Emma – Page 6 – Diabetes Diet

Aubergine and Pepper Parmigiana

Jul 24, 2018Jul 17, 2018 Emma10 Comments

The Diabetes Diet picture of an aubergine and cheese dish If you read your way through my weeping and wailing post about meat-eating and ethics last week (congratulations, by the way), then this recipe will seem a natural follow-up.

To recap, I’m reading The Ethical Carnivore: My Year Killing to Eat by Louise Gray and hoping for easy-to-follow guidelines that assuage my conscience about eating meat, falling short of killing it myself as I’m pretty sure I can’t do that.

In the meantime, there is always low-carb vegetarianism. I know vegans argue that vegetarianism is little better than meat-eating given what goes on in the dairy industry, but it’s a start. Besides, I can’t imagine a life without cheese.

Low-carb veggie

Here’s a low-carb veggie recipe for you—a bastardised version of aubergine parmigiana. Allow roughly 10g of carbs per portion.

Aubergine and Pepper Parmigiana

Servings: 3
Time: 60 mins
Difficulty: easy
Print

A large aubergine
One red pepper
One yellow pepper
400g tin chopped tomatoes
2 cloves garlic, crushed
2tbsp rapeseed oil
Grated rind of one lemon
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
75g grated parmesan cheese
50g grated cheddar cheese

Pre-heat the oven to 175 degrees C.

Chop the aubergine and pepper into equal-sized pieces and toss in one tbsp of the oil. Cook on a griddle until softened—about ten minutes.

Heat the other tablespoon of oil in a saucepan and add the chopped tomatoes, garlic and lemon rind. Allow to come to a boil and turn down to a simmer, stirring from time to time. Cook for about ten minutes to, allowing the sauce to become thick and concentrated.

Season the sauce with salt and pepper and sprinkle some on the cooked aubergine and peppers.

Layer up the vegetables, sauce and cheese in a gratin or rectangular casserole dish finishing with cheese. Cook for twenty minutes.

For other low-carb vegetable recipes, see:

The Ethics of Eating Meat

Jul 17, 2018Jul 18, 2018 Emma11 Comments

How do you love animals, hate waste and environmental damage, and yet eat meat, fish, dairy and eggs at the same time?

I ask myself this a lot. I was a vegetarian for years because I called myself an animal lover and meat-consumption didn’t seem to fit. As a long-term lover of vegetables and pulses, I found the food delicious—certainly the stuff I made for myself in the house. I suffered my way through plenty of bad pasta dishes in restaurants staffed by unimaginative chefs.

In 2010, I embraced low-carb living. At first, I only added fish to my diet. You can do a low-carb version of vegetarianism, but it’s limited. Fish added variety and health benefits even if my ethical self shuddered at the thought of being one of ‘those’ vegetarians.

Bacon temptation

I started eating meat in 2013. The stance didn’t feel as big as a jump as going from vegetarian to eating fish, so it wasn’t such a dramatic shake-up of my internal moral compass. And blimey, bacon… it’s a cliché that many a former vegetarian stumbled at the bacon hurdle and it’s well founded.

The reason for all this pondering is a book I’ve just bought—The Ethical Carnivore: My Year of Killing to Eat by Louise Gray. The premise is that the Daily Telegraph’s onetime environmental journalist decided she would only eat meat she’d killed herself, and the book begins with her first experience of shooting a rabbit.

I’m 75 percent certain I couldn’t kill an animal deliberately. I’m of the generation that’s become completely detached from the animals we put in our mouths. My father shot rabbits and gutted and skinned them, and he could do the same with birds. I have a razor-sharp memory of him standing at the back door, one back foot of a dead rabbit in each hand, and ripping it apart to allow the cats to dig in

Chickens coming to life

Meat’s almost always appeared in front of me packaged, its origins neatly obscured. Handling chickens makes me flinch as I visualise a head sprouting from that gaping cavity or feathers poking through the skin.

Veganism’s argument for greater health benefits doesn’t convince me. An omnivorous diet of unprocessed foods and plenty of fruit and vegetables will provide the same health gains. But I’m still left with the conundrum—how to eat meat that minimises animal suffering and doesn’t cost the planet dearly?

The ethics thing trips me up all the time. Buy free-range eggs—yes, but they clip the birds’ breaks and kill the male chicks at birth in a horrible way, anyway. Buy Red Tractor meat—not according to this article about what it means for animal welfare standards. Eat meat from the Farmers Market—but it’s so expensive. Eat organic dairy—what about the forced separation of cows from calves and what the industry does to male calves?

