Anyone Here Diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes?

[Twelvefret]

If so, can you control with diet and exercise. Why or why not?

What if I said you could get better results with your diet than medications?

I am asking because of a discussion I am having. Whatever you think is what I want to know. Thank you in advance.

[kuzzie]

Hi my son is diabetic and watch your food is the best med good luck

[callouses]

My brother is a diabetic and he can control his numbers with diet and exercise. He does atkins diet.

[Bingoccc]

I'm type 2 and I know others. One fellow was a healthy weight, ate well and got regular, significant exercise. He is in great shape. His blood sugar got worse and worse and he ended up on insulin within two years. He really struggles to control it. Without insulin and pills he would die regardless of his efforts.

I can control mine with diet and pills. Due to arthritis I don't get the exercise I should and I'm not in good shape.

Diet and exercise are important control techniques for all diabetics but we have different bodies and organs. The amount of support one needs from drugs/insulin varies person to person. There are no hard and fast rules. Other than to manage it with the advice of your doctor and not with well-intended free advice.

[s2y]

My dad is pre-diabetic, basically with a glucose and A1C a hair under Type 2. Diet and long low intensity workouts are your friend.

[jpd]

I've found the key to control your blood sugar, besides diet and alcohol, is to exhaust the sugar content of the major muscle groups. Hope you find what works for you.

[Roselynne]

I'm Type 2, but on insulin and a low-carb diet. Diagnosed at a late stage.

Many (most?) Type 2s can manage on diet alone (as long as it's the right one for them) -- but not all. I can't eat anything without insulin. In fact, I can't fast without it.

[JCave]

I'm not yet however it tends to run in the family. I am attempting to break that with diet and exercise. Exercise needs improvement of course. Nutrition is key for me and has been for years. Stay off the meds if at all possible, and yes, I think (hope) it is possible.

[philjs]

I have Type 2 (adult-onset) diabetes but have been borderline for my entire life. I've been able to control it through careful control of my diet and long, low intensity hikes and walks. Diet/exercise have been able to keep me borderline as I age (genetics and careless disregard of diet when I was younger are why I've been borderline throughout my life) but my fasting blood sugar these days is almost always just at the limit (+ or - 7.0).

Day by day by day, etc.

Phil

[Twelvefret]

Please let me make sure you all understand, I do not have Type 2 Diabetes.

I am in a discussion with someone who thinks no treatment is superior to treatment. I contend his position is theoretical than real experience.

This person sees the pharmaceutical industry as promoting diets that will result in the need for medication. They see the pharma industry as the sole bad guy who value profits before patients.

I have attempted to educate this person that individuality, demographics, insurance, access to specialists, and date of diagnosis play important roles in which therapies will work.

I have also reminded this man that diet and exercise, type of carbohydrates, are essential elements of glycemic control.

Any opinions, agreeing with me or otherwise, are appreciated. If I am wrong, I need to know.

[DVGuy]

I came here at the suggestion of a friend, after discussing with him the dangers of relying on drugs, based on a meta-analysis of a few dozen studies which were published in the New England Journal of Medicine recently, just to post my brief experience, and to encourage everyone who struggles with this issue to do all that they can to stay away from meds.

IN short, they do more harm than good. Yes, they lower blood glucose, but they greatly increase the risk of death, and provide no actual benefit in terms of health outcome.

What I have learned by careful study and by experience.

If your body senses starvation, which it does when your diet is high-glycemic loaded carbohydrate based and lacking in saturated fat, (like the one the ADA diet recommends.... bread, grains, pasta, fruit, low-fat dairy, which contains lactose) it will signal the body to store fat, and this will further decrease insulin sensitivity.

Starving yourself by reducing calories, especially when the calories you do intake are from high-glycemic foods, (which I will from this point on refer to as simply "carbs") will reduce your muscle mass, reduce your insulin sensitivity, reduce your metabolic rate, imbalance your thyroid and other delicate hormones, and set you up for disaster.

So, you'll "lose weight," meaning you'll weigh less when you get on the scale, but you are totally screwing up your metabolism, and decreasing your insulin sensitivity and setting yourself up for the diabetes cycle. It's not the solution. Your body absolutely NEEDS fat, saturated fat in particular, to function optimally. They are proving to be the absolutely healthiest kinds of fat to eat, yet the ADA, AMA, et al still discourages them.

You'll end up initially losing the "weight" but you'll almost always gain the weight back in the form of body fat. It's why most diets fail, because they don't give the body what it needs. We know it, and most of us have probably experienced it, if we've ever tried to diet.

Research this for yourself very carefully. It's absolutely true.

