The dreaded diet counseling continued this week.  I don’t dread the counseling, but the patient may dread it until they are overjoyed with their new knowledge to help them succeed with their goals!

I happen to enjoy the look on my patients face when I tell them that 4 ounces of orange juice is 75 calories and turns into 4 teaspoons of sugar (over 1 tablespoon!), or that the avocado they are eating as part of their healthy weight loss plan may be healthy (and it is filled with monounsaturated fats – the most heart healthy fat!), but every 2 tablespoons have 45 calories and is considered one fat serving.   One patient this week was so excited to learn about nutrition.  She has been successfully cutting back on portion sizes and fats but didn’t realize some of the hidden calories and how quickly they can add up.  She was surprised to learn that 3,500 calories equal ONE POUND and ………….if you reduce your caloric intake by 500 calories a day, for one week, you will lose that pound!

It’s so easy!  She was eating 1/2 an avocado.  If 2 tablespoons has 45 calories how many calories in 1/2 of the avocado?  Too many!  One piece of cheese is 100 calories, 15 almonds is 100 calories, 6 ounces of juice is 100 calories, 8 ounces of skim milk is 90 calories, 4-6 crackers is 100 calories – and there you have it – your lost pound.

The moral of the story is:  calories add up when you don’t think about them.

©2009 Do It Yourself Diabetes with Marci Sloane. All Rights Reserved.

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Started eating healthy and exercising again yesterday.  I had a salad for lunch and some chicken with very little pasta on the side last night for dinner.  I played tennis for a little over an hour last night.  I used to play lightly against my girlfriend, but she has become really good, so I have to play a lot harder and sweat a lot more and run around the court a lot more.

Some big hockey games coming up this weekend, along with a big basketball game for my Spartans of Michigan State.  That should be really good on my blood sugar levels.  Speaking of blood sugar levels, I have to set up my next A1C bloodwork soon.  Last time I got it done was the very end of December so I am due for it right about now.  I don’t think the number is going to be that great, because I had a lot of highs this past month, and I haven’t been eating really healthy.

Well you all have a splendid day!

Well, it wasn’t such a good weekend for the Eagles, but what are you going to do?  I don’t want to talk too much about it.  However, my blood sugar levels were perfect throughout the entire game which surprised the heck out of me.  Today is the start of a strict, strict, diet to lose about 10 pounds before Thanksgiving rolls around.

I plan on cutting my calorie intake down to about 1,000, and burning about 200-300 per day from exercise.  Right now, I am intaking nearly 2,000 a day and that’s not working out so well.  The only part that is making me eat so much is the snacking at night that I am taking in almost 400-500 calories after dinner…. not a good idea when you are trying to lose weight.  If I cut out that snacking, I can lose 5-6 pounds a month just by that!

Today’s weight… the highest I have ever been is 242.  Every Monday I will put up a new weight and give a new goal, and we’ll see if I can meet it. My goal for next week is 237.  5 pounds in one week may sound like a lot, but it is just so much excessive fat that it will come right off with 1-2 games of tennis.

Also, A1C time is approaching fast.  I don’t remember exactly when the last one was, so I have to check up on it and see.

The diet and exercising is going along pretty well.  The diet is still a little slow, but I am continuing to work out.  I have been doing cardio only, but starting today, I am going to start lifting also.  I will also be starting a low carb diet today, no more pasta, thats for sure.  I am also going to try and cut down the amount of bread I am eating, but those $5 footlongs are way to good to pass up.

The Eagles game didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to, and it was very stressful on me also.  However, I did test my sugar 3 times during the game, well once before, once at halftime and once after the game was over.  I usually never do that, but it was a lot easier to do since it was on national tv, and I was able to watch the game at home.

Happy hump day everybody!

This weekend marks the beginning of the Eagles football season. Along with that comes blood sugars that range all over the place during the games.  They shoot up and down and left and right.  When it’s a close game, it is even worse.  A new season comes with a new chance to do things differently, so this year, i WILL bring my meter  to the bar with me to watch the game.  It should be an easy game, but who knows.

Anyway, I have been tracking Ike all day today, and it seems that the latest advisory and tracking pattern is more something I was wanting to see, that it looks like it will be missing us down here in South Florida.  I still haven’t received my A1c results yet, and I got the bloodwork done last Thursday.  I called my doctor and she told me that she hasn’t received them yet, but Quest Diagnostics told me that they faxed them to her already, and that they will re-fax it over.  I was a little excited to see these results because I think that I did better.

The weight loss is coming along, slowly, but surely.  I am down about 4-5 pounds since 2 weeks ago when I started running again.  The only problem that I am having is still the snacking and munching.  I am eating smaller meals, but then I am starving, and I cant fight the hunger, so I am picking at little things.  Also, I haven’t done any serious running in almost 2 years, so I can barely even make it a mile on the treadmill, so I am not burning too many calories.  I don’t want to start lifting yet because I want to lose the weight first, then build back muscle.

Well, I must get going now, ya’ll have a wonderful day.

So tonight is final positioning night for the bowling league.  We are in 4th place going into tonight and only 3 points behind first place.  We will be bowling the 3rd place team, so it will be difficult to win first because we will have to rely on the 1st and 2nd place teams on splitting the games, plus we have to win all 3 games tonight.  Also, today starts the new diet, and it started out on the right foot, I was up at 6:45 today and at the gym by 7.  New apartment, new diet, new me!

