Sunday, March 05, 2017
Quick Summary of My Actions in Dealing with Diabetes
(This is being edited with feedback from friends and comments.)
First thing I did was cut out soda, white flour products (tortillas!), and start trying to figure out what things I could eat. I think that not being sure about what to eat I ended up eating a low-calorie diet. This is also called calorie restriction.
I was testing glucose 2 hours after eating and first thing in the morning. My numbers were still far above average yet slowly coming down.
I started going to the gym right away. I knew of research about weight lifting being positive for diabetics and for diabetes prevention. I also had experimented with high intensity training specifically for diabetes.
I did 3 days of light lifting. I was doing 3 sets of 20 repetitions for a full body workout for 6 weeks. From previous lifting experience I knew that 6 weeks was a good period to allow joints and ligaments to adjust to lifting before going heavier.
Following this same Dr. Moseley I came across his 5-2 Diet and started doing more research on eating. I was trying to figure out how to adapt it. I was losing weight fast and my blood sugar numbers were not moving down as fast as I was hoping for. Yet I tried it.
Then I came across this.
I was experimenting still with a little less wheat bread and more yogurt. I was trying eat more veggies in the meantime.
Then I came across this work by Roy Taylor. I learned about Personal Fat Threshold. That is a threshold on how much fat your body can handle before saturating your liver and pancreas which are factors for diabetes.
This led me back to Dr. Moseley and I was going to try this 500 calorie a day diet for the new year. All of these previous experiments were done in December.
Then I came across Dr. Jason Fung.
I started with a combination of Intermittent Fasting (fasting for 12-16 hours a day, essentially not eating after dinner.). I stopped snacking. And I started fasting 24 hours on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I would have dinner Sunday, and not eat again until Monday. Repeated this pattern on the other fasting days. This is often called alternate day fasting, except that it is not truly every other day since I was eating both on Saturday and Sunday.
So with 21 minutes of cardio a week, 3 weight workouts a week, and intermittent and alternate-day fasting I was able to lose 38 pounds and drop my A1C from 9.3 to 5.0 in a little over 90 days. I'm going to still avoid snacking for the most part, breads (within reason), and soda.
A1C is a measure that calculates the blood sugar in your system over a 3 month period. It is what is generally used to diagnose someone as diabetic, pre-diabetic, or "normal."
I will still fast when needed. My goals are not weight loss, I was OK with the weight I was.
I will answer questions. This was brief and I know there are many details that are not here. I believe that diabetes is reversible and that I am currently no longer diabetic. I know many people disagree with that. With all of the information on the benefits of fasting and low-process food diets I think I will do my best to continue on this path long term.
Hopefully I'll also get strong. As someone who power-lifted (not for competition) I really enjoyed being strong. Thanks to all who gave me support along the way and I hope to be of support or inspiration to others.
Much Love!
LATE NIGHT ADDITION:
Here's what I said on Feb. 21 -
If my A1C is above 6.5 then I'll continue to fasting 3 times a week. If it's between 6.0-6.4 then it will be two days a week. 5.5-5.9 and I'll go down to one day a week. Below 5.5 and I'll stick to intermittent fasting (daily eating with no snacks, especially after dinner).
First thing I did was cut out soda, white flour products (tortillas!), and start trying to figure out what things I could eat. I think that not being sure about what to eat I ended up eating a low-calorie diet. This is also called calorie restriction.
I was testing glucose 2 hours after eating and first thing in the morning. My numbers were still far above average yet slowly coming down.
I started going to the gym right away. I knew of research about weight lifting being positive for diabetics and for diabetes prevention. I also had experimented with high intensity training specifically for diabetes.
I did 3 days of light lifting. I was doing 3 sets of 20 repetitions for a full body workout for 6 weeks. From previous lifting experience I knew that 6 weeks was a good period to allow joints and ligaments to adjust to lifting before going heavier.
Following this same Dr. Moseley I came across his 5-2 Diet and started doing more research on eating. I was trying to figure out how to adapt it. I was losing weight fast and my blood sugar numbers were not moving down as fast as I was hoping for. Yet I tried it.
Then I came across this.
I was experimenting still with a little less wheat bread and more yogurt. I was trying eat more veggies in the meantime.
Then I came across this work by Roy Taylor. I learned about Personal Fat Threshold. That is a threshold on how much fat your body can handle before saturating your liver and pancreas which are factors for diabetes.
This led me back to Dr. Moseley and I was going to try this 500 calorie a day diet for the new year. All of these previous experiments were done in December.
Then I came across Dr. Jason Fung.
I started with a combination of Intermittent Fasting (fasting for 12-16 hours a day, essentially not eating after dinner.). I stopped snacking. And I started fasting 24 hours on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I would have dinner Sunday, and not eat again until Monday. Repeated this pattern on the other fasting days. This is often called alternate day fasting, except that it is not truly every other day since I was eating both on Saturday and Sunday.
So with 21 minutes of cardio a week, 3 weight workouts a week, and intermittent and alternate-day fasting I was able to lose 38 pounds and drop my A1C from 9.3 to 5.0 in a little over 90 days. I'm going to still avoid snacking for the most part, breads (within reason), and soda.
A1C is a measure that calculates the blood sugar in your system over a 3 month period. It is what is generally used to diagnose someone as diabetic, pre-diabetic, or "normal."
I will still fast when needed. My goals are not weight loss, I was OK with the weight I was.
I will answer questions. This was brief and I know there are many details that are not here. I believe that diabetes is reversible and that I am currently no longer diabetic. I know many people disagree with that. With all of the information on the benefits of fasting and low-process food diets I think I will do my best to continue on this path long term.
Hopefully I'll also get strong. As someone who power-lifted (not for competition) I really enjoyed being strong. Thanks to all who gave me support along the way and I hope to be of support or inspiration to others.
Much Love!
LATE NIGHT ADDITION:
Here's what I said on Feb. 21 -
If my A1C is above 6.5 then I'll continue to fasting 3 times a week. If it's between 6.0-6.4 then it will be two days a week. 5.5-5.9 and I'll go down to one day a week. Below 5.5 and I'll stick to intermittent fasting (daily eating with no snacks, especially after dinner).
