Anything with white sugar, white flour, refined flour, corn syrup, dextrose, mollasses, high fructose corn syrup, basically everything that sounds too good to be true. If it does, it is. So yes, you can no longer eat cake, pie, pizza, candy and the like. However, it should be noted that these things can often be made in a hypoglycemic friendly form using whole grain products, natural sweeteners and good food. So, for example, an apple pie could be made using whole grain, natural crust, stevia or xylitol as the sweetener, organic apples, and cinnamon if tolerated (see below in next part). These things could possibly be eaten, but ONLY if you find a way to make them without all the terrible additives and sugars that have ruined us to begin with. However, you should always avoid bananas, corn (all products containing as well) and root vegetables (carrots, potatoes, beets, etc.). If you want to try them, BE VERY CAREFUL.
If your case is SEVERE, the following should be eaten in moderation or avoided at first, otherwise just be aware that they can cause problems for various reasons:
Beans (all types), Black Pepper, Cabbage, Cashews, Cayenne Pepper, Cinnamon, Curry, Dried Fruits, Garlic, Hot Peppers (the hotter, the less you should eat if you’re doing bad), Juice (all kinds, best to cut it with water if you want to try it, equal amounts), Peanuts and Turmeric. I’m sure there are more things out there, but these are the things I’ve experimented with and had problems with AT FIRST or figured out need to be eaten moderately. If you uncertain, check sugar versus carbohydrate level (if both are high, it means the sugar is high and thus the rise of glucose in the blood) and look on the internet to see if a specific food or spice is known for lowering blood sugar.
If you’re wondering why peanuts and cashews should be avoided, it’s because they’re not nuts, they’re actually BEANS. Read up on it. They affect sugar levels much differently than actual nuts like walnuts. One bad thing is SOY. AVOID IT ENTIRELY. Soy has high levels of phytic acid, something the human body was never built to process. If you eat too much of it, your body has to find a way to pass it through, so it takes vitamins and minerals and such out of YOU and attaches it to the molecules, which will make you feel even worse. This is why many vegetarians look so weak and sickly, they eat too much soy. It lowers immune response, weakens skin, hair, you name it. The Chinese NEVER used it as a main food staple, only as a condiment, and this is why.
Everything else can be eaten, paying attention to food allergies of course. I prefer to eat organic only if possible, but certain foods it doesn’t matter with because they don’t get too much on them. Oranges, for example, are not much of a problem because the pesticides cannot get into the part you eat. Meat, however is notorious for containing tons of hormones and antibiotics if you buy it nonorganic. Fish is usually not a problem at all, but be careful of farm raised, it can contain some serious garbage. Luckily, everything is indicated now, so if it doesn’t say fresh caught or anything about not using antibiotics/hormones, it’s best to stay away. This bit is not absolutely essential, but I recommend it. And now, without further ado, here’s how you put it all together.
It depends on your GTT, if you’ve had one, but I recommend eating no less than once every two hours (it’s up to you ultimate, but that is the bare minimum, I currently eat three times a day). If you get low, snacks are best such as walnuts and hard boiled eggs or cheese. DO NOT eat more carbohydrate except for fruit, preferably apples in small chunks. Don’t overdo that though and you may not want to try it if you’re starting out severe. Once you decide on how often you want to eat, measure everything out. Typically, you should be eating no less than 60g and no more than 150g of carbohydrate per day at first and getting the majority of it from vegetables and fruit. You can raise the carbohydrates as time goes on, but never drop below 60, EVER or you’ll get a nice surprise. If you seem to be okay on unrefined grain products, such as brown rice, then that’s fine, but try to make sure your vegetable content is nonetheless high, but not ridiculous. If you feel like evening out carohydrates is too much, make one meal have a higher amount and then wait two more before another high amount is given, but make sure it’s still all measured throughout the day.
