Hey Ray,
I don’t know of any formula for bolusing protein. Maybe that’s a good thing since who wants to have to count anything else! My endo told me to try to eat the same amount of protein day to day & meal to meal. Doesn’t mean that I had to eat the same exact food, but to keep the amount consistant so I’d know the effect protein had. I was adding protein to meals to gain weight. When I added a couple of ounces of protein to each meal, I noticed my BG went up & I increased my bolus. Perhaps because I’m a small person increasing protein had an effect. So if your numbers are good eating what you do, don’t worry about it. I’ve heard people say that they’ve eaten the same number of carbs at meals & had varying BG. I wonder if it’s because that meal had more or less protein, though we know that just about anything can effect BG.
I found this article explaining the percentages of protein converting to sugar. Sorry, it’s long. Apologies to the author because I can’t find the source. It’s not from a diabetes site. I was searching for something to explain my increased BG from additional protein.
"This is how you can ‘guesstimate’ how much of the protein-food you eat will become sugar: in every ounce (by weight) of protein-food, there are about 6 grams of actual protein. Of that 6 grams, about 58% can become carbohydrate. This means that of every ounce of protein food you eat, your liver can create about 3.5 grams of sugar. This is THE major source of Hidden Carbohydrates.
Additionally, remember that dietary protein is not the only source of amino acids. I explained previously that the blood contains amino acids at all times, and that fasting does not reduce the amount of them. Recall also that all tissues are breaking down and building up constantly. This means that even if you were to eat no protein at all, amino acids would nevertheless be present because of the breaking down of your tissues, and the liver would be able to convert those amino acids into sugar.
What To Do
Now that we are all completely afraid to eat ANYTHING, we still have to try to put together a dietary plan. We want to keep our carbohydrates low, but we don’t want to get all our carbs from the conversion of protein, because we want to get the important vitamins, minerals, and fiber from vegetables. So, we follow a low carb system of eating between 20 and 60 grams of carbohydrates, and we eat protein and fat.
But, often we don’t lose weight, or at least not fast enough to suit us. We can now see that the amount of protein we eat plays an important part in this. We must eat protein, or suffer the consequences of lost muscle mass or worse, but how much protein do we need?
There have been many studies. None of them are terribly conclusive, but we have to start somewhere. A good estimate for adults (not pregnant or breast-feeding women, not children, and not teenagers) is that the protein requirement ought to be about 2 grams of actual protein per 5 pounds of ‘ideal’ body weight.
For example, if you think you ought to weigh 150 pounds, divide the 150 pounds by 5, and multiply that number by 2 grams. The answer to this example is 150 divided by 5 is 30, times 2 is 60. If your goal weight is 150 pounds, you need about 60 grams of protein each day. Remember that this means protein grams, not the weight of the food containing the protein.
However, since you probably don’t yet weigh your ideal weight, more protein may be required to maintain your body’s protein structures the way they are now. To be safe, we can figure a higher protein allowance, say 10 to 20 extra grams of protein per day, depending on how much you currently weigh in excess of your ideal weight.
How Much Protein Will Be Converted To Carbohydrates From Our Protein Intake?
Now, for fun or horror, (depending on how you look at it), we can calculate how many hidden carbohydrates the person in our above example will get from eating her required amount of protein. Since an average of 58% of the protein can become carbohydrate, we multiply 60 protein grams by 58%. The answer is about 35. Depending on how a person’s body uses the protein it needs, as many as 35 extra carbohydrate grams may be available from 60 grams of protein consumed, in addition to the amount of carbohydrates that the person is getting from eating other carbohydrate foods.
There are two questions that you are likely asking yourself right now. The first question is, “Why hasn’t Dr. Atkins talked about all this?” I think the answer is that since everyone must eat their required protein, and since many people can lose weight without concern for how much excess protein they are eating, low carbohydrate plan experts merely avoid talking about it. But, be assured that when Dr. Atkins, the Drs. Eades, Dr. Schwarzbein, or any of the others tell you to start your carbohydrate counting at 20, 30, or 60 carbs per day, they already are taking into account that you will be getting carbohydrates from protein conversion. This is one of the reasons why the amount of allowed ‘regular’ carbohydrates is so small."