Diabetes and Diet

I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes last week. I’ve since met with my nutritionist, and what I was told *NOT* to eat floored me:

NO dairy (any kind..especially milk)
NO fruit
NO fruit juices/vegetable juices
NO sugary drinks (soda)
NO diet soda/ANYTHING with artificial sweetener (was told *everything* turns to glucose in the end, which i find hard to believe).
NO more than 75g of carbs per day

I feel like I’m starving…feel terribly deprived…and have very little energy. Does this mean that my nutritionist is wrong in the diet plan that she’s given me, and that I need to consult a new nutritionist…or am I just overreacting?

I am 26 weeks along, and failed my 1 hour non-fasting test with a 160..and also failed my 3 hour fasting (never was told the numbers, just that I had failed and now had G.D.)

Please, please, get a better nutritionist !!!
That diet is absolutely stupid for a pregnant woman!

Artificial sweeteners are exactly that, artificially sweet. Have you seen the size of them? Even if they do turn into glucose, there is such a tiny amount it makes absolutely no difference.
Feel free to drink as much diet soda – sweetened teas/coffee as you like.
You need dairy. Saying no dairy to a diabetic makes absolutely no sense at all.
Fruit, fruit is good. Full of vitamins, minerals, and lots of goodness your body needs right now.

Eat a healthy diet, avoid anything with added sugar, and get a better nutritionist that had an idea of what she’s on about.

Less than 75 carbs is a low-carb diet, that takes a lot of research and thought to make it a balanced, nutritionally complete diet.

Personally, i’d sue that woman for preffessional incompetence. That is a terrible, terrible diet.

The increasing obesity epidemic among children today is thought to be a leading cause in the increase in juvenile diabetes in this country today. While not everyone agrees on the causes and affects it is hard to argue with the continuing increase of children with Type 2 diabetes who are also overweight. In fact as the percentages of obese children raises so does the percentage of those affected with juvenile diabetes at nearly the same rate.

There appear to be two main reasons for this increase in Type 2 diabetes among children. Most children these days have a sedentary lifestyle that revolves around watching TV, playing video games, or using their computer to chat with and email their friends. The second issue for many kids is their poor eating habits and nutrition. Living the fast food life style or eating a bag a chips while playing video games is one of the major reasons for the preponderance of overweight kids we see today.

For many years Type 2 diabetes was something that overweight adults had to contend with, mainly because children weren’t having the weight issues they have today. Type 2 diabetes in an adult is also known as non-insulin-dependent diabetes. The primary treatment for this type of this disease is lifestyle changes involving diet and exercise for both children and adults.

One of the main concerns with type 2 juvenile diabetes is the affects it can have later on in a child’s life. Children with type 2 diabetes have been found to have more life threatening complications than type 1 diabetics. Some of the major problems juveniles with this type of diabetes face include heart disease, damage to the nervous system, renal failure, blindness, and limb amputations, particularly of the feet and lower legs.

The first line of defense against juvenile type 2 diabetes is probably the most obvious. Maintain a healthy body weight through proper diet and exercise thus preventing the onset of the disease. For children already diagnosed this same treatment applies if they are to avoid the complications to their health later in life.

For the juvenile diabetic a healthy diet is the cornerstone of their treatment. A well balanced diet low in sugar, saturated fats, and salt is the way to go. High fiber foods such as fruits and vegetables, along with complex carbohydrates are best for the diabetic. Even then foods high in carbs should be eaten throughout the day to help prevent large rises in blood glucose levels. Regular physical activity or exercise is also recommended to help insulin move glucose out of the blood and into the cells.

Childhood obesity is an epidemic all parents should take seriously. The long term health affects of all children are at stake, particularly with an increased risk of juvenile diabetes, a disease that will affect any child for their life time. By making easy lifestyle changes centered on a healthy diet and physical activity the onset of type 2 diabetes can be prevented, or even delayed in children at high risk.