I weighed myself last night, after a week of eating nothing but fast food because I was moving all week and was just grabbing stuff on the go, I weighed 250 pounds!!!!  5 years ago I weight 200 pounds, just a year ago I was 205, I have gained 45 pounds in one year, not too good.  However, the good news is that it is excessive fat that I will probably be able to shed about 10 pounds in almost a week.

Well the insurance is almost up, September 1 is approaching fast.  I have to get my blood work done before that because I have the whole 9 yards being done this time, more then just A1C.  I am expecting a better A1C then last time, but I still don’t think it is going to be under 7.  With the new diet though, I feel confident that by November, it will be under 7.0 and hopefully under 6.5!

 Have an amazing week everybody!  I promise, I will post more than I did last week.

Another Friday, another week of work finished. I do not want to do anything at all this weekend, I just want to lay in bed and sleep all weekend. I have actually started playing a little bit of playstation again, my girlfriend hates it! She also hates staying inside on the weekends and just being lazy. Oh well. I think I am going to see the Indiana Jones movie this weekend, I can not wait.

I also want to see the new Strangers movie, but I don’t know if I will be able to sleep after seeing something like that. The way the world is now, that could happen any day of the week. What does all this have to do about diabetes? Absolutely nothing. I decided today, I don’t even want to talk about diabetes. Well, I am right now, but this is the end of it, no more. Let’s talk about some of the fun things in life, like the Indiana Jones movie, or Call of Duty 4, or hell even chinese food.

You know what really bugs me? Since I started dieting, Taco Bell (my weakness) started the whole .79 , .89 , .99 campaign and I can’t eat it. I have cut fast food out completly and now they decide to do this. That irritates me. Why does a rain cloud come by and then it clears up and then it starts raining again? Why are there so many dragonflies flying around right now, do they really love the heat that much? Who will win, Celtics or Pistons? I hate Kobe Bryant, but I love watching him play, so I would love to see a Kobe- Richard Hamilton match up, that should be interesting. What’s for dinner tonight, I usually go out to eat on Friday’s, but I don’t know where I want to go.

So, if you all wondered what goes through my head in about a 5 minute span, there you go! Good news everybody, bowling league starts back up this upcoming Monday. You know what the best part of it is, it is a Miller Lite league. If I have never expressed this before, I ONLY drink Miller Lite. My whole apartment is designed in Miller Lite and Eagles stuff. $1 Miller Lite drafts throughout the night also, compared to their usualy $3.50. I am excited!

So, these have been my random thoughts of the Life of a Diabetic

Even with the holiday, this long weekend was way too short. Friday night’s concert was a success. I tried to position myself in a good way in the lawn thanks to Sara’s comment, but I still couldn’t see anything. Luckily, I knew somebody who lived in the high rise apartments above Mizner Park and could see from there. The concert was only about an hour, but Free Bird rocked the place.

Saturday was a longggg day at the Sawgrass Mills Mall. I went there just to have something to do and when the day was all over, my wallet was empty, surprise surprise. Sunday was a very boring day, but yesterday we had a nice little cookout, but I overate there of course. But the workout regime and diet is back to normal.

Let’s finally talk some diabetes now. I’m still in the process of getting some insurance coverage, but it is tough. I’m also looking for a new house at the same time, I have 63 days before I move out. I am prepared for a long uphill battle and fight!

So far after 2 weeks of dieting I have kept off most of the weight, and I haven’t really gone over 225 in those 2 weeks. I am still not exercising as much as I would like to be, but I am getting there, baby steps. I am running on Tuesday and Thursdays, playing tennis on Wednesday’s and attempting to play a round of golf every weekend. I am pretty ashamed of myself that I can’t even run a full mile anymore without taking a break, talk about being out of shape.

So, that is why I say it has been semi-successful, because the weight hasn’t been pouring off because of not exercising. I have cut down my calorie intake to about 1,200, slowly I will get it down to 1,000 and then burn off 300 exercising. Right now the late night snacking is what is hurting me, literally, because I am waking up with 400 blood sugars because it seems that my body can’t break down sugar while I am sleeping, even with a 2.0 basal on the pump.

Sorry so short on the post today, but lots of things to get done today.

Finally after 4 1/2 months I went to get my bloodwork done. Everything was good except for the most important part. The A1C was 7.6. My cholesterol numbers were perfect and something else was a little high because of the bad eating habits and weight I had put on over the last several months. But that should be fine by the next time I get it done because I have already lost 7 pounds in about a week. This is just because those 7 pounds were just excess weight that had no reason to be there. The new articles coming out about the junk in the trunk being better then a muffin top makes you feel good when you ask if your butt looks fat in your jeans.

Back to my A1C, it was a little elevated, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be with all these morning high levels. If I could regulate my levels from 3:00 a.m. – to about 8:00 a.m., I bet my A1C would be about 6.5 – 6.7. That is my main goal, maybe I should try more sleep, like falling asleep before 1 a.m. I have also cut out eating after 11:00 p.m., and will eventually cut that down to 10, but I can’t just go cold turkey on it.

Time to go, I will be going to the movies tonight, What Happens In Vegas.