied would naturally feel different.

Mad, my blood sugar AND weight go up sometimes for no apparent reason. It is sure a lot easier to gain weight than it is to lose!

I have never eaten any Indian food, but I would love to try it. I don't know if that will ever happen though, because DH would not even try it. It took me 30 years to get him to try Chinese and he's only had that twice. I have no hope for Indian Food. What did you have?

Shannon, glad to hear you're sticking to your plan. You go girl!!

weight is finally going down today.
Carol Sue, I love Indian food. My daughter-from-another-mother, Liz, married a man whose parents are Bengali, and we regularly get family gatherings with Indian food. Complex spice mixes are the highlight, not all are hot, (but some are, and they can be very hot).
If you ever get to try some, I recommend a Korma for you. (usually chicken or lamb). It is a delicious sauce with almond, sultana raisin and often coconut flavours. The spice and flavour mix seems to be as individual as the cook. Everywhere has slightly different tastes to me. I started eating Indian food when I came to Waterloo region from my home in a small town of Welland in Niagara. I was excited by the chance to eat ethnic food, as my mother was a very plain cook. So Indian is my favourite, but love Thai, chinese and Japanese quite a lot.
These days my biggest challenge is to lower the carbs, and watch out for citrus. So I have been learning to cook my favourites myself. However, this particular Indian restaurant cooks all meals from scratch, so they will avoid the lemon for me and I feel quite safe to eat there.

FUnny, I bet most of us don't consider Italian and possibly greek cuisine as exotic anymore. But my mother sure did. However, she was used to Polish and Ukranian food from her childhood. (Welland has many people from Eastern Europe, and I think they all lived in her neighbourhood, to hear her tell it! However, I was 7 and in grade school before I saw a black person not on television)

Trish, I would say that really working the Atkins has reduced my sugar cravings and appetite in general, finally. I admit that cheating and using artificial sweeteners is a problem. I didn't give it up completely, I still have one packet of splenda on my breakfast high fat greek yogurt. (greek gods) I mix that with skinny ***** or holy crap cereal. ( chia, hemp and buckwheat bits) and have it 5-6 days a week. Other than that I have avoided sweets and desserts. Kim (Jersey Girl) suggests having a fatty snack when you get a sweet craving, and I have had either a spoonful of cream cheese or half an avocado and have managed to get past it.

It is VERY cold here (-33 last night) and yesterday it was hard for our furnace to keep the house warm. DH suggest I bake. What to do? I made my chocolate macaroons with stevia and splenda, so low carb, high protein (egg whites) and sugar free. I don't feel I had a lot of will power, but I ate two of the 36, and had one today. I am not going nuts, they are sitting in plastic containers on the counter and I am not obsessing about them. So I really think the withdrawal from sugar and artificial sweeteners has worked.
SO not to lecture, but to reassure you that it will work over time.

I hope everyone is warm, safe and snug, or that you have much warmer weather than we have here.
RUth, I hope there are folks who help you shovel or keep things clear and that you are snug in your place.

Mad, there are no Indian restaurants in our immediate area or I could order a take out meal to try. There are some in Pittsburgh, where there is a pretty good Indian population, but we rarely go into Pittsburgh, and that would involve DH also eating at the restaurant. I think I might have an Indian cookbook in my cookbook collection, so I might try a recipe from that. I know it involves a lot of spice that I don't usually use, but the thing with cooking it yourself is you can alter the amount of spice to your own taste, but still get the basic idea of the food.

When I started eating larger portions of vegetables and trying new ones, I lost my craving for sweets. It might have actually been the low carb eating that did it, too, as eating more veggies seems to go along with low carb eating. DH has baked good in the house at all times and they don't tempt me at all. The one exception is chocolate candy. I have not lost my taste for that, but he doesn't like chocolate so it is only in the house if I buy it, which I don't. Occasionally I will buy a single bar that they have displayed at the check out line in the grocery. It's eaten and then it's gone. That is only done occasionally, maybe a few times a year. I do get tempted by the potatoes, pasta and bread that he eats, and that's where my carbs come from, although I do try to control it. I eat no carbs at breakfast or lunch, but dinner is a different story, and I need to learn to control that. I do notice that including carbs in my meal causes me to overeat....the taste of the carbs makes me want more carbs. I like eating out because we each can choose our own meal Most restaurants we go to will substitute veggies for a starchy item and that works for me.

Thanks for the sharing Carol Sue and Madeleine. Comes back to what works for us individually. I'm back on the plan that got my fbs down recently. I have a doctor's appt less than a month away and I want to be sure things are improved when I see him.

I hope everyone is staying safe and warm. We aren't having it as bad as others. DS girlfriend who lives near Boston is having weather like Madeleine and Ruth. We hit 18 last night and we are supposed to have a mixture of rain and sleet tonight. DGS left today with the idea of staying with a fraternity friend to keep from driving in it to get to school tomorrow, but it is supposed to be out of here for us tomorrow sometime. Not sure if we will get some more the weekend. Kind of iffy on that.

After my binge eating yesterday, my fbs was down 11 pts from yesterday. Even my bp was down from yesterday, but the weight was up. This morning I started eating and using some of the insulin blocker ideas I learned from the dummies book and the Magic Foods book I read. I will also use grains, but only the recommended 3 to 5 a day and no more. I am drinking the ACV before I eat, but not the drink. I will use it in a salad before lunch and dinner. Since it seems to work for me, I see no reason to change it and it will help DH with his bs as well. I will learn how to cook new menus using what I've learned. I will also do it using IF. I think at this point I have to get serious about the exercise to get it all working together and will definitely make that a priority this week.