I’ve only started the book and I’m hoping it will end with a neat set of guidelines. Follow these and you too can be an ethical carnivore kind of thing. I doubt reading The Ethical Carnivore will turn me into a hunter, but if I emerge with a better understanding of what I can do, I’ll be delighted.

How do you deal with the ethics of eating meat? Any tips or advice gratefully received…

Ethics picture – Madhamathi SV and licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International Licence.

Thrity-One-Year-Old Claims Cure for Type 1 Diabetes

Jul 11, 2018 Emma13 Comments

A PICTURE OF BLOOD TESTING EQUIPMENT AND NEEDLES

Google alerts frequently pairs ‘diabetes’ and ‘cure’ together, but most of the time the words don’t capture my attention. Even when ‘type 1 diabetes’ and ‘cure’ make the same sub-heading, I’m not jumping up and down.

Yeah, yeah, heard it, bought the tee shirt, and no impact on my life so far…

But The Sun newspaper carried a story this week about a 31-year-old who claims to have cured his type 1 diabetes with diet and exercise alone. Again, that approach can achieve results with type 2 diabetes but it’s the first time I’ve seen it accredited to a cure for type 1.

Exercise and diet

Daniel Darkes’ regime isn’t for the faint-hearted. He eats a diet high in zinc (nuts, oily fish and veg) and runs more than sixty miles a week.

But before you dig out your trainers and start stock-piling the Brazil nuts, Daniel’s type 1 diabetes has some qualifications. He has a rare, abnormal gene, which doctors believe might have restarted his pancreas.

The 31-year-old from Daventry in Northants developed diabetes eight years ago and stopped giving himself insulin last January (2017)*. He started cutting down on insulin after experiencing hypos in 2016. He travelled to the US in March 2017 to find out more. Doctors ran further tests to find out what we happening to his body.

Brain sending messages to pancreas

He was put on a fasting diet and exercised at the same time. The medical staff noted his brain had begun sending new signals to his pancreas, and he hasn’t injected himself with insulin ever since.

Daniel told The Sun that doctors believed his abnormal gene combined with exercise is the reason he’s been able to cure himself—it’s as if the gene acts as a back-up immune system and has recharged his pancreas.

He is still being monitored at Northamptonshire General Hospital.

Abnormal genes

I’m fascinated by this story—as I suspect most type 1s will be. I’m no medical expert so my opinions are qualified, but I suspect that Daniel’s abnormal gene plays a huge part in his ‘cure’ (and this won’t be regarded as such until he reaches the two-years-without-insulin mark). It’s also interesting that the description of his diet (scant as it is) sounds like a low-carb diet.

The article said that Daniel’s case “could provide a revolutionary new approach to treating type 1 diabetes”, while Diabetes UK said it couldn’t speculate on whether Daniel had ‘cured’ his diabetes or not, and that there was “no clear cure for type 1 or type 2 diabetes”.

*DISCLAIMER – please, for the love of all things injectable, do not skip your insulin injections if you have type 1 diabetes…

Half-Marathon Training – an Update

Jul 2, 2018 Emma3 Comments

a picture of a blood testing machine on The Diabetes Diet — Post-run blood sugar today. Ten out of ten for me (for smugness too).

“Stone the crows, Emma! Wouldn’t have thought excessive temperatures would be the weather issue throwing a spanner in the half-marathon training, hmm?”

Good people, the woman who signed up for the Glasgow half-marathon in January uttered various predictions about running in Scotland. Most of them involved rain. As it turns out, my lightweight shower-proof coat has needed minimal use. Instead, I’m reaching for the sun cream and hugging the walls in a bid to stay in the shadows as I pound the pavements.

Smell that sizzling tarmac! Scotland has just reported its hottest June ever. Let’s give a shout-out to the poor polar bears in Aviemore.

Fortunately, I’ve discovered I can run in the heat. Again, not something I’ve had the chance to test out much over the years. When I trained for a half-marathon ten years ago, there were two hot days in May. I ran during them and hated it.

Blood sugar levels

But now? I’m okay. Running’s so bloomin’ difficult for me, the heat isn’t the thing that’s bothersome. It’s still the breathing, the adjusting of blood sugar levels to minimise low or high blood sugars and my reluctance to build up my miles

My half-marathon is three months away. I’ve yet to go farther than six miles. Most training plans are for 12 weeks, so there’s still plenty of time to add them up. I’ve found my ‘pace’, a super-slow snail-like jog. I’m hoping my general fitness will stand me in good stead, so that if the pre-race miles don’t stack up, those walking miles will cover ‘em.

