Ok. Here is the truth. I know I have to look it in the face.

I was officially diagnosed 6 weeks ago as having Type II Diabetes. My doctor prescribed Avandia which is an anti-diabetic drug. I didn't fill the prescription. I am still nursing and the box says that you're not supposed to take it if pregnant or nursing. (It's time that I stop nursing though... the baby is 19 months.) I am 36 years old and was gestational diabetic with all 3 of my children but my sugar went back to normal after their birth. I was told that I would most likely become diabetic later in life since gestational diabetes is often a precursor to full blown type II later in life.

I didn't think it would happen this soon. Here is what I know:

I know that if I change my diet, I will be able to control my blood sugar.

I know that I am absolutely addicted to sugar and bread and rice and every other carb under the son.

I know I am insulin resistant Big Time.

I know that my vision has deterriorated markedly in the past year.

I know that every muscle in my body hurts all of the time.

I know that my sugar is very high.

I know that I love my husband and my children.

I know that I want to be around to see them grow up.

I know what I need to do...

So why don't I do it?? Why don't I follow a high-protein diet and stick to it?? Why do I do so well for the first week then absolutely sabotage myself?? Why don't I take my health seriously? If not for my sake then for my families sake? I don't dislike myself, but it's as if I have an underlying death wish or something. I know that I can fix my health problem but losing weight and maintaining a life-style that promotes low blood sugar, but I can't seem to stick with it. SABOTAGE comes naturally to me. It's pretty pathetic.

I adore my kids.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME?????!!!!


Jessica

Jessica changing your lifestyle is not an easy task.

I know when I first started changing mine 2 years ago, it took a lot of courage. I quit smoking first, then I quit drinking, then I tackled the task of losing the excess weight.

What helped me get through it all was making a list. Why was it important for me to do these lifestyle changes. Ask yourself all the hard questions and then answer them.

Is it worth the work? You bet it is. When you feel weak, go back through that list you made. Remind yourself of why you are doing a lifestyle change. Reason I say lifestyle change is this isn't a diet you go on or off of. This does become the way you eat for the rest of your life.

I wish you only the best in life.

You might just need a partner! Is there anybody in your group of family or friends who would be willing to support you by joining you in this WOL? When I started, I was alone in my family, but I had a friend I saw once/week who was supportive. Even so, with junk foods in the house all the time for the other family members, I would have had a much harder time staying with this way of eating. Thankfully, my son and husband joined me on Atkins and we've all had great success together - it's a VERY supportive environment.

Perhaps, if your spouse realizes that without Low-Carbing you're headed to blindness, kidney failure, high medical bills, and who knows what all else, he might be - at the least - supportive and encouraging? Perhaps you have a neighbor who has always wanted to lose weight but no "diet plan" ever seemed to work? A friend who would pat you on the back every day?

You know, if nothing else, you've got us - here. If you have nobody locally, log on here every day for a daily dose of willpower. It's a great place.

Hi there! I can empathize with you - seriously. I'm sure there are a lot of folks here who can, so you're in the right place.


This might sound over simplified, but one thing I try to gain a little "real time" will power is to just tell myself to wait 20 minutes. I did this with fair success when I stopped smoking. So a craving or the sabotage comes up, like as you seem to be describing happens in your second week, you tell youself Wait 20 minutes to eat that bag of cookies (or whatever). I found that if I could win a bunch of little battles right up front, I felt more & more successful. I tried stretching it out a bit: Monday is the 20 minutes day; Tuesday is the 30 minutes day. Wednesday is 45. By the time a 1/2 and hour or 45 minutes passes, you've moved on to something else anyway & have forgotten the cookies or cigarettes or whatever. As time went on, I forgot more & more to want cigarettes. The need & craving was & still is there, but I managed to practice a healthy form of procrastination!

Another thing that helped me was a picture of a smokers black lung. Maybe try keeping a picture of how rough diabetes can be on your body on the refrigerator?

Before & After pictures have helped me too. Put a before picture on the refrigerator or the pantry. Maybe another one on your mirror in the bathroom? It sounds morbid, but for me at least, pictures are more accurate than my memory of myself.

OK -- I'll stop bombarding you with suggestions. I hope you can find some peace for yourself soon. You sound pretty upset.

Best wishes You CAN do this.

What a tough situation!

This is just encouragement to set the tone for diet and foods in your family. In my family, there is a lot of diabetes. As a result, my mother did not serve sweets/desserts, and breads, etc... were strictly controlled in my family growing up.

Had I stuck to the diet pattern she set, I would not have gained the weight I have over the past 10 years. A mid-life change of diet led me to ballooning weight.

But I guess I'm trying to say this - this is your life, and it is also your childrens' lives - since there is a genetic component to diabetes.

Set the tone for your family with the low carb foods you choose, don't feel compelled to surround yourself with temptation "so that the kids and husband can have them". Your husband can get his higher carb treats outside the home - at work, on break. Your kids don't need them, won't benefit from them, and *will* benefit from your setting low-carb habits for them very young.

