5 Simple Tips to Get The Blood Sugars House Back In Order

I wrote extensively about how I handle diabetes, some recurrent elements in my strategies and the stuff I’ve learned it’s best to avoid (just pick a random post recent post).

These are really the most simple things you could imagine, but the fact that so many people - including me in the past - are not taking basics elements such as exercise nutrition and sleep seriously enough is probably the reason why I am continuing to hammer these concepts into the internet through my writing.

Instead of forcing the reader to dig out the information from many long form blog posts - although taking the time to read, digest and think through these things is THE thing to do - I decided to offer a simple list of tips to start get back in control of blood sugar, and stop living a half life, the other half being hostage of the “ups and downs” of diabetes.

Each item in the list has a brief explanation of the idea behind, and most importantly a link to a longer article on the topic.

So, if you are struggling with diabetes management and aim at better time in range, here are some simple things to get you started.

1) Track your food and your insulin intake

It can be as simple as using pen and paper, or slightly more sophisticated such as maintaining a spreadsheet. In either case, make sure you include these data points:

Time
Current Blood Glucose
Carbs (g)
Fats (g)
Predicted C:I ratio
Injected
Actual C:I ratio
Notes on Food or Activity

For the grams of carbs and fats, you can quickly get the precise measurements from any food logging app.

For the ratios, you simply calculate (Grams of carbs you eat / units of insulin you inject). The predicted one is what you expect will work based on previous meals. The actual one can vary, depending on your post-meal glucose: if you had too high levels and needed to add insulin, your ratio was too low. Otherwise it was too high and you should inject a bit less the next time.

2) Add leafy greens to every meal

Adding leafy vegetables will lower the total glycemic load of the meal. Green light foods will also help you feel fuller and lower your chances of overeating spiky foods. In practice: if you’re having a bowl of pasta (or rice, bread, potatoes, you name it), start with some salad.

*Your secret weapon to keep blood glucose in range while filling up your stomach..*

3) Split your meal in half. Eat each half slowly, and wait a bit in between

*Eat one half. Wait a few minutes. Eat the other one. Looks juicy!*

The higher your carb load, the more effective this is. Eating and chewing slowly is in itself an excellent method to allow any nutrient to be better absorbed, and any carb to be more slowly absorbed. By splitting in half and waiting some minutes before eating each, you’re helping your body managing the glucose entering your bloodstream, because insulin will have more time to do its job.

4) Lower your fats

Fats make you more insulin resistant. Insulin resistance is when your body becomes increasingly insensitive to insulin: no matter how much you get, it won’t be effective. Minimize your fats to healthy sources (chia seeds, flaxseeds and some nuts), avoid oils and any other unnecessary fatty processed foods.

Go for tons of fruit and whole plant based carbs instead!

5) Do something physical after each meal.

No need to smash a workout every time you eat (nobody keeps you from doing that, though!).

Just stay active in general!

It can be as simple as climbing the stairs for a few minutes, going for a short walk around the neighborhood, mopping the floor and other chores that keep your butt moving more or less intensely.

The main point is: don’t sit on the couch after a meal, unless you really want your blood sugar levels to rise.

6) Sleep more

Yes. All other things being equal, sleeping the appropriate amount of hours each night (around 8 hours) will have a RADICAL and IMMEDIATE difference in the variability of your blood glucose levels.

*Excellent way to control your blood sugars, young lady from the “stock images”!*

Maybe you don’t want to change a thing in your diet. Maybe you’re a bit lazy and don’t want to move your body. Maybe you’re too scared to pick up exercise, fearing low blood glucose levels. The first two are not excusable, you need to take responsibility for your life The latter is the only one I can understand, exercising with diabetes can be tricky at times. In any case, just sleep more and you’ll already put powerful changes in motion and see things move towards the right direction. Perhaps that will generate the momentum for all other pieces (nutrition and exercise) to fall into place.

If you’re an all-nighter, a restless party animal or hustler, please consider that sleeping more is what will allow you to party and hustle for longer.

I hope any of these points got you thinking about some improvements you can do right now (they did for me, writing always brings new stuff to the surface for me to deal with!). If you feel overwhelmed, simply focus on ONE. Pick one and commit to it. Once you’ll see things get better (such as 90% time in range on a consistent basis), you’ll have the motivation and the momentum to go chase all the others, and live a life full of joy thanks to diabetes.