I ought to join a running group too. Nothing like surrounding yourself with like-minded idiots people to spur one on. And they might know some different routes. I run the same roads all the time, favouring the reassurance of knowing at what point I draw on my reserves of energy and where I get excited because the end’s in sight.

Jessica Smith TV

Last week, when it was very hot (32 degrees), I exchanged outdoor for indoor exercise. I found an indoor jogging work-out on YouTube. “T’uh!” smug self said, “This’ll be easier than running out there in that heat.”

Not so! Ten minutes in and I decided I’d have been better off running outside in the blazing sunshine.

The heatwave here is set to continue. I’ll be training in high temperatures for a little while yet. Again, I’m hoping this magically builds up my fitness so that when I do talk myself into running more than six miles, it’ll be easy.

Pills Instead of Injections?

Jul 1, 2018Jun 27, 2018 Emma4 Comments

a picture of a syringe and insulin at The Diabetes Diet What are your thoughts on taking pills instead of injections? We type 1s and our colleagues in insulin-taking at the type 2 camp have believed for years an insulin tablet isn’t a go-er because of what stomach acids would do to it.

Recent research says an insulin pill might now be in the offing. My husband got excited about it, emailing me a link to the published article. I was more “meh”. The injections I take seem to be the least bothersome bit of diabetes. Working out how to get your blood sugars in line, constant blood sugar tests (restrictive, dependent on how many sticks you’re prescribed a month), tiredness when you don’t get the dosage right—they’re the things that make diabetes tricky to deal with.

Daily injections

As a child, pre-diabetes, a boy on a neighbouring farm was diagnosed some months ahead of me. “Ooh,” the young me said, “I wouldn’t like to inject myself all the time.” Nine-year-olds tend to think that way, condensing diabetes down to the one thing that seems horrific—more than daily injections.

The nine-year-old obviously tempted fate in that some months later I too was in hospital practising shots on an orange. (What did that poor orange ever do to me?) If someone had promised me a pill at the time, young Emma would have leapt on it.

Back to the research. Professor Samir Mitragotri, who co-authored the study from Harvard University, says his team they took a new approach by dispersing insulin in a liquid made of two components. They were a nutrient called choline, and a substance called geranic acid that is found naturally in cardamom.

Hormone stays intact

They experimented on rats and found the pill lowered the animals’ blood sugar levels rapidly. The team say further experiments suggested the liquid in which the insulin was dispersed inside the capsule stops the hormone from being broken down by enzymes in the digestive system after the capsule dissolves. This helps the insulin pass through the mucus layer of the intestines and opens the seal between adjacent cells lining the intestines, so insulin can pass into the blood vessels.

The article says it will be several years before clinical trials can begin as so far, the method has only been tried in a few small animal studies. It isn’t clear either whether someone could use the pill for background (basal) insulin.

I’m still meh. There is a lot of trials currently being conducted, researching multiple ways to help we folks with diabetes. While there are people who do have genuine needle phobias and find injections unpleasant and painful, I’m lucky enough not to be one.

Pill or injection? Not bothered. Closed loop pump system or (whisper it), the hallowed cure. Okay then…

Coping with T1D in the Heat

Jun 27, 2018 Emma2 Comments

Inforgrpahic about the heat by The Diabetes Diet

Heavens above—this isn’t a post I’ve needed to write before but the last few weeks of incredible sunshine and heat in Scotland (Scotland! I’ll say it again, Scotland!) necessitates it.

If you’re a type 1, what special precautions do you need to take when the mercury rises? I prepared this handy infographic to help…

Please note—if you have neuropathy (nerve damage) this can affect your ability to sweat and therefore cool down. Go out early in the morning or later in the afternoon if you can, drink water to stay hydrated and exercise in air-conditioned gyms. Cut down on drinks with caffeine and alcohol, and take care of yourself as best you can.

#TalkAboutDiabetes – Diabetes Awarness Week June 2018

Jun 11, 2018Jun 5, 2018 Emma9 Comments

What do you struggle with when you’re talking about diabetes? It’s Diabetes Week 2018 (June 11-18) and the theme of this year’s awareness-raising seven days is the stuff we find awkward, embarrassing, difficult or even funny to mention.

