...not to mention trying low carb to someone with T2 diabetic complications?

[ItWasnaMeGuv]

Over Christmas met lots of relatives and friends, and friends of DH etc. that we see annually.

One friend of DH has had a horrendous couple of years healthwise and is being cared and closely monitored by diabetic team through local hospital. They have T2 diabetes and risk losing feet and eyesight if they don't get control of it. Feet are currently 'stable', eyesight is more complicated and a real cause for concern. Friend can't read, struggles to see tv (jumping about, wavy lines, blank spots).

I'm a low carb fan and have removed starches and sugars for eight years now, I'm used to not having them and have adapted pretty well. No-one else in my family does this, just me. However I don't talk about it publicly as I know it is a 'hot potato' to some and considered a fad and I do not want to come across as a diet zealot.

After chatting with DHs friend I got to learn that the diabetic team do not advocate for limiting carbs (i.e. cereal and banana for breakfast etc) and felt somewhat dismayed as I'd thought that, over the past 8 years, limiting carbs had become more mainstream in NHS dietary advice. I know of a Dr David Unwin, a GP in a practice in North Liverpool. who has practiced limiting carbs with his T2 partients for several years now quite successfully. It was his infographics that got me interested.

I can't stop thinking about DHs friend and wonder whether I should have mentioned low carb to help minimise diabetic complications, bearing in mind they have experienced health professionals in Type2 diabetes advising them. I am not a health professional at all. Low carb works for me, that's all I can say. My instinct was to keep my mouth shut on the matter unless he had asked me for advice. I'm just very, very sad about the whole thing .

YANBU to keep your mouth shut. They will have been offered dietary advice and low carb diets are not the recommendation for diabetics, low GI diets are (not the same thing). For all you know they have already tried low carb anyway and found they couldn’t get on with it. And yes, low carbers do generally come across as the most evangelical of the dieters - I actually think they are the ones that deserve the reputation vegans have.

May I also state that most Diabetic Consultants I've met believe that low carb had not been proven yet because there isn't enough long term data and statistics on the long term effects.

And I actually agree with that. We don't know what the long term effects on T2's who low carb for say 30 years, are. Because we don't have that data yet.

"Diabetes is a disease of carbohydrate metabolism. "

@LifeExperience

Don't you mean Type 2? Type 1 is an autoimmune disease.

There's nothing anybody with a chronic condition enjoys more than unsolicited advice from randoms who see themselves as experts due to an ability to use Google and YouTube. They will never have heard of the advice you've given them, they will be instantly cured and thank you with tears in their eyes in sheer gratitude for being sent links or pulled aside to have this new information shared with them.

Ask anybody with autoimmune disease.

🙄

My NHS advice for gestational diabetes was to limit bread to 2 slices per meal 🙄 I would not assume they have been given adequate nutritional advice

Agree with NeverDrop. I've had T1 for over 50 years, since aged 1. When I was diagnosed they told my mum they expected a cure in 10 years. 50 years later I'm still waiting. The progress they've made in T1 diabetes is minimal. Have you even worn a pump and a cgm. It's heavy and got a screw that a Yr 7 woodwork project could do better.

But yeah. I'm sure turmeric will cure me..... FFS. God give me fucking strength.

Agreed, and yet there are still posters going on about 'you need some carbs', 'you shouldnt eat no carbs'

No one has said that anyone will be eating no carbohydrates at all, people that need a certain level of carbohydrate for medications wont be devoid of that and can time their intake around the need for the meds.

Perhaps in your mother in law's case, but Ive seen diet sheets given to my t2 OH, which are not tailored for him specifically and which do mention small glasses of juice, cereals, toast and a focus on low fat

And as with another poster below/above(?), the diabetic nurse was completely ignorant about needing to reduce carbs for him.

DP is T2 and has been doing an ultra low carb diet for 6 months as his sugars and health had got really bad. It has worked brilliantly for him and he feels so much better. He has also cut out nearly all ultra processed foods.

What is interesting is that some of his banned food are ones he was advised about 10 years ago that he should eat eg brown bread and rice, cereals etc.

I don't think there is standard practice ( this advice came after we moved and got a new GP).

Ouch!

Dr Unwin has very detailed records of each patient collected over eight years of offering a dietary solution to T2 diabetes. He always first asks whether they want to try this option or whether they prefer medication only, they decide themselves (using the infographics) what foods to include. He does not provide a diet sheet to follow but does have weekly support meets with other low carb patients where they can swap information, ideas, support etc.