I looked up Slow Carb and didn't find too much, but will continue looking. I did read one person's story. I'm sure I'm not looking in the right place as it just kept sending me to new links that only led me back to where I started. However, I did find 2 threads on FB and my membership into the groups are pending. I will continue looking until I find more info.

Y'all stay warm and I'll catch y'all again later or tomorrow.

Trish, here are 2 sites that I read about Slow Carb, which is also called The 4 Hour Body, as you eat every 4 hours.

http://fourhourworkweek.com/2012/07/...ampaign=buffer

And this one gives the best information, and also includes some other diet plans, including IF.

http://www.chewfo.com/diets/the-4-ho...void-food-list

I was OK with the ACV when I reduced it to 3 tsp instead of 2 Tbs. I guess that was just too much for my system.

Hi everyone! I have been out of pocket for a while but I wanted to jump in and say hello. We have had a bit of everything - colds, husband traveling for work, kids out of school, Mardi Gras...life without king cake is HARD, y'all! But I'm hanging in! I had a piece a while back but I'm a lot more choosy about what KIND of king cake now, not just any ol' hunk of dough with icing will do I made it to exactly zero parades but I'm not very good at all that and never have been. I like my bathrooms indoors, thank you.

I see my dabetic education person tomorrow. I met and passed my weight loss goal, was a little less great on my steps goal (more days than not, but not five days a week), and my fasting glucose stays between 98 and 110 so I'm happy. So far, so good. Just need to keep going.

Hope all is well with everyone! Happy Fat Tuesday!!!

TheSecondHalf Congratulations on meeting your goal and such good FBS readings.

Well, I'm sticking to my plan. Not changing anything at this point. My FBS and weight is slowly coming back down. I have blood work in 2 weeks and a doctor's appt in 3. Looked back at how this worked for me when I started it last month and my FBS should be down in a good range by the time I see my doctor and get my A1c. Not sure how good the weight will be, but a good A1c would make him and me happy.

Hope everyone has power and staying warm. I understand there are places even here in SC without power today. I'm just trying to stay warm. Drinking so much water doesn't help me accomplish that.

2nd half: what exactly is king cake? and how does it relate to mardi gras.
Here we had Shrove Tuesday, and I made pancakes and bacon and sausage for supper. Had many kids over, as I wanted to give them the special childhood memories that I have, a special meal of pancakes and maple syrup on a school night (how crazy is that?)
Another thing about these traditions, we all seem happy to celebrate these fun things, but they are Christian traditions, (I'm not advocating, just saying) but we are not going with the next tradition, of Lent, where we fast, or cut back on eating and treats etc. I have been saying to my friends that I had to start lent early to make up for a great holiday season.
So if we really have a period of restriction, these holidays are fine.
I did have a couple of pancakes last night, but no weight change today.
I really had to work to stop myself afterward though, to not eat more, even though I wasn't hungry.
So there is a change with low carb too, I don't spend the evening thinking about food with the low carb diet, with carbs, I am craving all evening long, and practising abstinence. MUCH harder that is.
Back to normal today.
Happy Wednesday friends

Secondhalf, good job on your weight loss and blood sugar! You have made great improvements! I'm sure your diabetic educator will be pleased with your efforts.

Mad, I eat pancakes for Shrove Tuesday every year. My mother started the tradition when I was young. DH never heard of it. Yesterday, I forgot about it until after dinner. I had some frozen pancakes in the freezer so I got a couple out and ate them. When I was a kid, we had pancakes for supper many times, because they were cheap and we were poor. DH never heard of eating pancakes for supper, either. It's funny, because we grew up a couple miles away from each other but our family experiences were very different. He grew up with fasting during Lent and I didn't. We don't do it now.

My blood sugar is high this morning from eating those pancakes, especially since I ate them after I had already eaten dinner. I took a glimiperide, but I think I take it wrong. I think I am supposed to take it before I begin eating, and many times I forget about it until after I've eaten. By then the sugar is already on an upward swing. I think I do that because in reality, I don't want to be taking it at all.

Trish, I think your A1c will be good. I am to have blood work done on March 1 but I am going to postpone it, hoping for some improvement. I will make my doctor's appointment when I get the blood work done so he should have the results by then.

My husband is English and grew up with Pancake Tuesday or something. I'm from Louisiana and grew up with Fat Tuesday, king cake, Popeye's Chicken, and parades. I told him pancakes are a sad substitute for Mardi Gras he did not find this funny. I actually LOVE pancakes and think Pancake Tuesday is BRILLIANT so in the past, when not trying so hard to keep myself in check, we adopted the pancake thing as well so our daughter can have a little of both traditions.

King cake is like gumbo, everyone has their own version an thinks everyone else's version is "the fake one." Ours is like a moist cinnamon roll in a ring, covered with white icing and sugar in purple, gold, and green. There's a plastic baby inside. Whoever finds the baby provides the next cake. Traditionally you eat them from Jan 6 through Mardi Gras Day (Fat Tuesday, yesterday). Some are more like cake, some more like bread, some are filled. This year the big thing was savory king cake with boudin Stein's cane syrup on top (no thank you, that stuff is SWEET). You can also get them filled with strawberry, chocolate, cream cheese, pecan praline, lemon, etc. There's a pecan praline/cream cheese combo I'm particularly fond of.

I'm not even Catholic, I grew up in the one tiny little pocket of Baptists in South Louisiana but everyone else is so many of our traditions are Catholic.

Anyway, off for my appointment. Will catch up here in a bit. Love reading all your posts!!!