I LOVE eating out. I live in one of the best restaurant areas in the country. Many people I know are foodies and we socialize naturally over wonderful meals of every ethnicity you can imagine. Did I say I love eating out? Sigh. I am going to try and learn from my experiences and maybe one day I’ll get it right! Yesterday I had not one but two chances and failed miserably both times! Probably eating two meals out wasn’t the best idea to begin with. So first lunch, my friend and I went to a Mexican restaurant that serves really good vegie burritos with organic ingredients. I’ve had burritos before and find if I can stop at 1/2 and take the rest home I’m ok. But that is for dinner, not lunch usually! But my eyes glimmered with delight when I saw mole vegetarian burritos…not easy to find! Mole is probably the one exception I make to eating something with sugar in it, and I knew it wouldn’t be much sauce and would be more spicy than sweet. But 20 years of living in Mexican neighborhoods and old habits die hard and I automatically ordered a Negra Modelo. Again I can drink a beer IF the rest of the meal is relatively low carb. It was late by the time we parked and got lunch so I was down to 68. Good! Should keep me from rising too high. Wrong! Two hours later I was at 214. What was I thinking?
Ok, dinner. Another opportunity to achieve diabetic success. We went to a West African restaurant where the wonderful cook just verbally tells you what he’d like to make you. He listed the ingredients in a “vegie combo” which included some high carb items like rice, plantains and a type of corn bread. Also I was still quite high from lunch, 156. So off I went and bolused my maximum which is 3 units. My I:C ratio at dinner is much better than lunch at 1:20. So that dose could cover a hefty 60 carbs. No beer this time. The food was great and I was proud of myself because even while my niece and I were engaged in conversation I carefully ate around the high carb items. I did eat the black eyed peas, but didn’t touch the rice, had one bite of the corn thing and ate a few slices of plantains. The rest was vegies. So in effect I bolused for a high carb meal and ate about 1/2 that number. Yep, you guessed it. Despite starting at 156 at two hours I was down to 90 and an hour later I was down to 58 and had to eat some cheese and crackers. Sigh.
I will have another major opportunity to get it right at the end of the month. I’m going to LA for the weekend for a family get together. Not only will I be eating out all weekend but with a whole group including a toddler I will probably not have much control over the time of my meals. Even harder, I will be staying in a motel without a car which is walking distance to absolutely nowhere. (Walk? This is L.A. we’re talking about, nobody walks). So I will be dependent on others to pick me up and take me to food on their schedule. Sigh. What I plan on doing is taking some bread, crackers and fruit on the plane to have in the room so if I’m left to my own devices past my need to eat I can make a little meal. Of course there is no fridge. (This is Malibu, you’re lucky $125 motel rooms come with beds!). Should be a challenge. Can’t say I’m not learning!