Diabetic beer olympics: advice on alcohol use?

No, two iced teas.

Even two does nothing immediately but I know to stop there because I know I’m about to be hit in 30 minutes or so.

It puts me at that perfect sweet spot. But I’m 210 lb. Maybe that’s why.

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Well for only drinking once in a while, you sure get the job done when you do. The spirits manufacturer’s salute you.

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I still have all the required liquors in my freezer purchased 5 years ago.

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Reading this thread reminds me of New Year’s Eve 2000. This was pre-CGM and pre-pump and I was never a drinker. I had a margarita type drink and bolused, but I did not know at the time how it might affect my BGs later. Needless to say that I was lying on the floor dealing with the worst low that I ever had in 45 years of T1D. My BG would just not go up at all and I felt deathly. I haven’t drank alcohol since then (except for a sip here and there). I guess it’s like getting really sick after eating something and not wanting to eat that thing again. I am really glad that this post is here to help educate people about the possible effects of alcohol on your BG and how to best manage it to avoid issues.

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OK wow. 1st off I want to say I feel like there’s si much information in this thread that I didn’t know before and that’s pretty awesome. Thank you everyone for your posts!

That being said, @Michel, I’d love to help put together a wiki on this. Like @Katers87 said, I think that a lot of young adult diabetics couldn’t greatly benefit from it :slight_smile:

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I learned a lot in your post @Katers87. For some reason I’d assumed all beers would be carbs and all wines meant carbs, but I’m seeing now that there’s a huge range on them.

Agreed! And beer has always been my go to when drinking, but it sounds like mixed drinks actually may be easier with D management… for some reason I thought they had lots of carbs but boy was I wrong!

love this idea. Just pulling it aside for a reminder for myself :slight_smile:

This is one of my favorite beers :heart_eyes:

I know others mentioned it somewhere in this thread, but craft beer for me always sends me spiking a lot more, and it feels good to have that validated with others saying it and I think some science was thrown around.

I completely agree, and this is what I really meant when I’d said I love drinking! You hit it spot on for me

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Super scary. Do you mind sending the link if you can find this study?

I checked out this site, and for those interested it’s really great. The reference chart that Michel referred to is under the " How much is considered one drink?" category.

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@Katers87 mentioned switching over the types of drinks after two as well, and I’m officially adding it to my list of things to try :smile:

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I’m not sure this applies to blood sugar effects; at least it doesn’t for me. I find that despite sobering up more quickly than most people and having my blood alcohol level return to zero (I used to hang out with alcohol researchers with breathalyzers on hand, so I know this for a fact), the effects of say, 3 drinks, last overnight and into the next early morning. Not sure why that’s the case, but I find the effects on liver glycogen suppression much longer lasting (and take longer to kick in) than the direct effects of alcohol.

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That is fascinating. And unfortunate too in terms of practical consequences for us:-)

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At one time I listed a link to it on FUD, maybe a year ago? I will look, I am pretty sure I can find it again.

Very interesting, this puts even more emphasis on why we will be testing on my son to figure all of this out prior to him leaving for college.

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This is technically true, and I know what you meant, but the wording could be a bit misleading. I find a lot of people consider “liquor” to be anything that comes from a liquor store, and “mixers” limited to sodas, tonic, fruit juices, and those horrible little envelopes of sour mix powders. But if you’re having mixed drinks/cocktails, the carbs can add up: sweet vermouth (4 g/oz), Dubonnet (4 g/oz), bitters such as Campari (7 g/oz) or Aperol (11 g/oz), or liqueurs like Triple Sec (11 g/oz) or Cointreau (8 g/oz). And of course plenty of cocktails contain sugar or simple syrup (both 4 g/tsp), which the bar menu may not list as an ingredient or your host may not mention.

I always bolus for the carbs in such drinks (and I always have them with food, so I’m bolusing anyway). I bolus for beer but not for wine, and I don’t make any basal adjustments for later on, primarily because if I’m having more than one cocktail, or one or two glasses of wine, I’m likely not at home and in that case carb counts, fat/protein effects and meal timings are often a guess anyway. And with moderate amounts of alcohol and a quantifiable dinner at home, I’ve never seen more than negligible effects on BG later in the night. I can’t really speak to drinking to excess, because after about four glasses of wine my stomach rebels (fortunately or unfortunately – depends on the wine).

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@Beacher, nice catch!!! I totally missed that point. I thought the champ in that category might be Kahlua with 15 carbs/oz–but now I have a feeling there may be more contenders… I’ll edit my post too (for the 5th or 6th time…?).

Depending on your source, Amaretto may take the trophy at 17 g/oz.

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I knew you could top my champ!

Amazing the things i learn here.

Beer olympics

Never did like beer so missed the games, but rum and diet coke was my preference.

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Love the link!

a combination of ruthless physical competition and endless beer consumption. The rules are simple and the outcome is fantastic.

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@cardamom, in support of your remarks earlier, @john mentioned a somewhat similar effect in another thread:

Beer for example always shows up late in my readings, up to 4 hours after consumption.

16 posts were split to a new topic: Diabetes, young adults and alcohol:additional mortality