| I've been a Type 2 diabetic officially for 18 years but impaired glucose tolerance for longer. You're on the right path, there's a lot you can do to slow down the progress of the disease. I'm not a doctor however so take any advice with a grain of salt. (But not sugar, definitely not that.) > I keep reading that the problem is carbohydrate overload to my genetics. Read up on "glycemic index". This index tells you how close your food is to pure glucose e.g. table sugar has a glycemic index of 68 so it has 68% of the insulin response of pure glucose. The index correlates to the type of carbohydrate and how processed it is, although there are some surprises e.g. premium ice cream has a G.I. of 37. http://www.glycemicindex.com/index.php You don't have to commit the entire index to memory. Usually you can come up with several heuristics e.g. tropical fruit tends to have higher G.I. than temperate fruit. Obviously you should test this with your own blood sugar readings as individual response to a carbohydrate challenge can be quite different. The other components to a meal also affect blood sugar. For example, acid, protein and fat tend to slow down digestion and thus blood sugar spiking. If you must take pasta for example, take it with a tomato-based sauce (acidic) rather than cream-based. YMMV. > Unfortunately, my doctor thinks that pushing pills is an adequate response, which I heartily doubt. It's important, although somewhat depressing, to see this disease as a progression. A progression that you have to slow down as much as possible, but still a progression. Know that in the future, you may have to resort to the first line of pills, and then possibly stronger ones. Try to slow down the progression as much as possible, and research the pills to see their efficacy and benefit. Metformin is usually the first line of defence and it has a long history and little side effect. It generally fools your body into thinking it's in starvation mode, which means you can lose weight, both fat and muscle. It actually lowers insulin resistance rather than increasing insulin. Generally in amounts >1g it gives you loose bowels, so when you have to use it keep on low doses as long as possible. When metformin doesn't work as well, generally you'll get prescribed sulfonylureas. Since they increase insulin secretion, they tend to exacerbate your insulin resistance. There is some inconclusive research that they burn out the pancreatic beta cells. Better to avoid these as long as possible, but if your glucose control is bad you may not have a choice. I'm currently on an incretin enhancer (gliptin) + metformin. Also look up supplements on examine.com. It's hard to tell the effectiveness of supplements, the only one that had a distinct effect on me was berberine. The other thing you can do is exercise. Lots of it. Strength training for more muscle and more insulin receptors. Aerobic exercise to burn/absorb more glucose and lose weight. There's even recent evidence that high-intensity interval training improves diabetic markers more than sustained, low-intensity exercise. |