Self Medicating With Food...Diabetes, Support?

[73kittycat73]

Hi, I've tried to word/start writing this a few times, so I hope it comes out OK...But, today I have finally realized that I eat junk/sweet food to self medicate.
I have type 2 diabetes and have been 'getting away' with it for a while, but I'm starting to feel the effects of eating sweet food. If I eat chocolate before bed for example, I get terrible cramps in (Mainly my left) calf. Recently I have cut down on chocolate as it was making me feel like crap after eating it. I take depression and anxiety tablets and they make me tired so I thought it was them. However I have really noticed recently that eating it makes me so wiped out afterwards.
Today I was bored so ate a bit of cheesecake. Boy did I feel like shit afterwards. I was still feeling a bit rubbish a few hours later so I decided to dig out the old blood sugar testing kit. My blood sugars were17. In the dangerous category. (A non diabetic person should be between 7.1 to 10.0). It has given me a shake, and a wake up call.
I went to my Sainsburys delivery (Due Sunday.) and have taken all the sweet things out, including Pepsi Max. I drink 2ltrs of the stuff a day (I get 'cotton wool' mouth from the medications I take for depression/anxiety and just water does nothing.). I have read conflicting articles on whether Pepsi Max spikes your insulin so have taken them out my list too. I tried finding a decent drink that wasn't full of sugar or artificial sweeteners, I couldn't find any! So I have ordered some fizzy water and orange squash (With sweeteners.) to have it very diluted for some flavour.
However, like I said, it's only just clicked that I self medicate with food (Sweet stuff being the most.). I know I'll be back to craving even later tonight, or definitely tomorrow, so I was wondering if anybody would like to join me on cutting down on junk food. We could come on when we are craving, or just for some support generally. If you're doing it to loose weight that's fine too.
I hope I haven't gone on...I just wanted to be honest (With myself too.) and start a new, healthier, way of eating.

Thanks WreckTangled Do you mind me asking what you eat? I got my shopping earlier and went to have a look in the fridge later and thought, 'I have nothing to eat/no snacks!' I did have some grapes to snack on. I just feel like I've hardly got anything in. I have a few salad bits, a pot of coleslaw and salad pot, Wheatabix, Alpro soya yogurt, some easy peelers and apples. That probably sounds like loads to others but I'm used to grazing all day and having snacks on tap in the cupboard.

Eugh I know just what you mean! There's a meme I've seen about being disappointed when you go into the kitchen and only have ingredient rather than snacks/meals! It's the weekend and I'm bored so today I've eaten:

2 slices of liv life bread with butter
A low carb wrap (pretty expensive I'm afraid) made into a pizza topped with cheese and ham
A low carb doughnut (bought from a bakery online)
A slice of Mexicana cheese and a pepperami
For dinner we're having pork loins. I'll do potato wedges for dh and the dc but I'll just have buttery green beans, or maybe salad not sure yet. After I will have a high protein low carb yoghurt probably.

Well, I've just ordered a few bits rom Amazon (Asda, Sainsburys and Morrisons all booked up for days.) that's arriving today! (I'm shocked as although I have Prime, things tend to take at least two days to dispatch/arrive. Never had one this quick!).
I must be desperate as I've ordered Pot Noodles, lol. A few cheese and onion mini rolls and egg mayonnaise sandwich filler.
I like the sound of that meme. :D

Ok, snacking and eating. Breakfast half cup oats with 1 cup oat milk. That's like 220 cals. Lunch is either soup ( get organised for the week ahead - whoever's said a meal plan is key is really right. If you don't know what you're having you can't anticipate or accept that you can manage without a snack etc). Sometimes salad with cottage cheese. Sometimes omlette. Usually 300-350 cals. Then dinner. Snacks here are an apple, blueberries, cottage cheese, teaspoon of peanut butter.

Thanks travailtotravel Do you count carbs as well as calories? I'm trying to keep to what WreckTangled said about 50g or carbs a meal. I'm trying to stick to 150g a day, but being veggie too it's hard to find food to eat that you don't have to prepare from scratch!
I've had no sweet things at all today. First time in over a year. Did crave though. I've also probably eaten more calories than usual though. I've eaten:
X2 Wheatabix with Alpro no added sugar yogurt (Was surprisingly nice.) and a very tart easy peeler on top (Going to try grapes with it tomorrow.)
A handful of Sainsburys Peanuts and Cashews
some seedless grapes
A Soreen banana lunch box loaf
A salad pot, absolutely smothered in mayonnaise and 4 vegetable fingers
I'm sure I had more at lunch, just can't remember.

Well done! I didn't realise you were veggie that does make it a bit more tricky. I'm not veggie (I probably would be if I didn't need to stick to low carb) but some veggie things I eat are: the Linda McCartney sausage (not the Cumberland ones because they're high carb and disgusting but the others are low carb), the Birdseye pea protein burgers and fajita mix are both really nice, I do paneer curry quite often literally fry onions, peppers, celery and add curry paste and a tiny of coconut milk then add paneer. I usually have it with a couple of popadoms and just have a big bowl of it, you can have it with cauliflower rice though or roasted cauliflower. I love cauliflower (never boiled though 🤢)

Thank you. That curry sounds delicious. I haven't tried the cumberland sausages. I do like Linda McCartney food, it's my favourite veggie food. Just to be an even more pain in the bum, I don't like Quorn. It might be because it's mushroom based and I don't like mushrooms?
Took my BS this morning, 6.0! Yay.
Hope you are doing OK today?

