How the h-e-double hockey sticks does a T1 diabetic lose weight??? The only thing that works for me is to just stop eating. 2 protein shakes and 6 glasses of water a day, and I’m down 13lbs in 3 weeks. If I so much as look at anything with substance…even lettuce or broccoli, I start gaining. Ok really, if I eat 2cups of salad consisting of a sh!t ton of lettuce & a little bit of broccoli, carrots, red & yellow bell peppers, and oil & vinegar, I put on 3 or 4lbs. No joke. If I exercise, I either spike up high & feel like crap, or drop low & have to eat, which of course negates the effects of the exercise I just did. How do you do it?
I think that you have to be EXTREMELY patient, expecting something like a pound or two/ week? I am totally compulsive about hitting the scale, I eat a bunch and go up 5 lbs, I run 10 miles, I drop 4. I know you aren’t supposed to do this but I don’t beat myself up when I run “up”, I just sort of file it away. For me, the thing to do was to look at what I eat and cut out carbs here and there. I eat one piece of 12g bread (I read the labels to find one that’s a bit lower, not looking for “lowest” or anything “special” [eg. the Ezekiel bread…], just regular bread…) for breakfast and 1 for lunch. For exercising, I try to run a pretty tight ship, I take gatorade with me.
For a long time, I’d make “high octane” with 45G of carbs/ 8 oz, in case of “emergencies” but I haven’t had too many emergencies lately so I’ve been making it close to “regular”, with about 2 bottles and taking jelly beans as well. A separate problem is that my CGM has been running amok lately and seems to have a mind of it’s own, which makes it more challenging but I can run for about an hour and 12G-20G of carbs seems like plenty, rather than the 80-90G of carbs/ hour of 10 minute miles suggested by the “ExCarbs” charts in TLAP and Pumping Insulin? I wrote about one of my recent long runs here and in a bit more detail here, in the DWRM group. The pre-race donut was a smaller Entenmann’s, around 20G of carbs. I think I did a “cut” bolus for that, like 1/3 what it was worth which caused some upsy/ downsies but I pretty much ran through them. The whole run run took both of my bottles (about 24G of carbs) and then another bottle of GA one I picked up along the way, still about 60-70G rather than well into triple digits like the experts recommend. I do variations on this pretty much all the time. Lately, I’m concentrating on running but I lift on my “days off” and am on vacation this week @ home so I’ll try to squeeze in some bike rides as it appears the weather will be fabulous. I am certain that if I cut back my evening binging, I could probably get a bit lower??
Best of all, yesterday we had a crowded schedule so I had to take junior to the endo with me. She commented “you are still losing weight, slowly but it keeps going down, are you trying to do this?” so I said “well, the chart seems to think that I (5’ 10”) should be around 170 so I’ve got a ways to go…" to which the endo replied “oh, you shouldn’t worry to much about the chart. you have a lot of muscle” FTW!! LOL…
I understand how you feel, battling the same prob, whilst still trying to come to terms with the whole idea if Diabetes . . .
I have just spent a couple of hours writing up food charts with of most of the things I eat, with carb measures etc . . .
gotta get it under control, whilst still eating enough to heave energy to exercise . . . which I am fast losing the interest to do so. Feel like I am turning into a lazy blimp
Used to be so fit a few years back, have run a couple of marathons, more half marathons, a few Half ironman triathlons and many more shorter ones . . . training was my life once upon a time.
Don’t want to be quite so consumed by it these days, but would like to be fit and a much healthier weight and capable of at least a half ironman and not look like a blimp in lycra lol
But I do think 13 lbs in 3 weeks is a lot and hard to maintain that lose and keep it off . . . but good luck with your efforts . . . hopefully I will also succeed . . . the plan is to start running (again) 2morrow and lets hope I maintain it this time
I regularly eat fairly low carb. I drink coffee. I do not drink much water since that adds weight to me.
Since I’m taking prednisone I have a tendency to gain, so if I go up 2 lbs, I revert to strict low carb.
I work on any gain within a day or two so it’s never very much assault on the body.
I go on an exercise increase to an hour-two hours of walking somewhere instead of only a half hour treadmill.
With the exercise, I revert to moderate not intense exercise but I increase time to help lose.
I never eat in a low produced by exercise. I only use glucose tablets to the exact correction needed.
I can’t eat that much salad without putting on weight, either.
So I empathize with you. Of course, I have easily gained all my life so I’ve had to hold this line for a lo-o-ng time.