Andrew Bicknell
http://www.articlesbase.com/non-fiction-articles/the-obesity-epidemic-and-juvenile-diabetes-140633.html

Have you found yourself asking this question after 6 months or 1 year of weight loss program? Maybe you have been dieting for a year now and you are probably also exercising, yet you don’t seem to be making any progress and you are worried. So you are now asking, why?

Some people actually loss the weight, maybe in their first 6 months but later gain it back. If you’re troubled by this it is most likely that you have been digressing from you plan. You’re not alone in this if you must know there are about 70% of the populations who suffer this problem.

First check out with your doctor to make sure you are not suffering type 2 diabetes mellitus. But it could also be that you are suffering the same problem every body out there who is trying to loss weight is suffering. They fail to seek expert advice. Or they have but are not adhering strictly to what was prescribed. The thing is that, we know fat binders work, but not every fat binder out there works as expected or promised. You can not afford to exercises just every now and then and expect that because you are on a diet, you should loss weight. It doesn’t just work that way. There has to be a well thought of diet plan as well as exercise plan.

Something I would suggest is maybe trying a particular kind of meal works for you, it makes sense to keep going with that food combined with fruits and vegetables. You can not keep trying different regimen forever; you need to stick to things that work. Use only tested diet plans.

If you have been using say, 1% milk that contains a very low amount of fat, then start using skim milk. You might want to incorporate lean protein like fish or chicken. You can also get good proteins from things like beans (some have more/better protein than others) or nuts.

Another secret is to stay away from snack bars. Don’t buy and don’t have it at home. Even if it belongs to someone else, the kid for example because, sometimes you will need a cooperative family to succeed in losing weight. The allure of these snacks is difficult to avoid sometimes. However, if you consider that you health’s worth more than a couple of snacks, it should serve as enough motivation for you to want to stay alive.

I am out lining some of these steps because I believe your problem is in either your wrong diet plan or lack of consistency-maybe ignorance too. So you should include some weight lifting exercises into your routine. This weight does not have to be heavy- Cardiovascular exercise is great and plays an important role in reaching your goal weight and maintaining a healthy lifestyle, however, once you stop the exercise you stop burning calories as well. With this you not just burn calories during exercises but continue even after the exercise.

Find out more on how to Natural weight loss

Rimzan Farook
http://www.articlesbase.com/women’s-health-articles/why-am-i-not-losing-weightweight-loss-701780.html

Health nutrition from food you eat and drink is your health and strength. What you eat is part of what you are and what you will become. What you choose for a meal has an impact on our body either positively or negatively. The quality of food you take affects the length and quality of your life. Many life threatening diseases such as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, cancers, are often, at least in part, linked to poor nutrition. Much of these diseases could be prevented with sufficient health nutrition intake.

We are often told that we must eat a balanced diet to obtain health nutrition for our wellbeing. However, what is a balanced diet? How do you know you are achieving the correct balance? Many of us do not eat enough healthy carbohydrates. Many of us are unaware of a diet which is very low in fat can cause as much harm to our body as a high-fat diet. Many of us do not know that we eat more protein than we really need, and that too much can be bad for us. Many of us fall short on the daily requirement of vitamins and minerals that our body need.

A perfect diet should contain all needed health nutrition such as carbohydrates, fat, protein, vitamins, minerals, fibre, in the right quantities. The WHO suggests at least fifty per cent of calories in our diet should come from complex carbohydrates, no more than thirty five per cent comes from fat and up to fifteen per cent comes from protein. The allowance for alcohol consumption is no more than five per cent.

To get fifty per cent or so of carbohydrates you need to ensure that at every meal you have a good portion of starchy carbohydrates food such as rice, pasta, potatoes, or bread. At most meals, you need good portion of vegetables and/or fruits. You should also include small portion of low- or moderate-fat protein such as fish, poultry, pulses and lean meat in our diets. High-fat protein such cheese, dairy product and fatty meats should be eaten less frequently and in even smaller portions. As all fat is a calorie-dense food, ideally you should include only small quantities of oil such as olive or corn oil in your meals. The majority part of your daily calorie needs have been taken up. There is only little room for alcohol and for the sugars. So, add these to your diet in moderation, if at all.

