Health and Fitness, August 2010

[Harmony]

Thanks! Those sound good. I especially like mandarin oranges. Gonna try some version of them.

[Indiana]

Harriet HRH has been eating his gift for about a week now. How does he like it?

[Harriet]

Well, "like" might not be the word. He is tolerating it well and sees the dramatic change there really is in his eating. He says, for instance, as he plans getting his B12 shot as the dr's office opens tomorrow, he would normally plan to pick up a something-biscuit at the fast food between there and work, being off-schedule. Now every day finds him carrying an NS bar or muffin and a piece of fruit, so it dawns on him what a difference it was making to his injection days to think he "had to resort" to that big biscuit.

He says a lifeline is little salmon cups he's allowed as an extra daily protein. Also steamed broccoli. (Several veggies are all-you-can-eat.) The only complaint (that isn't about portion size) is that the spaghetti seems to cause a feeling of acid, which he never gets with any other spaghetti. He tried another beef patty and it was another wrestling match to keep it from falling apart. It tastes okay, just in several pieces, hard to balance onto a bun!

He's learned that sometimes an NS food that doesn't taste so great still turns out to be a favorite because it may be filling. The first thing he ever tried was a cinnamon muffin and what a face he made, but now he says he didn't choose enough of those, because they are so satisfying.

He absolutely hates that corn and beans are considered carbohydrates in his little NS check-off booklet, not vegetables at all, so his best ideas of veggie additions to supper are out the window! (I know our starch counters here will be amused at that) Btw, according to NS, potatoes do not seem to exist... ...

I think he (OR ANYBODY) could have done this from his own grocery store list, and probably cheaper, except for the "D" part (diabetic emphasis on glycemic "load" of foods). That is confusing to him, when added to other tough criteria for buying, too, and he would just give up and buy the wrong things out of frustration. We're hoping this teaches him smart buying.

[Nancy]

I've done my walk and it's cooler out 65* was
very nice for taking a walk!

[Lynlee]

Harriet`the`beans`and`corn`is`interesting...
All`forms`of`beans/pulses`and`corn?
I`like`to`think`that`sweetcorn`and`cornflour`are`different...and`that`green`(round`or`broad)`beans
are`different`from`kidney`beans..
Sweet`potato`and`potato`are`not`related...Is`sweet`potato`allowed?
I`just`went`looking`at`food`vaues`at`http://www.glycemicindex.com/
corn`on`cob...some`items`ok`on`that`list.
Sweet`potato`surprised`me.`result`is`higher`than`I`thought.
`It`depends`on`type`and`how`it`was`prepared...
I`couldn't`find`green`beans.

[Nancy]

Mon. walk w/ dgds done.
Saw doe & her 2 fawns too!
Smilies are not working wondering why; they
worked last week!
Ok got one to work later after I posted trying this one again.

[Indiana]

Nancy I just checked your posts from last week and I don't see smilies in any of them. They are working for everyone else I wonder why they aren't working for you. I'll look around and see if I can see why.

[Harriet]

Lynlee, they are saying any kind of bean or pea is considered a carb excepting green beans, which are a veggie. I don't know about snap-pea type - that might be a veggie, too, since with them you are also eating the "husk" rather than just bean, like with green beans. One-third cup sweet potatoes are allowed as one additional carb.

HRH has dropped hints that his weight loss number so far has been worth it. I haven't asked for numbers. I'm trying to pretend it doesn't matter to me! The real number that we are both most interested in will be whether the A1C moves down at all, and it's the dr who makes the decision when that test happens. I will be calling NS in the morning and asking what to do about the spaghetti meals - we bought several of those and they are just too acid to eat, really not tolerable. He seems okay with their chicken.

I do feel some pressure about frequent grocery shopping. Every few days, we realize he's about to run out of some of the few things hes allowed and looks forward to. Because there is limitation (and experimenting to find ideas), and because a majority of the additional items he's allowed are perishable, I am really hopping on the grocery route. We're learning. He definitely asks me to shop - the temptation inside a store is better avoided.

Harmony, he says to tell you no, right now he wouldn't want to hear you had received this gift because you don't really have a health concern to address like he does, so he'd like to think you are enjoying variety while you're eating smart. He says later when he is back to eating more normally, and just remembering the good parts of this, he might recommend it more!

[Indiana]

Harriet HRH's A1C I'm sure will be down. Not just from this month but it will keep going down with healthy eating.

Earlier you talked about glycemic index. I couldn't get into that. I just couldn't figure out how ripe my banana was to see if the glycemic index had gone up. I just went with exchanges and made sure I spread out my exchanges over the day with an am and pm fruit. My numbers came down very quickly.

I think he will be pleased with his numbers. Does he take his blood sugar at home?

[Harriet]

I did the Basic T-Tapp workout of 15 minutes this morning.

No, HRH doesn't test at home, because just 3 weeks of morning testing, when reported to dr., was so normal it caused the dr to cancel the rest of the 30-day testing and pull back on his opinion of how bad HRH's symptoms were. Actually, the testing things are here still, I think.

Indiana, it can be a puzzlement! Add to that glycemic count difficulty the reading HRH has just done this week on information about "resistant starches" ( beans, potatoes, barley, brown rice, corn) helping control blood sugar levels. For instance, that a banana that is slightly green is actually a resistant starch, too. What a puzzle this can all be, when you realize that the NS diabetic meals idea is to forgo the potatoes completely and restrict the others.

"Because it skips routine digestion, we see lower blood sugar and insulin levels following a resistant starch-rich meal," - Christine Gerbstadt, MD, RD, CDE, a spokesperson for the Am. Dietetic Association, quoted in Prevention. She says she'd like to see the average American woman's consumption go up from 4 to 8 grams daily. (1/2 cup potato has 4 grams, 1/2 cup corn has 2 grams, that small slightly green banana has 6, so I find it surprising that "average daily consumption" is just 4) Prevention says the best way to eat a cooked starchy food is to let it cool after cooking, because cooling raises resistant starch levels. Just don't reheat, because that causes the resistant starch levels to go down.

I remember "resistant starch" chat during the "banana diet" boom. Remember that? And of course that book I mentioned in Discussing Diabetes thread as the one we'd marked up and post-it-noted most (smile) recommended vegetarian meals for similar reasons.