Another good option even for people who have problems is sprouted grain. Read about it. I suggest ONE slice of Ezekiel bread in the morning, it’s pretty common now and easy to find at general supermarkets even, and the same company makes sprouted grain pita wraps, pasta and more. Protein should be about 1g per every TWO pounds of body weight, no more. If you’re more active, such as weight lifting, more protein is permissable, but don’t overdo it. I don’t recommend soy or protein powders or anything either, I recommend MEAT. Before running, if you do, it’s best to eat a lot of protein
and THEN carbohydrates after your run (an orange works best). Fat content should be below your protein intake, but a little higher than normal. Once you get on this diet, your body will use protein and fat for its main energy, saving the carbohydrates for the brain and the sugars from fruit for muscles and back up energy. So you won’t gain, you will lose weight. Sometimes it’s pretty drastic, but always evens out eventually
Thus, feel free to add organic butter, cheese and other things to your diet as you feel the need, but again, don’t overdo the fat just like the protein. The best thing seems to be to eat a decent amount of carbohydrates in the morning. My old routine consisted of avocados (one is enough) as well as two fried eggs, a whole apple and sheep yogurt. The avocado contains a special sugar that suppresses insulin production, so it’s a good idea to eat them at first. My current breakfast now consists of the following (to show you what you’ll eventually be able to do):
2 tablespoons of brewer’s yeast (downed with water)
3 fried eggs
1 slice of whole, sprouted grain bread
1 smoothie (it’s AWESOME) made from:
1 cup unsweetened almond milk
1/2 cup water
1/40 teaspoon stevia
3 mineral drops
1 whole apple cored and cut into fourths
1 or 1 1/2 cups of frozen fruit (berry mix, pineapple, peaches maybe)
4 large spoonings of sheep yogurt
my vitamins
Grains are fine, as long as not refined and you feel like you can take it. I do not recommend milk, only yogurt or cheese, and preferably, in the case of yogurt, goat or sheep only. Your fruit intake should be decent in the morning, at least 1/2 or a full apple, about the size of a little less than a softball. After this, every meal should consist of your protein intake for the rest of the day divided evenly, as well as your carbohydrates. If you’ve figured 80g of carbs per day, for example, and eat 5 meals, try at least 30g in the morning and then 10g for the next three and 20g for the last one. Eventually, you should be able to cut down to a normal three to four meals a day. Here is an example of what I may eat for lunch:
1 large chunk of cheese
1 pound chicken
1/4 pound used for a pita wrap
the rest prepared how I want (for example, boil the water for a little bit,
put the chicken in it for a short while, take out, cut into pieces, fry up in
rice vinegar, paprika, pepper salt, covered in cheese afterwards)
1 sprouted grain pita wrap with some of the chicken, tomato, lettuce, very
hot sauce and a dallop of sour cream
1 large slice of watermelon (or maybe a whole peach)
1/2 of an apple
1 liter water (maximum) with my fish oil pills
Nighttime is important because you should be eating less carbohydrate, not as much as breakfast and with a little more protein. If you wake up and are panicky or hungry, always eat protein, never carbohydrates or fruit. For fruit you can try whatever you like, just be aware of carbohydrate content. DO NOT worry about the fructose in fruit, it actually does not activate insulin as carbohydrates do, so eating a bit more if you feel down during the day can help, but I recommend this being from apples at first, though it’s up to you.
Supplements:
I recommend taking a good calcium/magnesium/zinc mix if you can find it, especially if you’re eating more protein and lower carbohydrates. Fish oil is also good, preferably from small, wild caught fish. Brewer’s yeast is something with benefit as well, and I myself take a tablespoon before breakfast and before my final meal. In addition, a good multi vitamin is something to take in the morning, but totally avoid stuff like centrum, because they suck. You need to get a good one from a health food store and be careful that there aren’t any ingredients you need to avoid in them. How do you know one is good? Put it in a small glass of water with a penny. Let the penny sit in the water for about an hour, then add the vitamin. If it doesn’t break down in 10 minutes, throw them out, it means it just passes through you. The final supplement I recommend is vitamin c, again in a good form that you’re only going to find at a health food store. High doses of vitamin c are good for the body as well as having an insulin lowering effect to keep you more stable. 1g a day is plenty, more than that really isn’t necessary and is just expelled from the body. It’s not entirely necessary, and I actually stopped doing it after awhile.