Good luck. There's nothing wrong with you - as someone else said, changing your life is really, really tough. Is there a diabetic support group that your doc could refer you to? Here, at the local hospital, there is one, and a friend has found this helpful as she works on her diabetes.

Take care,

Thank you so much for your good advice! You're right, I need to break up my goal into small reachable goals.

I bought $125 worth of meat and protein stuff on Sunday and still have not started the WOL. I had toast and cereal for breakfast. I'm truly an addict, like a smoker is. I know that sugar is a drug. I will start today at lunch.

Also, I know I should show my kids the example. They eat far too much sugar and carbs. They don't like meat or vegetables. I have to say that I offer veggies at every meal but they follow my husband's example and don't eat them. It will be a battle to get them to eat in a different way. But for their own sake, I have to make the effort.

I will take a before picture and hang it up. I don't allow myself to be photographed because I can't stand looking at myself. It's true, unless we have a photo of our fat self in front of us, it's easy to forget what we look like.

Thaks for all of your good advice. I promise to stay close on this forum. I will ask my doctor if he could recommend a support group in my area. That's a fabulous idea. I don't want to die from diabetes.

and neither do we.....so that's why we are going to stick close and get you started!

Okay...first things first. Start a journal. Visit mine, and then visit as many more as you possibly can. All you can gain from them, is menu ideas, recipes, encouragement and motivation. Most of the folks that are around are/were carb addicts.

You will probably feel like crap the first few days...most do. Headaches, fatigue. YOU were the one that said you were an addict.....well the withdrawal from carbs ain't pretty either. Trust me...this too shall pass.

Not so long ago I was 71 pounds heavier. I too looked in the mirror in disgust. It was also the thought that I had a wonderful 6 year old son that depended on me that woke me up. He deserves a mom for a long time. Yes, I come from a long line of diabetics, and yes...I had borderline gestational diabetes when I was pregnant with him. Do I want to risk my life? .... no. Do I want to risk HIS????? absolutely not. So for both of us....I have cussed these 71 off, and tried to teach him how to be healthy.

You can do it too...I know you can.

Get that journal up girl...and drop by mine. I promise to keep an eye on ya!

Sam

I wish I knew the secret of the "jolt" that got me stared. I had received a call from my sister that she was diagnosed with diabetes (my 3rd sibling with diabetes). I'm in the high risk group. I had known for months that I HAD to diet. I had gained over 40 lbs. in the previous year, my feet ached all the time, and I was down to two pair of jeans and a couple of tops that fit. I had tried over and over to start a diet, and never made it to dinner time. I dieted myself right up to my top weight ever.

The one thing I remember about getting started this time, is that I simply promised myself three days. I bought a case of bottled water, a couple of grocery-store cooked rotisserie chickens, salad fixin's and blue cheese dressing. That, along with eggs and bacon for breakfast was all I ate for those three days. I found it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, once I got over the "hump", that is the decision to just go ahead and do it. Then, after three days, it became so easy! I found certain items that I have for "treats", that keep me motivated. (For me....I don't stick with the "no-caffeine" rule, so I love a cup of coffee with real cream. In the evening I have a glass of red wine. Sometimes, I'll savor a small piece of brie cheese for dessert.)

Good luck. You can do this. Believe in yourself. Then, just DO IT!

Tami

Oh yes -- I forgot to mention something: My Dad was diagnosed with Type II about 10 years ago or so. For quite some time his (ex) wife didn't really take it seriously. She kept cooking desserts & mashed potatoes. My dad, being the kind of guy he is, never wanted to rock the boat with her, and so his blood levels kept getting worse. It got to the point where he had to start taking pills instead of just changing his diet.

It seems like a couple of years ago they changed the threashold number in your blood count that makes you diabetic. (I know I phrased that horribly, but I couldn't remember what the darned # is called!) It made his situation even worse. The doctor called my dad's wife in the office & gave her what for! The doctor told them both horror stories about diabetics losing feet & eyes & even death. Sometimes it takes a punch in the face like some guy without his feet to really wake you up.

The long story short is that the ex-wifey started cooking a diabetic diet & my Dad started taking things more seriously too. Now he's off his meds & he wears the same size pants he did in college.

I'm sure his story is just one of a growing number of success stories. I read somewhere (probably here) that good health starts in the kitchen.

I'm really glad to see you've started by buying some yummy meat & protein. Great! My dh was the same way as you've described yours, but after his big hiney saw me lose 30 lbs. he starting to do reduced carb too. It's hard to lead by example all of the time, but it sounds like you're on the right path. Can't wait to check your journal someday & see how great you're doing.

Hi Jessica!

Addictions can be strange things. You know it's bad for you and that it's ruining your health, but darn that cake/cookie/pasta still looks good!

