Diabetes continues to grow at rapid rates mainly due to lifestyle and diet choices. Diabetes can lead to various complications and even death and being educated about sugar diabetes management and the diabetic diet is the first step in winning the battle over the disease not only for you but also for any family members with the disease or at risk of developing the disease. Proper management of sugar diabetes through initiating and maintaining a proper diabetic diet and incorporating other lifestyle changes such as regular exercise, will ensure that you have many healthy years of life free from diabetes complications such as heart and kidney disease, nerve damage, limb amputations, etc.
The first step with diabetes and is to get yourself tested by a doctor. By finding out whether or not you are a diabetic, have pre-diabetes or are diabetes free is crucial. If you have vertigo, finding out which type you have properly manage diabetes.
Diabetes is the result of the pancreas not producing any insulin (Type 1), not producing enough insulin or disregarding the insulin produced (Type 2). Gestational diabetes affects pregnant women and either clears up after giving birth or turns into Type 2 diabetes later on.
is the most common type of diabetes and diabetics with this type continue to significantly increase mainly due to poor lifestyle choices. About half of the diabetics with Type 2 diabetes are unaware that they have the disease. Type 1 is usually diagnosed in childhood and requires daily shots of insulin.
Insulin is the hormone that helps the body use glucose (from sugars and carbohydrates) needed by the body’s cells for energy. When insulin is not produced or not enough insulin is produced by the body, the glucose levels in the blood stream will rise and since there will be no insulin or too little insulin to transfer the glucose from the blood to the cells for energy, the glucose will be eliminated by the body which leads to diabetes related complications some of which were mentioned above.
Proper diabetes management starts with controlling the body’s glucose cycle which is done with a proper diabetic diet. The glucose entry into the blood stream and the insulin levels in the blood are the two factors that affect the glucose cycle.
Diet and exercise are the two main factors that affect the glucose levels in the body. Making changes in at least one of these areas, should first be discussed with your doctor to determine what will work best for you. Diabetes management involves making a complete and total lifestyle change and frequent checking of the glucose levels in the blood to ensure that the glucose levels remain constant and are not too high or too low.
Measuring the blood sugar levels is becoming easier and easier by the day with the development and continued improvement of glucose meters that are readily available and easy to use.
A small drop of blood is applied to the testing strip that is attached to a glucose meter and a number is generated by the meter and represents the blood sugar levels in the body. This number helps the diabetic to determine whether or not they need additional insulin to help the body transfer the glucose in the bloodstream to the body’s cells.
The diabetic diet usually involves carbohydrate counting. A proactive diabetic can get the tools and resources to help them to differentiate between good carbs and bad carbs and how to space out carbohydrates to meet the daily carbohydrate requirements in an effort to properly manage glucose levels in the body.