Drop all grain-based carbs from your diet.  This includes bread,
pasta, pancakes, sweet rolls, ad naus.  Don't eat "sweets" of any
sort.  Test your BG frequently - before eating, one and two hours
after.  Start adding carby foods back to your diet one at a time, in
small portions.  Test.  Test.  Test.  Find out what spikes your BG and
how fast and avoid those foods altogether.  Switch to whole-grain
versions of the foods you do keep.  Did I mention you should test?
Don't forget to test, especially one and two hours after eating and
especially if the meal includes carbs.  The only way you'll find out
how various foods affect your system is to test frequently after
eating them.  Keep good records.

Oh, and ignore "palm".  

+++++++++++++

Reply to the list as I do not publish an email address to USENET.
This practice has cut my spam by more than 95%.  
Of course, I did have to abandon a perfectly good email account...

There's a bunch of q's a lot of us will ask.  I'll start the ball rolling.
I saw you responded that you are type 2.  Are you on meds?  Diet and
exercise?  Are you excercising?  What foods are you eating?  When do you
test?

The type of diabetes you have is important.  I"m T2 and a T1 is completely
different from my needs.  Even the needs of T2's vary.

Meds can cause hypos and also might alter how the insulin response works.
Meds that push up insulin production can cause hypos.  There's also a
phenomena call "false hypo" that many newly diagnosed have.  After you've
had high numbers and they start to normalize you feel like you are having a
hypo even though you aren't.  That may be the case for you.

The food you eat is the biggest variable in controlling this.  As carbs are
what cause glucose to rise, those are the foods that must be controlled.
Carbs are more than sugar.  They are pasta, white breads, baked goods,
beans, peas, corn, rice etc.  Sugar is but one carb.  As you go through the
archives and read the posts you will start to understand all that involved.
You'll also start to recognize the crackpots and extremists.  My best advice
is to take the information that sounds logical, doesn't promise a cure, and
is adaptable to you life.  Some people are ardent low carbers.  Some
moderate carb.  The majority of us learned to "eat to our meters."
Jennifer's advice is the most important bit of diabetic infor for the
beginner.  Testing will become you most important ally in fighting this.

It would help if you gave us a sample of some of the foods you eat and your
test #'s.

What was the criteria for diagnosis.  Did you have an A1c?

Okay, now that I"ve completely overwhelmed, sit back and take a deep breath.
The good news is we've all been where you are.  The better news is we've
learned to deal with this and have a healthier life to boot.  It takes a
while to learn it all and we all progress at different paces.  The best news
is you've decided to do something.

Well, I have to run off to the farmers' market to buy a whole bunch of
delicious. fresh, and diabetic friendly veggies.  Keep posting, keep
learning, and keep asking questions.  There's usually someone here 24/7 to
answer them.

c

It woulld be wiser to befriend hunger.  It is the fear of hunger that is
making you shake when your BG is not low.

"Hunger and healthy appetite are one and the same."

In Christ's love and service,

Andrew

--
Andrew B. Chung, MD/PhD
Board-Certified Cardiologist

**
Suggested Reading:
(1) http://makeashorterlink.com/?G1D5217EA
(2) http://makeashorterlink.com/?W13A4250B
(3) http://makeashorterlink.com/?X1C62661A
(4) http://makeashorterlink.com/?U1E13130A
(5) http://makeashorterlink.com/?K6F72510A
(6) http://makeashorterlink.com/?I24E5151A
(7) http://makeashorterlink.com/?I22222129

d,

When blood sugar rises swiftly and then drops, you get the feelings you
describe. This can be from Type 2 diabetes or from what they call
"reactive hypoglycemia."

Though many doctors think that reactive hypoglycemia is nothing to worry
about, and will tell you "eat protein" to control it, in fact, it is
almost always a step on the way to full-fledged type 2 diabetes. So no
matter what your doctor's tests give you for an official diagnosis, it
is time to do something to smooth out your blood sugar and make sure
that if it is not diabetic, it doesn't not become diabetic.