What should you expect? In lucky cases, you’ll feel better immediately, but this is rare. Usually, you can expect to feel awesome for about 1-2 weeks and then like total, absolute, waste-of-life garbage or just start out feeling like you’re going to die. I CANNOT stress this enough. YOU WILL FEEL LIKE YOU WANT TO DIE AND ABSOLUTELY HATE LIFE. Read that again and again. You may have years of bad eating to make up for and unforunately one week is not even the surface of what needs to happen. Expect to start feeling better, or at least a small difference, in no longer than four weeks (it’s rare, but it can take longer), and then slowly get better. Healing time to where you feel around 90-100% most of the time seems to take at least 6 months and up to a year in some cases. Again, YOU WILL HATE IT, YOU WILL ABSOLUTELY HATE IT. But to keep things going smoothly, keep yourself in focus and always remember that you should never worry about a symptom, new or not, unless it lasts longer than a steady, and I mean steady two weeks. Expect a lot of adjustment in your body, including your thinking, to be taking place. It won’t be fun, trust me, I had a terribly severe case and it took forever to feel awesome again. But now, I’m doing great with occasional slips that take around 5 days to go away. If you have any questions about the above, post away!
Corn is bad bad bad. However, if you use corn starch that should be okay, because you usually don’t eat ALL of it when you make a sauce from it. Corn is usually really, really bad for hypoglycemics. You can try a nut flour or flax meal and that should thicken, but you’ll need to experiment to see how much you need. No alcohol right now, avoid it entirely. Anything with any bit of caffeine should be avoided (if you want to know why I can tell you). This INCLUDES ‘decaf,’ which just means less caffeine, not no caffeine. Eventually you won’t need protein with everything, I just had a large hunk of watermelon, an orange and a glass of pure cranberry juice after running and these things don’t bother me at all anymore. I’ve heard various things about this but as far as I know all of them are incorrect. Major sugar processing actually begins RIGHT when you’re eating, it starts to absorb in your mouth (this is why people who chew get an effect from it, things enter your blood really easily through the mouth) and goes right in your blood through the lining of the stomach as soon as it hits it. Nothing can ’slow’ this, you can only, sort of, slow down digestion in the small intestines and such, but this really doesn’t do anything, it’s all a myth as far as I’ve read. If you can handle milk you can try that, but you may do just fine with juice. Try ONLY bitter fruit juices like blueberry or cranberry and make sure they’re 100% juice and not from concentrate. It’s a little expensive, but cut that with some water and see how it goes, it should be okay for you but you still may be too sensitive.
I definitely recommend you stop eating those bananas first off.
what am i supposed to do when i feel crummy and my hands go numb (especially at night)
You need to eat protein. You can have something like half an apple if you tolerate it, but absolutely do not eat any other type of carbohydrate than this. No pasta, bread or anything like that. Protein is preferable at night because it’s slow to go into the system, so it won’t cause problems over time. The unfortunate thing is, you need to wait this out. It takes a lot of patience and time, you won’t get better in a day, or even a month.
ok so no hard candy? thats what the arrogant drs at the ER told me to do. sadly they dont know a thing about nutrition and dont learn it in med school.
so how does protein keep my blood sugar from dropping?
All food is converted into glucose when you eat it, protein is just a lot slower in the process. It gives your body energy while things get better, but it doesn’t stimulate insulin like carbohydrates do, so it’s the snack of choice for you right now. NO candy.
That’s what I eat. It’s only provided as an example of what I currently consume to show everyone. If you were eating that much you’d spread it out over several. I eat three meals a day now with a snack here and there if I feel like it. Because I work out so much I can eat that much protein, my body needs it to recover. Make sure you read through it carefully because I explain everything in detail. I say in there 1g per every 2 pounds of body weight. If you weigh 90 pounds, that’s only 45g per day. If you weigh 180, that’s 90g, which is not as much as you think. 1/2 a chicken breast has about 34g of protein
, and you have to include any other food you eat that has protein in it. I eat about a pound per day because I work out a lot, but if you don’t, that won’t be how much you should eat. 1g per every 2 pounds is the suggested intake to start at. I assume you probably weigh around 120 or so, which would be only 60g of protein per day. That’s about 1 1/2 chicken breasts. Look at a can of tuna and see how much is in there. That will give you an indication of protein content per amount of meat.
