Thread: Diabetes!

I used to work with a Russian guy who always told the office birds who wanted to lose weight "No fat people in the gulag. Cabbage soup, black bread, nothing else, and lots of hard labour."

I weighed 122 kilos when diagnosed with diabetes. I went to a strict diabetes friendly diet and walked a minimum one hour daily. Now I am 98 kilos and holding. Not easy but nor is losing legs and/or going blind as happened to a couple of mates. A total change of life style was required. Almost no grog, lean meat and not much of it, no sweets, lots of vegetables. None of those nice foods we like to pig out on. Definitely no white bread. Whole grain or rye only. White brings the blood glucose up, up, up quickly. Get the fat almost totally out of your diet. Don't waste time or money on dieticians. They are a waste of oxygen. They only tell you what you can glean from the Women's Weekly or New Idea.

Jonesfarm, just remember type 1 amd type 2 are quite different. Take advice fro..your diabetic educater. As for food, just eat a well balanced meal. They say to have carbs, personally i suggest cutting down on them, they affect my sugars drastically (type 1 for 23 years). Have 6 smaller meals a day if he can.
As for excercise, walking is probably the best, but may be incorporate it with something he is interested.
Last of all, Get a CGM!!!!! Being under 21 years of age he can get it for free, such an eye opener to how food and lack of movement affects you sugars.

what about that game pokermon or what ever its called, geocache even if ou need to get the other kds to hide hings within a 500mradius of the house and teach him to use a gps to findd them. I finnd bananas good for taking out the lows
cheers
blaze

At 135 kilos. he is bordering on grossly or morbidly obese. His exercise tolerance will be low. Start him on gentle walking as far as he can go before he runs out of energy. Walking will be the only exercise he can tolerate for some time until you get 15-20 kilos off him. Believe me, I know.

Make sure he has footwear with sturdy soles and wears them. No more bare feet or thongs outside. Wounds on the extremities of diabetics can be slow to heal and sometimes life threatening. They can turn gangrenous easily if circulation is impaired.

sorry to hear that about you boy. hydrotherapy might be an option for exercise as the boyancy will relive some of the weight bearing and still give some resistance benefits to exercise the muscles.

It sounds like a change for the whole family may be needed.
My family does lots of things to keep weight down, but it is a long trip.
With children you need to lead by example ....
Change all foods in the cupboard to healthy alternatives, plenty of fruit and vegies. Dont but highly processed foods in any shape or form.
Remove all remote controls , every little bit of exercise matters.
We always eat at the table . No tv dinners. Takeaway is rare and only when working late, never a reward.
Reduce internet time by turning the router off. Increasing the off times.
Saw a tv show about 'feeders' , Find out if you have a feeder and get them to reduce the feeding.
Family walks and exercise are always good but everyone needs to go.

Get an electric bike if needed to help start the exercise and outdoors happening.
Go camping if you can, far away from power and phone coverage.
There is some good information on the web re food combinations etc but non processed wins every time.

Good luck with helping your son it wont be easy.

Ian
Bittern

Every journey of 1000 miles starts with a single step.

Hi Jonesfam, and while it will be hard for a while, you can change the way he does things without changing the way he does things.

I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes about 17-18 years ago, and food, of any type, is my enemy, because I liked lots of it.

When travelling, it is near impossible to find good quality, diabetic friendly food.

Also note, while sugar is bad, so is salt and if you can reduce the salt intake, at actually reduces the hunger pangs.

But exercise is definitely my biggest problem, that is until I found some interesting YouTube videos.

Try looking for LOW STRESS exercises for over weight people, but concentrate on exercises he can do while watching TV, you may even find some that work in with him playing his Xbox, hence the suggestion of changes without changes.

Best of luck.