Here are mine:

I don’t like telling people in general. I’m not ashamed or embarrassed; I just don’t like drawing attention to myself.
Jelly baby etiquette. When you eat sweeties in front of someone, politeness dictates you offer them around. But they’re the medicine that corrects low blood sugars*, so stinginess is understandable.
Explaining a hypo when you’re in the middle of one. Most of my low blood sugar episodes are manageable. But I can be in the middle of a conversation and my mind goes blank. “Bear with me! My mind’s distracted. It’s screaming ‘SUGAR, SUGAR, SUGAR’ at me. My word power will return in a few minutes,” is what I should say.
Or don’t talk to me. When I’m high, conversation is too much effort. Please don’t take it personally.
I don’t talk much either when I’m high because I’m conscious of the nasty taste in my mouth and am reluctant to impose halitosis on anyone.
And don’t take the grumpiness low blood sugars produce personally either. First aiders once told me about diabetics who punched people when they were low, so grumpiness seems moderate in comparison.
Please know that managing diabetes is like having a part-time job that you do on top of everything else.
If you manage to work out I’m hypo long before I do, be aware I’ll deny it in an exasperated fashion. “Flip’s sakes, no I’m not. Look I’ll even do the blood test to show you and here it…oh. Alright then.”
Sometimes when I say I can’t do something because of the diabetes, I might be using it as a fab, ready-made excuse. It’s not me, it’s you. OH NO! I’ve just given away diabetes’ best-kept secret!

*I told a little girl my jelly babies were medicine once. She gave me one of those, ‘why do adults lie to me?’ looks.

Baba Ghanoush – Low Carb Recipes

Jun 9, 2018May 29, 2018 Emma4 Comments

a picture of aubergines on the Diabetes Diet Aubergines are fan-flippin-tastic done in a pizza oven. Cut the tops off, half them, score the skin and rub with olive or rapeseed oil, sprinkle with sea salt, wrap in foil and place in the heated oven for fifteen minutes.

Done! The best accompaniment to…well, anything if you love aubergines as much as I do. Traditional matches might be lamb steaks. Or you could wrap up some peppers too and make yourself a big bowl of garlic dip to go with them. Ooh, veggie heaven…

Alternatively, why not try some Baba Ghanoush? Ever heard this aubergine dip referred to as poor man’s caviar? If you’ve tasted the real thing, you’re within your rights to argue the supposed paupers’ option is the much better deal. What would you rather eat—a super silky, lemony-garlicky scented paste you can dip things in? (Fingers if you really must; we won’t judge.) Or fish eggs?

Here’s my version, with an alternative method if you don’t have a pizza oven.

Baba Ghanoush

Servings: 4-6
Time: 45 mins
Difficulty: easy
Print

2 medium-sized aubergines
2tbsp tahini paste
4tbsp rapeseed or olive oil
4tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
Salt and pepper

Slice the tops off the aubergines, half them lengthways, score the skin and rub with some of the oil. Wrap in foil.

Slice the onion in half too and wrap in foil.

Either cook in a pizza oven (about 250 degrees C) or place in an oven (180 degrees C). The vegetables will take about 15 minutes in the pizza oven. Unwrap from the foil and place in for a few more minutes to char them.

In the oven, allow about 30-40 minutes. You want the aubergines collapsing. Take the foil off for the last five minutes of cooking.

Scrape most of the aubergines from the skin, although you can keep a bit of it for extra smokiness. Place the aubergines, onions and garlic in a food processor with the rest of the oil, the lemon juice and the tahini. Whizz till smooth.

Taste and add salt and pepper as necessary.

The whole dish has about 45g carbs and 18g fibre.

Half Marathon – Diabetic Training Progress

Jun 2, 2018Jun 2, 2018 Emma8 Comments

Diabetes Diet Emma with her 10k medal Mutters to self—so why did you enter a half-marathon you eejit? Because it was January, and the said run was in nine months’ time. Distance from something is the equivalent of wearing beer goggles. Everything looks do-able when it’s months away.

Anyway, the experts recommend you try a few other races to keep motivation levels up so I entered the Vale of Leven 10k, which took place this morning (Saturday 2 June).

Many runners think of 10k as nothing. Easy-peasy to train for and do. Not me. Mama Nature didn’t make me a natural runner. I plod. Sometimes a 4k feels like a Herculean struggle. I can walk long distances without finding it onerous or unpleasant. I should stick to that, right?

Mornings or Evenings?

