Learning To Eat - Insulin and Blood Sugars

I am approaching my thirty-seventh birthday this spring. My thirty-second anniversary of life with diabetes also happens around that same time. I have lived with type 1 diabetes pretty much my whole life.

As far back as I can remember I have been a picky eater with weird eating habits. To this day I eat more like a little kid than an adult. I usually don't like meat, eat very few vegetables, and little to no fruits. What does that leave? Carbohydrates. Pasta, rice, potatoes, grilled cheese sandwiches, macaroni & cheese. Simple stuff that doesn't have a lot of weird things mixed in.

Deep down I've known for a while, but I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that this way of eating makes it incredibly difficult to manage my blood sugars and my weight. I'm also starting to realize that I am a victim of just not trying enough new things. I need to experiment more and try many new things. I need to expand my food horizons!

Food is scary to me in many ways. What if I take my insulin and don't like what I've made? Or worse yet, what if I have ordered something at a restaurant and can't get to any "backup food" easily? As I'm experimenting, I need to be OK with my blood sugar being a little higher as I get familiar with these new foods and how they are prepared and presented.

Instead of taking my insulin a few minutes before the meal is ready, I will need to wait until I know what I've gotten and whether I'll eat it before dosing. Otherwise I run the risk of dealing with a nasty low blood sugar if I take a full dose of insulin and end up not eating what is there.

Another piece that I'm finding helpful is that I'm experimenting with ways to fill my plate with more protein and/or greens and vegetables. These food things usually don't need much insulin anyway, so they are a little safer to experiment with.

As I'm adding some non-carbohydrate foods into my meals, I'm finding that I can take less total insulin. Being able to take a little less insulin means that even if I make a mistake in counting or measuring, the resulting low or high isn't as hard to treat or correct.

I'm also learning that you can play around with the overall makeup of a meal to change how fast it digests, and therefore how fast it raises blood sugar.

It is a little exciting, learning all of these things, but it's also a bit overwhelming too. What's that old saying? The more you know, the more you know you don't know?

I'm trying to take it slow, and am leaning on the many great cooks in my family, many of my friends in the diabetes online community, and all of the resources and recipes out there (including many here at Diabetes Care Club).

Little by little I'm finding ways to improve! And as Chuck Eichten says in his book, 'The Book of Better', any bit better is better!