I've been a type 2 diabetic for 10 years. At first, I didn't really take it too seriously. I figured I'd just follow the diet they gave me, get a little exercise and everything would be fine, right? Well, for a while it was. I lost a lot of weight by exercising and just keeping my calories low (1,200 a day or less). Then I got pregnant...3 times. I did okay during the pregnancies; even managed to stay off insulin all 3 times, but afterwards it was awful. Post partum depression set in and I turned to the "great white psychologist" and gained back all of the weight I'd lost and then some. Blood sugar was still okay, so I figured everything was cool. Well....a few more years down the road to 2001. My blood sugars suddenly went out of control even though I was really sticking to the old diet this time and I wasn't even losing weight. By the time I got to the doctor, my blood pressure was also dangerously high....so high that he gave me medication right there and wouldn't let me leave until it came down to a safe range and was going to put me in the hospital if they couldn't get it to come down. He was afraid that I was about to have a stroke right there!
That scared me. A lot. The whole time I was laying in the doctor's office waiting for my blood pressure to come down or be sent to the hospital (which was a couple of hours) I kept thinking about what would happen to my 2 little girls if something terrible happened to me. Sure, my husband would raise them, but how would they grow up without a mother?
I made up my mind then and there that I was going to do whatever it took to get my health back again. I had tried low carb before but gave up when I hit my first stall after losing 30 lbs thiking that it just wasn't working for me. A friend recommended Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution to me, so I got the book and started the plan immediately. The rest is history. My husband has been absolutely behind me in all of this (I think he wants me to live a little longer too!) and is a wonderful source of support. He's even low carbing with me.
Please don't let it get to the point that I did. It took a bad scare to shape me up and get me serious about taking care of me.
If you have to, think about all the bad things that can and will happen to you the next time you're tempted to eat something you know you shouldn't and think also about whether your health is worth whatever it is that you are about to eat.
Please take care of yourself. If you don't, nobody else will!

I'm sorry, but I have to say this. Not all diabetic support groups are going to be receptive to low-carbing. Mine wasn't. My diabetic counselor was low-fat all the way, cut out the meats & fats, etc. The support group she headed was just as bad - and I got WORSE on the diabetic diet.

Freydis...

You're absolutely right about that. Most dieticians are still very much sold on the low fat dogma and many diabetic support groups will tell you that low carbing is a ticket straight to the coroner's shop, but we know better don't we? If they want to continue taking their pills and shots, they're welcome to. I don't want that.
The last time I saw a dietician (and I flatly refuse to ever go back), she had a hissy fit when I told her that I was low carbing, saying that I was going to kill myself with all that fat and protein (you know...all the usual heart attack and kidney failure stuff). Still, when I told her that she couldn't argue with my numbers and I had gotten OFF my medication eating this way and that my doctor supported me, she didn't have much more to say; just mumbled that she hoped I didn't have a heart attack anytime soon.

Jessica-

I don't have personal experience with diabetes, but I darn sure know about addictions. I am an extremely addictive personality and have slowly gotten rid of many of them. I still have ciggies to go! I have also changed my way of eating a couple of times. First by becoming a vegetarian and second by going low carb.

How I did it differed on the circumstances. With alcohol, I had a support group and used the 10 minute trick that someone else has already suggested. I leaned heavily on my support network and did what my sponsor told me. In effect, I turned my choices over to someone else for a while until I could make good choices. I just celebrated 14 years sober.

I also dumped all sodas, but I did that a bit differently. I did not deny myself soda-but I limited it to the weekends. After a while I forgot to get my weekend soda and just stopped drinking them completely.

Both times when I changed how I ate-I used a different trick. I did both for a limited amount of time and then made my decision to keep going. I decided to try low carbing for two weeks after my doctor suggested it. I went to him because no matter what I did I could not lose weight. He said-do the low carb thing for two weeks and if it doesn't work we will try something else. I figured I could do anything for two weeks. Two weeks later, I had dropped four pounds and had made it through the fatigue and feeling lousy. Since I saw results and I was feeling pretty good, I decided to try it for a while longer. I have only been doing lc for a little over two months, but it has been wonderful.

Same thing with becoming a veg head. I lived without meat for two or three weeks and it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I decided to see how far I could take it. That was 7 years ago.

I think you have made an important first step. I hope this time it takes for you. You know what the stakes are.

Keep coming here and we will help you get through this and become healthy.

Paleoanth

I can feel what you're feeling-I think your carbs have caught up with you -literally, and it's a scary thing to face. I'm in somewhat the same place, diabetic family, etc, and after roaming this forum for a few weeks, reading and re-reading DANDR, it suddenly dawned on me--I am a sugar addict duh! Very hard to face and I, too, have children, and worry that I won't be here for them and I'm not setting a good example and helping them, either, by the choices I have made. Time to do something. I've found, in the past, that if I 'just do it', don't tell everybody, just start, no fanfare no big production, it works better for me. Maybe for you?? I really, really believe that you can do it this time, just take one hour, one day at a time, and it WILL happen! Will be thinking of you...

Thank you so much for your encouraging comments! You're all very sweet and reassuring people. I know that each one of you is right. I was doing well for a few weeks, but recently slipped back to my old habbits once again. I'll start again tomorrow. Who knows? Maybe one day I'll get this right!

I was so uncomfortable on induction and even after I upped my carbs by 5 grams a day for a few days. My gall bladder was giving me sooo much pain! I couldn't even sleep. I was afraid I'd have to have it out! I decided to try eating more carbs (far more) and the pain went away. Now I know that it's better for me to eat high protein, but I'm afraid to be in so much pain again...