A variety and a balance intake of health nutrition is the most important element of a healthy diet for life. To ensure adequate amounts of all necessary vitamins, minerals, fat, protein, carbohydrates and fibre, eat as wide a variety of foods as you can. You should eat different sources of carbohydrates, varying types of protein, lots of different vegetables, salads and fruits.

There is no need to worry too much about the exact nutritional content of every morsel of food you eat. The fact is that almost any kind of meal can be adapted to form part of a healthy diet if you follow the abovementioned guidelines.

Casey Yew
http://www.articlesbase.com/nutrition-articles/a-balance-intake-of-health-nutrition-68585.html

The most common set of diseases facing Americans moving into their 40′s and beyond has been termed “metabolic syndrome”. Metabolic syndrome is a collection of disease symptoms that tend to occur together. These are excess body fat around your waist, high blood pressure, high LDL cholesterol, low HDL cholesterol, elevated triglyceride levels, and high fasting blood sugar.

As more Americans are carrying a high-deductible health plan along with a Health Savings Account, many say they are beginning to pay more attention to their health. Health Savings Accounts allow you to put aside pre-tax money to be used for future medical expenses. Because deposits grow tax-deferred and are not taxed for medical withdrawals, if you fund your account and stay healthy, you could have hundreds of thousands of dollars in your Health Savings Account by the time you retire.

The fundamental metabolic disturbance that seems to be common in almost all people who have metabolic syndrome is insulin resistance. Insulin is a hormone that your body uses to move the carbohydrate that you eat into your cells. If you are insulin resistant, your cells don’t respond well to insulin, and your pancreas has to produce higher amounts in order to keep your blood sugar from going too high. (Once your pancreas is no longer able to keep up with this increased demand, you become diabetic.) If you are insulin sensitive, your body is responding well to smaller amounts of insulin.

Fortunately, metabolic syndrome is almost entirely preventable. Avoid it, and you’ll greatly increase your chances of also avoiding cardiovascular disease, breast cancer, colon cancer, prostate cancer, stroke, and many other serious conditions. Though all the mechanisms behind the metabolic syndrome have not been worked out, the evidence is strong that combinations of several lifestyle strategies are very effective in preventing this condition.

Exercise

Exercising does more than just burn calories or build muscle. One of the most profound benefits of exercise is its effect on insulin sensitivity. When insulin is released in response to carbohydrate ingestion, glucose transporters come to the surface of the cell in order to carry the glucose into the cell. In muscles and fat cells this transporter is called Glut-4. Exercise itself helps Glut-4 to move through the cell membrane to the surface of your muscle cell, causing these cells to be much more insulin sensitive. Even a single bout of exercise will cause your muscles to respond more effectively to insulin.

Eat Low-Glycemic Foods

The glycemic index is a measure of how quickly a food raises our blood sugar. The high-glycemic carbohydrates in the American diet are primarily the “white foods” (bread, pasta, rice, white potatoes, and sugar). These foods cause many of the changes associated with metabolic syndrome, including lower HDL levels, and higher triglycerides. When a person eats these foods year after year, insulin levels remain chronically high. The result is that eventually the cells become less responsive to the insulin, in turn leading to increased risk of obesity, hypertension, heart disease, diabetes, and premature death. Low-glycemic carbohydrates include most fruits and vegetables. Eating a diet that limits or avoids high-glycemic grains, potatoes, and sugars, and includes more low-glycemic fruits and vegetables, fish, and lean meat can dramatically improve your insulin sensitivity.