I wonder whether you have read my original opening comment as I specifically did not offer any advice at all and precisely why I did not was because DH's friend was being monitored by diabetic health professionals. I stated that I am not a health professional and that low carb works for me but I do not advocate it to anyone else, not even my own family.

I'm not sure why you are so negative about Dr Unwin, or my comments. "Snake oil" is pretty offensive term to use about something you know clearly nothing about. Here is a link to an article from BMJ by Dr Unwin that might help to educate you https://nutrition.bmj.com/content/early/2023/01/02/bmjnph-2022-000544

Is he the one that did the Sheffield Diet, is that the name of it?

That was fairly groundbreaking I thought?

Or was it called the Liverpool Diet?

I'm not sure, the practice is in Southport, North of Liverpool I believe.

I misremembered this.

Its Newcastle (knew it was up north somewhere)

And the premise is not low carb, its extremely low cal and aims to reduce fat around the organs/pancreas and works on the theory of excess weight 'for the person'

So someone might not be overweight or obese but is too heavy for their body to cope with

Theres quite a lot of evidence about this being the case for people from the Indian subcontinent, a higher incidence of t2 diabetes yet not high levels of obesity.

I would mind your own business. As someone with a long term health condition there is nothing more annoying that people who don't have any medical knowledge or the condition themselves giving the benefit of their opinion on what will work. It is so arrogant of them to think they know better than the scientists, medics and people who have had the disease for years.

A low carb diet may help people who are trying to lose weight to manage diabetes but there are other ways of losing weight and not everyone needs to lose weight (you haven't mentioned his weight). There is no evidence that it is better than a healthy diet. Also people on low carb diets often seem to increase saturated fat intake which will be the last thing he needs if suffering from microvascular complications. A Mediterranean diet would probably be better and is probably what the actual experts have advised.

It's touching that so many of you believe diabetics are usually given up-to-date expert advice, especially nutritional. Not in my 100+ years of close family experience of T1, we're not.

Do I think I know my diabetes better than the vast majority of doctors and nurses I have seen over the years? Absolutely, 100% I do. And actually, the really, really top-notch experts acknowledge this and largely encourage you to figure out what works for you rather than blindly follow guidelines.

But yeah. I'm sure turmeric will cure me..... FFS. God give me fucking strength

not cinamon then?! that's the one my poor boy is frequently told to try! eat some cinamon, you'll be right as reign....no, he'll be dead.

@ItWasnaMeGuv Thank you for the link. Apologies for the rant, just have spent much time trying to debunk the not so serious research...
Will explore this further

Same here @Oblomov23 and @NeverDropYourMooncup !!!

One way to sure fire give me the rage is someone offering diet’ advice’ or telling me how to cure my Type 1 autoimmune condition 🤦🏻‍♀️

It's true that patients often know more than the experts. I was referring to people who don't have the disease and have no medical knowledge.

Are you his Mum?

Because if he's paying you to do this, he needs a refund.

Dr Unwin has just popped up on telly now in this programme about diet myths

Talking about the good carbs in veg.

YABU
I would definitely tell him.
I have PCOS insulin resistance and have had gestational diabetes. The NHS diet advice is worthless.
Low carb plus supplements - magnesium, inositol, probiotics - have completely regulated my blood sugar.

It would depend on my relationship with them. The nhs advice in some areas is so bad. A diabetic nurse advised giving a hugely sugary milkshake down my relatives feeding tube when her sugars were already really out of control, it contained no nutritional benefits and we really can’t understand where the idea came from. If he has discussed his worries with you and you mention it then do so sensitively NOT pushing it, make sure you tell him to discuss it with his doctors as he will likely need to adjust his insulin if he is currently eating a high carb diet or at least he will need to keep a more careful idea on his BM. My relative is type 2 insulin dependant and eats relatively low carb, they just have to look at carbs for their sugar levels to soar. They don’t count carbs but thankfully know how to adjust their insulin roughly for whether they are eating carbs or not, not everyone does so your friend needs to speak to someone before making a drastic change.

I appreciate that, @quisensoucie. When I first heard about low carb I didn't have any faith in its success but six months of my own research and I was ready to try it myself for one month. Another website, dietdoctor.com, was helpful to get me started all those years ago. One month turned into eight years so far.

The Public Health Collaboration is another website to look at. UK based, NHS doctors and dieticians meet and discuss current issues relating to their patients. Really interesting lectures here. Dr Unwin gives some interesting talks about his research, too. Worth a look at.