The best way to do this is not to eat protein, but to learn how many
grams of carbohydrate there are in the foods you regularly eat, and then
experiment to find out how many carbohydrates you can eat at one time
without causing the spike and drop.

For many of us, that will be somewhere between 10 gm and 25 gram. Use
your meter to find out what the case is for you.

Another thing I've learned is that for me the intense hunger comes from
the body overproducing insulin in response to the food intake.  The
mechanism is this: your body is no longer using insulin properly, which
is why your blood sugar rises in the first place, so the pancreas pumps
out more and more insulin until, finally, it starts to have an effect.
However, for some reason high levels of insulin in the blood triggers a
starvation response.

Cutting your carbs way down can cause less insulin production and
eliminate that hunger. If it doesn't, then it is time to ask your doctor
about a drug, like metformin that brings down your body's resistance to
insulin, allowing it to function with lower insulin levels.

Most importantly, if your doctor tells you you aren't diabetic, don't
take it to mean you have nothing to worry about.  The way they diagnose
diabetes leaves a lot to be desired. If I'd waited for an official
diagnosis, I would have been wandering around with dangerously high
blood sugar levels for many years, and would, like far too many newly
diagnosed diabetics, already have serious complications caused by years
of exposure to high blood sugars.

http://www.geocities.com/lottadata4u/misdiagnosis.htm gives the story of
how the ADA established the diagnostic criteria used to diagnose
diabetes and why those criteria are set at a level that lets blood sugar
levels be high enough to cause nerve damage and even, in 8% of people
diagnosed with prediabetes, "diabetic" retinal damage.

--Jenny

http://www.geocities.com/lottadata4u/  Type 2 Diabetes info
http://www.geocities.com/jenny_the_bean/  Low Carb info

<snip>

To understand this phenomenon, it is important to understand how the
pancreas creates and stores insulin granules.

When you eat something that raises your BG, this increase triggers your
pancreas to release insulin stored in the beta cells. This is called
Phase-1 insulin response. If this is not enough insulin to lower your BG
to "normal" levels, the betas start active production and release of
insulin. This is called Phase-2 insulin response.

It is common in type-2 diabetics to have a "broken" Phase-1 response.
So, Phase-2 kicks in. But for an unknown reason, the mechanism that
turns off Phase-2 is broken, too, so too much insulin is released and
your BG drops below "normal".

This phenomenon is also called reactive hypoglycemia, and is common in
people who are not yet diagnosed with type-2, or are diagnosed early in
the progression of diabetes.

BTW, hypo feelings can occur not only when your BG is actually low, but
also when it drops fast. Note that above I described BG as "normal".
This means not only the usual range of 70-120mg/dl (4-7 mmol/l), but the
"normal" that your body is used to. As one first gets into control,
their personal level of "normal" changes, and so does the point at which
a hypo affects them.

The trick here is to get off the rollercoaster of large BG fluctuations.
The mantra of this group is to manage these swings with a "low spike"
diet. This also helps take the burden off of your already tired betas,
and allows them to recover somewhat.

d. you sound like you were have symptoms of low bg.  123 is technically
not a low actually it is diabetic number, but if you had very high
numbers and you went down to that,  you will have low symptoms.  Please
at that number dont eat sweet things.  Have some protein .

I hope your doctor is scheduling you with a dietician.  Your team will
probably consist of an endocrinologist, an opthamologist, a podiatrist
and a nutritionist.  

I recommend the book by the Calorie King, Calories, Fat and
Carbohydrates,  As diabetics it is not the sweets that are bad for us
only.  We count the total number of carbs in what we eat, minus the
fiber.  

At 123, I would not have any carbs.  Are you on meds yet.

This all takes time.

Loretta

--
In tribute to the United States of America and the State
of Israel, two bastions of strength in a world filled with strife and
terrorism.