Eat the Right Fat

We’ve talked in previous issues about the seemingly miraculous health benefits of fish oil. Fish oil improves insulin sensitivity. Eskimos, who consume high quantities of fish oil, rarely experience diabetes, even though they are often overweight. Though the mechanism by which fish oil works isn’t yet understood, many researchers believe that fish oil makes the cell membrane more “fluid”, enabling the Glut-4 transporters to more easily move to the surface of the cell in response to insulin. Everyone who does not eat fish on a regular basis should consider taking a high-quality fish oil.

Saturated fats and trans-fats, in contrast, make the cell membrane more stiff and inflexible, and also reduce insulin sensitivity. Saturated fats are found primarily in beef, pork, and dairy products and trans-fats are found in processed foods. Saturated fats should be minimized, and trans-fats should ideally be completely eliminated from your diet.

Eat Enough Protein

If you’re avoiding starches, you’ll need to replace those calories with something else – that should be lean protein. Protein satisfies your appetite more than any other macronutrient, it increases metabolism, and it will contribute to weight loss. The best proteins are lean meats like turkey breast and chicken breast, lean beef, fish, and eggs. And if you are overweight, nothing will improve your insulin sensitivity faster than losing some weight. In fact, weight loss significantly improves all aspects of metabolic syndrome. Eat the right foods, and your body will tend to normalize at the right weight without you having to count calories or starve yourself.

Take Action

Remember, just reading an article has never made anyone healthier. Though there are drugs available to treat some of the symptoms, doctors have no pharmaceutical cure for metabolic syndrome, and almost all individuals become more insulin resistant as they age. It is the lifestyle choices and the actions that you take today to improve your insulin sensitivity that will have a powerful impact on the length and quality of your life.

The characteristic that many people like about Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) is that they reward those who take responsibility for themselves. By putting aside money to pay for future medical expenses, you are being a responsible citizen, and deserve the tax benefits that an HSA offers. Make the same investment in your health, and you’ll not only have the good health to enjoy your retirement, but you’ll also have plenty of money in the bank as well.

Wiley Long
http://www.articlesbase.com/insurance-articles/how-health-savings-accounts-reduce-medical-expenses-and-help-you-avoid-metabolic-syndrome-73158.html

This scares me to death, every day you walk down the street it is becoming more and more apparent that the average person is becoming larger and this trend has escalated over recent years.

Why are they getting fatter? Here are some reasons…

* Less incidental activity

* Automated and computerized lifestyle

* Longer working hours and less leisure

* Increased consumption of processed foods

* Our food servings are larger than ever

Being overweight, or obese, has now moved from a social nuisance and domestic embarrassment to an official disease. The American Heart Association has announced obesity is a major risk for heart disease.

Obesity itself has become a major and dangerous epidemic. More than 70% of US adults are overweight and that figure is rapidly increasing.

What do most people do to rid their body of unwanted fat? They diet! Dieting is now a trillion dollar industry and just about every month a new diet is announced.

If you do have weight problems how do you find a diet that is safe, effective and sustainable?

What you do is try to find a diet that includes a variety of foods that you can live with comfortably. You have to take a long-term view and include plenty of exercise.

A good diet is one that supplies all of the essential vitamins and minerals, and is not high in fat or protein.

Research on people, who have successfully lost a lot of weight and kept it off long term, shows that the vast majority succeeded by consuming a low fat diet high in fibre coupled with strength training and cardiovascular activity.

Be wary of diets that

* Ban a specific food group

* Promise a quick fix

* Replace a balanced meal with a drink or a snack bar

* Make recommendations based on single studies

* Make recommendations to help sell a single product

Excess weight does not appear overnight and nor will it disappear overnight! In fact the faster you lose weight, the more likely you are to pile the pounds back on.

Seek out a program that will help you maintain long-term body fat losses by providing attainable solutions such as a program that promotes lifestyle changes, healthy eating and regular exercise.

Regular exercise is important (i.e. strength training) as it burns fat, boosts your metabolism and also increases your energy levels.

Dietary changes can lead to initial weight loss, but this is only for the short term. Exercise is essential for maintaining weight loss for the long term.

