T2 Diabetes, metformin and dieting

[GnomeDePlume]

Newly diagnosed with T2 diabetes and high cholesterol plus fat in my liver.

I am hugely obese and need to lose weight. I have read a lot about intermittent fasting but I'm not sure that is going to be possible as I also take warfarin for an autoimmune blood clotting disorder. Warfarin needs constancy to manage the clotability of my blood.

Can anyone recommend any good diabetes diet books please?

Low carb eating is useful for Diabetes, so this would mean you don’t need to IF. I find the diabetes.co.uk forums useful and also low carb uk on Facebook.

Thank you @PaperMonster I will take a look

@GnomeDePlume I also forgot, look at DietDoctor.com - really useful for recipes!

@PaperMonster thank you

I was in a similar place to you at the start of last year and now neatly 6 stone lighter using low carb and lots of walking. I use my fitness pal to measure my carbs, test blood sugars periodically to see how I am doing and have used the forums on diabetes.co.uk which have lots of good advice.

@TheStirrer wow! that is an amazing achievement.

Baby steps but not a single Christmas chocolate passed my lips. I have switched from white coffee to black tea. Cutting down on sugar isnt going to be a problem. The big challenge will be cutting out the carbs.

I started swimming again at the beginning of December. Sadly we went into Tier 4 as of this morning so that is gone.

Definitely low carb.

Along with the other recommendations, look up Dr David Unwin, he’s a GP in Southport who uses diet to reverse T2 and had success for hundreds of his patients, including getting them off metformin

Totally possible and not a death sentence

Good luck

Link here www.diabetes.co.uk/in-depth/david-unwin-low-carb-not-just-diabetes/

@GnomeDePlume you might find it easier giving up different carbs one at a time, eg give up potatoes next week, pasta the week after etc. Celeriac is a good potato substitute. I buy Nimble bread as it’s low carb and I really struggle to eat anything else at breakfast time!

Many, many thanks all. I have been looking at links and blogs. Low carb definitely seems the way to go.

I have found this book:
The Diabetes Weight-Loss Cookbook: A life-changing diet to prevent and reverse type 2 diabetes

It has a foreword by Dr David Unwin so I'm taking that as a good sign (unless he has written dont use this book!).

DH does most of the cooking and wants to lose a bit of weight so I think an amazon order will be made.

Good luck @GnomeDePlume

You’ll start seeing and feeling the difference very quickly...2-3 weeks

Thank you. Recipe book is now ordered. Quite excited to see the ideas.

Day 3 of monitoring calories and carbs. First two days have been fine. Cauliflower rice has been a revelation.

The challenge will be to find something to replace my morning porridge as that is 40g of carbs. Big order in with a whole food shop for nuts, seeds etc.

I struggle with breakfast. I’m OK with Ready Brek as long as I make it with milk and cream and I do the school run afterwards! (I’ve checked in the past with a meter!) But I rarely have it. So I’m eating low carb toast mostly. Sometimes Greek yoghurt with nuts and cinnamon.

Good luck OP, I'm another advocate for low carb high fat, I've lost 8 stone in the past 2 years and have 1 more to lose to get to my goals.

I don't breakfast now as I usually fast until 12pm but when I first started I would have scrambled egg, sometimes with bacon or mushrooms cooked in butter and cream. Or maybe for something quicker some full fat greek yogurt with a small amount of blueberries?

Are you giving yourself a sensible amount of calories per day? The great thing when I first started was that I didn't track calories, just kept a rough idea of my carb intake and I didn't worry about the calorie content of food. It was only after losing tge first 6 stone that I then stalled and realised it was because although I was still eating low carb food, I was eating too many calories for my new weight so I had to readjust and thats when I started fasting.

Anyway, good luck with everything 😊 I never joined an official low carb bootcamp on Mumsnet but I followed the guidance (they have specific rules for your first 2 weeks of low carb) and BIWI and other users know everything there is to know about a low carb high fat lifestyle!

PS- Sorry, my post above DID have paragraphs but sometimes my MN app deletes them and I've no idea why 😕

Many thanks @grool and well done on your amazing achievement!

I am finding low carb counter-intuitive but carbs really are my problem.

It will be interesting to see how my warfarin blood tests react to all the leafy green vegetables I am eating. This is the circle I have to square. For diabetes I need to be avoiding root vegetables and eating the leaves. For warfarin I need to be careful of eating the leaves (vitamin K).

Currently on around 1200 calories per day and trying to keep carbs below 100g/day. Porridge is around 40 of those. Difficulty for breakfast is I cant eat eggs!

I stood on the scales (which frightened them and me) BMI is 51 I need to lose half my current weight.

How about low carb granola with Greek yoghurt? Sometimes I have sausage with mushrooms and roasted tomatoes if I don’t fancy eggs....

Try the low carb thread on here. They ar3 very friendly! There are brilliant recipes and very knowledgable people.

It’s under Low Carb Bootcamp

Many thanks all