Races mostly take place in the mornings too. I’m not a fan of morning runs. My blood sugars do weird zig-zaggy things at that time of day (see pic). I’d rather run at lunchtime or early evening when they’ve had time to settle down. Plus, there’s the whole ‘what to do I do about breakfast and insulin’ question.

Still, the day came round and I got up early. Are you familiar with west coast of Scotland summers? For the most part, they promise much and deliver little. This year, however, May has been unbelievably warm and sunny. Weather forecasters promised cooler weather and even rain, but it dawned bright and sunny once more.

Eeks. My ideal run takes place at about 8 degrees with drizzle and a strong wind behind me.

The run started at Moss O’Balloch next to Loch Lomond Shores and spectacular as far as scenery goes. Parts of the route were recycled so runners like me faced the depressing sight of the fast yins heading home as we puffed and panted our way past kilometres seven and eight.

Hanging out with the Back Pack

Ah well! Lisa Jackson who writes for Women’s Running and who has a fair few marathons and ultra-marathons under her belt talks about the joys of hanging out at the back of the pack. Crowds tend to cheer you on a lot more. The marshals, volunteers and people at the race were most encouraging.

Pain when it’s passed leaves an imprecise memory—thank god—so I remember struggling for the first two kilometres as they were uphill and then at the last bit where I speeded up to keep up with the one hour pacer. But the detail’s no longer there, just the relief and pride of finishing.

tee shirt and medal for a 10k run I’m a sucker for a goodie bag and this one included a tee shirt (too big, but they always are as they’re sized for men), a medal, a bottle of water and a Mars bar. Chivas sponsored the event, but sadly a wee nip wasn’t included.

First Finisher

It’s years since I’ve run in a race. You rely on the atmosphere to chivvy you on; the crowds shouting encouragement, so you keep running when you want to walk. Or crawl, in my case. This wasn’t a busy run—I’d guess 550 people—and the ability mixed. I channelled Lisa. Yes! It’s BRILLIANT to hang out at the back, or the second half of the group at least. According to the ticket I collected at the end, I finished 257th and the 22nd woman for my age group (senior vet, whit whit whit??).

For other diabetic geeks, my blood sugar when I got up this morning was 13.6 (oops). I took half a unit of fast-acting insulin to correct this and I took my basal insulin at 7.30am and knocked two units off the usual dose. To avoid working out food and insulin requirements, I didn’t bother with breakfast* and ate a Hike bar—Aldi’s own-brand protein bars, 25g carbs and 9g fibre—twenty minutes before starting. My blood sugar at that point was 10.6, so I took another half unit of fast-acting insulin. I didn’t test my levels immediately after finishing, but an hour later they were 9.6.

So, another three months and I run more than twice that amount. Ooh, ‘eck! I ran the 10k in 60 minutes and 53 seconds (I told you I was slow), which puts me on course for running the half in two hours-ish. Wish me luck!

*Don’t do this at home, kids. I have no nutritional or sports expertise related to type 1 diabetes or in general.

More Thrush Ladies?!

May 31, 2018May 29, 2018 Emma2 Comments

a picture of canesten cream on The Diabetes Diet Could I live with more thrush? Ladies who live with diabetes, you’ll join me at wincing at this one. No thanks, eh? Who wants to spend their days wishing they were sitting in a bath of calamine lotion?

I ask because I filled in a survey last week which asked me if I’d take a tablet to help with my blood sugar control despite initial findings where the control group suffered thrush as a side effect. That wasn’t the only reported side effect—weight loss is another one—but the benefits reported are exciting.

The drug is sotagliflozin (marketed as Zynquista), made by Sanofi and Lexicon, and it’s a dual SGLT1 and SGLT2 inhibitor. At present, it’s about to be reviewed by the US Food and Drug Administration, as diabetes.co.uk reported.

The SGLT1 bit works to delay glucose absorption in the intestines which helps with blood sugar spikes after eating. The SGLT2 inhibitor makes the kidneys better at getting rid of excess sugar in the blood.

Zynquista had undergone clinical trials. People who took the drug achieved better HbA1c levels without increasing the risk of severe hypos. But one group of trial participants taking sotagliflozin developed diabetic ketoacidosis, compared to just 0.6 percent taking a placebo.

Participants on the trial lost 2.98kg compared to those not taking the drug.

Would I take it? Heck, yes, even if it means stockpiling the clotrimazole creams beforehand. All addition help in the blood sugar battle is always welcome.