Now let’s take a closer look at what food is made up of and then you will have a good idea of what to look for in your daily eating plan. Firstly we need a wide range of nutrients to perform various functions for a healthy life.

These nutrients include carbohydrates, proteins and fat and are all present in the food we eat on a daily basis.

The foods containing these nutrients are cereals, legumes, nuts, vegetables, fruits, milk products and flesh foods (fish, meat and poultry).

We need all these nutrients to live and thrive and since we receive them through the food we eat, our food must be well balanced and in the proper proportions. Food is a fuel; the body requires this fuel for energy, which is measured in fats, carbohydrate and protein.

Each of these nutrients provides different amounts of energy and these are measured in calories.

Nutrient Calories per Gram

Carbohydrate 4

Protein 4

Fat 9

Let’s look at carbohydrates first, carbohydrates supply energy for our body, they provide fibre for the prevention of disease and taste and texture to food. They are found in cereals, potatoes, fruits and vegetables.

They come in two basic forms, simple and complex. Simple carbs are easily identified by their taste and are sweet. Complex carbs, such as potatoes are pleasant to the taste buds, but are not sweet.

They are then divided into two groups, high fibre and low fibre.

High-fibre foods are the healthiest choices for nutrition and the intake of these foods is associated with a lower incidence of cancer and diabetes. Carbohydrates supply the sort of calories easily burned during cardiovascular exercise.

They are often wrongly feared and considered fattening, but the most important factor in weight control is balancing the energy (calories) consumed.

Please remember:

Energy In is more than Energy Out = Weight gain

Energy In is equal to Energy Out = Weight maintenance

Energy In is less than Energy Out = Weight loss

Different foods affect the ability to exercise at different levels. High levels of exercise (cardio and strength training) require carbohydrate as a fuel source; at lower levels it is fat.

A lack of carbohydrate in the diet will lead to fatigue, the inability to exercise effectively, and excess fat consumption. When our food is digested, carbohydrates are broken down into simple sugars.

These sugars are absorbed by the body and used by the muscles or stored as glycogen in the muscles and liver. As our glycogen storage capacity is limited, carbohydrate needs to be continually topped up by the foods we eat.

But the body has an unlimited storage capacity for fat!

The average person is extremely vulnerable to fad diets and extreme dieting behaviours. The low carbohydrate diet is one of the latest eating plans to hit the streets.

This current diet craze is very popular but there are safer and more effective methods based on scientific research, to reduce body fat levels.

Low carbohydrate dieting is simply wrong.

Why is this? Just as a car runs better on a certain fuel, so does the human body. Unfortunately the latest low-carbohydrate fad diets are not the fuel mix the human body was designed to run on.

Carbohydrates contain 4 calories per gram, whereas fats contain 9 calories per gram. For weight loss, the priority is to decrease total calorie intake. Reducing the amount of fat in the diet will make the biggest difference in reducing total daily calorie intake and hence weight loss.

Carbohydrate intake is not fattening, excess calorie intake is fattening.

If you aren’t having enough carbohydrates in your diet you will experience:

* Fatigue due to low blood sugar levels inadequate intake

of vitamins and minerals

* Low fibre intake, which may affect bowel movements

* ‘Bad’ breath due to the breakdown products of fats

(called ketones)

The bottom line for carbohydrates and weight loss is to:

* Try to balance carbohydrate intake with activity levels

* Maintain energy levels by eating carbohydrate rich foods on

a regular basis

* Carbohydrate rich foods are normally low in fat and

nutrient-rich

A real weight loss program includes all the food groups, strength training, and low-level aerobics, a slight decrease in your daily calorie levels and a program that can be followed for life.

In conclusion try to achieve a balanced diet, eating a balanced variety of foods will help you to feel great every day, ensure better long-term health and improve weight control.

Gary Matthews
http://www.articlesbase.com/nutrition-articles/carbohydrates-what-you-must-know-122454.html