Even better diets than what the ADA recommends, such as other "low-carb" diets will often include too much protein, which the body will convert to glucose anyway (gluconeogenesis) if you consume more than you actually need to maintain muscle mass.



Let me give you my own stats.

I had high blood pressure, blood glucose problems, tachycardia, and my BMI was way out of line. I'm 5' 10" small-medium frame, and weighed close to 200 pounds. I was fat. I had a 40 inch waistline, but I was eating "healthy" high-carb, low-fat, and I was doing aerobics literally every day for two hours, including biking for 20 miles a day, seven days a week for TWO YEARS!

My weight, blood pressure, and medication doses were going up and up. I got my BP up to 190/110 and that's with meds!

I monitored what I ate, and it was within the normal caloric range, but actually a bit low, even by ADA standards, because I belived the same myth. Eat less + do more = lose weight.

When I switched to a Keto Diet, and started doing FIVE MINUTES three times a week of HIT training and stopped doing the aerobics, I lost 40 pounds of body fat, gained 37 pounds of lean muscle mass, my waist size went down to 30 inches (I had to buy new pants) and I got off ALL the medications. I also stopped using plastic and other hormone disruptors.

I saw immediate changes, but the total transformation took about 6 months.

I am not unusual, and I even deliberately ate a slice of cake or bread a couple of times, but I found that I didn't even like the taste of it anymore, and eventually, all my food cravings just vanished so I didn't miss the "old way" of the ADA diet that was killing me.

Today, I eat 80% fat (no vegetable "healthy myth" fats... only saturated fats, like coconut oil, butter) and 15% protein, and 5% low-glycemic carbs from veggies, and my total calories are TWO TO THREE TIMES WHAT I ATE BEFORE when I was eating the "healthy" ADA style diet.

With this LCHF (Low-Carb, High-Fat) eating, my BP today is 117/76, my waist is between 29-30" depending on how I'm training, and I'm 45 years old.

Human bodies do vary, and everyone starts in a unique place, mentally, physically, and spiritually, but the basic principles of metabolism work the same, and if you give any body what it needs to thrive, it will do so on its own.

Personally, I believe that's the way God designed us to live. We were not created to eat a carb-based diet.

Last point in my rant against the ADA (and to shout the praises of the Keto-Diet) would be that it’s not easy to fully adapt to ketones as primary fuel over glucose, particularly if you are stressed a lot, because stress increases your blood glucose and makes your blood sugar very unstable, so ANY diet and exercise routine that doesn’t include stress reduction and proper sleep will likely not be as successful as one that does.

I've not been here since July, 2013, so yeah... that's all I wanted to say.

For the record, and in full-disclosure, I started my education as a pre-med student with the goal of becoming a cardiology specialist, but my distaste for the pharma industry and the inherent conflicts of interest that abound within the system bothered my conscience so much that I decided that I could never practice medicine that way, and I didn't know there were other ways at the time, so I left the program by choice.

I don't know everything, of course, but I did Keto-adapt properly, and it absolutely saved my life.

Peace.

[pitner]

TYPE II HERE BUT ON INSULIN. No failure in my thinking just the way my body is. Better 4 shots a day than sawing off body parts cause I'm not taking care of myself. I consider all types of management a plus.

[Twelvefret]

Thank you, Don. If nothing else happens, perhaps those with Type 2 will be benefitted from the discussion.

Originally Posted by DVGuy

For the record, and in full-disclosure, I started my education as a pre-med student with the goal of becoming a cardiology specialist, but my distaste for the pharma industry and the inherent conflicts of interest that abound within the system bothered my conscience so much that I decided that I could never practice medicine that way, and I didn't know there were other ways at the time, so I left the program by choice.

I don't know everything, of course, but I did Keto-adapt properly, and it absolutely saved my life.

I would hate to admit that distaste for pharma prevented me from becoming a person who could help others, but everyone has their reasons for not becoming a successful physician and forgoing the income.

[BoneDigger]

I am borderline and it runs in my family. I have been reading a lot of information lately, from experts to just people posting on a forum. It would appear that for most, but not all, it can be controlled with moderate exercise and eating correctly. I am working towards those goals as we speak.

Todd

[Dan Carey]

My wife developed Type II diabetes about five years ago. She took some meds at first but they caused major swings in her sugar level. She went to a different doctor and, with his help, has kept her sugar under control for four years now.
She follows the Diabetes Self-Management newsletter and exercises regularly.

Diabetes Self-Management
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We rarely eat processed food, use fresh vegatables, and have cut way back on red meat. We also cut back on salt and salty snacks.