Quorn is fairly high in carbs anyway as are most other veggie replacements. I suppose the best advice is to eat natural etc etc but it's not always practical and personally I need convenience food sometimes! Your fasting blood sugar this morning is such an improvement that must be so encouraging for you well done, it just shows that what you're doing is working already. I think some of the fibre one bars are quite low in carbs would you eat those? Or maybe prefer not to as they're sweet. Salted popcorn is fairly good carb wise and a packet of skips is less than 10g.

I don't count carbs specifically. I am less bothered by carbs that appear in things like beans, apples etc than some people are who are very low carb. I am avoiding high starch carbs like potatoes, sweet potato, rice, pasta etc all together. I find these spike my sugar and make me more hungry (although obvs delicious) but I cannot exorcise myself not to eat a 3 bean chili made with beans, onions and tomatoes for example because its too high in carbs when its good quality protein etc etc. Others who are low carbing will take a different view but overall I am rarely over 150g carb per day. Porridgeg is my biggest crime but without it I would have eaten the pantry by lunchtime!

Hi WreckTangled Thanks for the encouragement. I totally understand what you are saying about convenience food!
Hi travailtotravel yes, I saw mixed responses for porridge on another website I go on. I'd say about 85-90% were eating porridge with skimmed milk for breakfast, some on the say so of diabetic nurses, and about 10% horrified! lol Do you eat Oat-So-Simple? I like their golden syrup one. I'll have to check the label and see what it says nutrition wise.

Just checked and got some original oat so simple, and some easy peelers to go on top. Thanks for the tip off!

Porridge is a tricky one. We're told it's a 'good' slow release carbohydrate but those of us with CGM can see the affects of it on sugar levels, a lot of diabetics (not all) struggle with it. Interestingly there's a blog by someone who is not diabetic and he wore a cgm for a while and porridge gave him the same spike in levels as 4tsp of sugar.

I was told if you’re going to have porridge then don’t use the instant pouch ones as they’re full of added sugars. Making you’re own is much better

I have porridge made with water and chia seeds every day and it keeps me going all morning. I think anything processed gets digested quicker so you need to snack.

I have 30-50g.

I’m ok with porridge as long as I’m doing the school run - 15 mins walk brings down blood sugars. Without that bit of a walk, they’re over 10.

Greek yoghurt with chia seeds is nice and filling. I also make pudding from it by adding cocoa and dark choc chips.

I'm definitely going with the porridge, I don't know how many more days I can stand the Wheatabix! It's not my favourite cereal, and I don't like it with soya milk as it goes all soggy and I don't like that. I've been having it with Alpro soya yogurt instead and it doesn't wet it enough. It's still hard and sticks to my teeth.
BS was 7.4 last night and 7.2 this morning. Not too pleased as according to my chart, that's just in the borderline zone. Maybe I had too many carbs yesterday? Going to have a sandwich for lunch but very little carbs for tea (Or dinner, depending on what you call it. ) and see how that goes.
Hope everyone else is safe and well today. :) We've finally had a dusting of snow, looks very pretty. Not as cold as yesterday either thank goodness, that was cold!

If you've got the funds available I would really recommend getting a freestyle libre. You can buy them from asda or Superdrug pharmacies for spring £50. It'll last two weeks and you can scan it with your phone to give your glucose results then it'll show it all in a grap. It would be really beneficial for you to see how different foods affect your blood levels. You could then compare your weetabix with the porridge and make a decision based on that.

@WreckTangled I've been wondering about one of those, are they simple to put on?

Yes really simple. If you look on YouTube there's lots of videos showing you how to do it

Good on the porridge. The original may be ok but I buy a bag of steel cut oats and make it with oat milk. Anything processed like Oats so simple will usually have sugar.

Never heard of anything like the freestyle libre, so I'll go have a look later on. Thanks for the tip off.
BS back down to 6.0 today . Maybe having less carbs for my tea worked. Going to try again tonight anyway.
Had really bad cravings last night. Just wanted to eat anything! lol I ate some grapes and about 3 Soreen bars. Much, much better than my previous binges though (2-3 ice creams, 6 packets of mini Iced Gems, mini Party Rings, chocolate, etc.).
Hope everyone is doing OK today? I'm getting my bedroom wallpapered. White glitter wall paper. It's not as garish as it sound. lol

I've searched online on Asda and Superdrug but have 0 results for 'freestyle libre.' I tried just 'feesetyle,' and just 'Libre,' and even 'diabetes,' and got nothing. Myabe it's only available in store?

Might it be that’s in the chemist at Asda, so wouldn’t show up online?

Op please discuss this with your diabetic nurse it is literally her job. Some of the advise given on this forum is actually quite dangerous.
I am type 2 and have struggled to control my sugars there maybe other medications that they can try, metformin does not work alone for me I am taking a relatively new med called empagliflozon which has worked fabulously.
Again please talk to a medical professional

And indwelling blood sugar monitors are not recommended for type 2 also are quite expensive