For iron, there is nothing better than at least two eggs per day. Red meat has a lot of iron as well, but don’t eat too much of it. Maybe like half a steak for you would be plenty for an entire day. There was something else good for iron, let me think. Spinach and pumpkin seeds are two good ones. Sea vegetables like seaweed has a ton as well, but I don’t know how much it costs in general.
Does water make your sugar drop? I fine that when i drink water it falls. I have told the Dr. but he said it shouldn’t because there nothing in it. Is this a problem for anyone else?
Be careful of obsessing. Funny you mention water because I had the same fear myself once! You’re just getting worried because of a coincidence. Water will cause no problem. I do, however, drink purified water, not from the sink
, it makes me sick. If you’re really worried about it, you can buy these super purifiers that take out everything, even chlorine, and then do what I do, buy some mineral drops to return the content to awesome levels. The purifier costs around $100 for the unit and $35 for the refills, which you only need once a year for a family of four and perhaps once every two years for a family of two. The drops are about $25 for a bottle that lasts around a year. Anyway, just letting you know what I do, you don’t have to do that at all, I just try for optimum health in all areas.
I have a pretty bad case of hypoglycemia and I don’t need to lose weight, I need to gain or maintain. I also have been weightlifting for 20 years and don’t want to start losing muscle. Atkins seems like a good diet for the hypo but I don’t think I’m going to have enough energy in the gym. I don’t know how to approach this situation but need to do something. Any help would be much appreciated.
You’d be surprised how much energy you’ll have on a low carbohydrate, high protein moderate fat diet. I don’t recommend pure Atkins because the restrictions are a bit too much. The diet I have here is a slight modification of it with higher, healthier carbohydrates. Can you eat fruit at all? I’ll tell you that when I wasn’t eating grain I was still able to run miles and lift weights, but I was eating fruit for energy as well. If you can’t, it will be harder, but still possible. I now eat roughly 1-3 pounds of meat per day depending on activity level. I work out A LOT, so that’s why. If you’re doing heavy lifting pretty frequently I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re eating around that much already.
I am trying to learn all of this carb stuff thats all people would say eat slow acting carbs, funny I only felt better when I ate protein.
When I read Vitamin C brought insulin down I ran in the kitchen and got a chewable 500mg, sure enough took the strong hunger down.
Are there any other quick tips for bringing insulin down?
Do you have a website with specific meals at all listed that would be helpful?
And I am a little confused on the protien. I can only have so much protien for the day so I have to divide it up over the whole day? How do I fill in the blanks if Carbs are not the way to go? Sorry I am a little confused.
Any extra guidance would be appreciated, I really get confused with this stuff.
No problem, that’s one of the reasons I post here, to help. I remember what it was like for me, I had to do all this and figure it out on my own. Whatever you feel is a good protein level for you should be evenly divided throughout the day. Fruit should be one of the first carbs you add in your diet, then I recommend sprouted grain (if you haven’t tried it, seriously try it for a bit to see what happens, you may be pleasantly surprised, but you also may not be ready yet). Spicy foods seem to help with insulin too, but they also have a blood sugar
lowering effect if you eat too much of it. Berries are another good way to balance insulin, but nothing is as quick acting as vitamin C, as far as I know.
Thanks so much stan! I ran to grab the vitamin c I had on the shelf, and it worked right away. I then boiled some eggs I ate one and drank a glass of water and made it throught the niht peacfully. I was impressed I ate this morning a half of an advacado a boiled egg and a glass of water, made it for 2 1/2 hours before feeling hungry! Ran back and ate the rest of my advacado and two slices of apple and ate my vitamin c. So far going well. I am gettin a little hungry now. I am weaning off of coffee only had a half a cup. If I did not have the coffee probably would have been a lot better. I can see where the coffee is a stimulant for cortisol and that shotts insilun up its like a ping pong going on.
Good for you! Now, keep in mind that you may get good and then a little bad again, so don’t get frustrated if you feel a little bad in the near future. I use these drops called Concentrace.
