I don’t “think” about or plan my meals in terms of macro nutrients (fats,proteins, carbs) and quantities and calories. In other words, except for keeping carbs lower, I don’t plan a goal for fats, protein. I’ve been trying to eat a balanced meal, usually based on color🙂, lots of greens, some red, some protein/meat, some carb/starch/fruit. Fruits are about colors too. I tend to choose my foods depending on my hunger/mood. The only thing I count deliberately is carbs because of insulin dosing. I don’t count calories. I’m not trying to lose weight or gain weight, prepare for a marathon, competition.According to Carb Manager, which I recently started to use, my daily caloric intake is about 1,000 calories, some days more, other days less. About 50%, (some days less), of my calories are from fats. Is this to be expected from those of us who do not follow SAD? I follow a lower carb diet between 75- 100 g carbs daily. Macro nutrients, and their quantification is
new to me because I have not kept track of calories, macros (except for carbs ). About 45-50% calories from fats seems like a high number to me. I do get ravenously hungry around 5:30 pm before dinner some times. I don’t know what that’s all about. Drinking water and having a few walnuts or cucumbers help.
It’s eye-opening to get some numbers, isn’t it? I track pretty much everything I eat. I first started logging food to get carb counts, but the calories and macros followed automatically in the app I use. Now I find it useful to ensure I get enough protein for strength training.
If you eat low-carb, you still have to get your calories from somewhere, so I’m not surprised that you get half of them from fat. Fat is 9 kcal per gram while protein and carbs are 4, so it adds up quickly. This also means that 50% of the calories is much less than 50% by weight.
I know there are people who eat high fat / low carb, to make it easier for BG management. And I know there are a lot of diets with various amounts.
Personally, I do not try to follow a “diabetic diet”. I try to follow the recommendations for healthy eating for someone my age and weight and activity level. I take diabetes out of the picture when planning my diet.
When I consider all of that, 50% of calories from fat would be way too high for me.
Just my belief. You will get a million opinions on what is right. But I recommend picking the diet you think is best for you, and then making the diabetes work with it.
As a side note…you may already know this, but a gram of fat has more than twice the calories of a gram of protein of a gram of carbohydrates. That is why the fat calories add up so quickly!
@lh378 I’m one of the LCHF (low carb high fat) people. I’ve followed and optimized a keto (now carnivore) diet plan and try to maintain macros of 75% calories from fat, 25% from protein. Carb intake is as close to 0 as possible.
My usual daily caloric intake is between 800-1,000 calories, and I maintain an A1C in the range of 4.6 - 5.0.
I have to mind my protein intake as I live with diabetic kidney disease.
I’ll keep an eye on it- I just started Carb Manager a few days ago. Two of the days, I had Haagen Ice Cream popsicles. Another contributor to fats: nuts/seeds. I eat some walnuts and pumpkin seeds; not a lot, perhaps a quarter cup a day in total. Maybe they all add up? 61 g of fat, about 550 calories is the largest amount of fat in the past few days (ice cream and nuts). 35 g of fat may be more the customary; I don’t eat ice cream daily. My food intake is about 1,000 calories a day. @Eric
ETA:. It’s the avocado! I just noticed that Avocado and nuts in one day easily pushes my fats to 50g of fat.
I use bitesnap on my iPhone. You can take a photo of your food/meal and it does its best to recognize the ingredients (seldom ALWAYS accurate though!), and then gives you the breakdown of what you might find on the back label, including all nutritional Daily Values of individual ingredients and the complete meal. My meals are not too varied but this app is fairly easy to use once the complicated menu items are entered, and I like to know the total DV percentages! It doesn’t offer anything in particular for carbs though other than just the carb count.
Curious if you still eat like this? I’m really trying to tighten up my control as I’ve just been diagnosed with Diabetic Retinopathy, and an A1C under 7, stable blood sugars and normal blood pressure and cholesterol are currently my only treatments (I’d like to keep it that way as long as possible). I have a hard time keeping my post eating numbers down even with accurate counting, pre bolusing and control iq. Open to trying drastic dietary regimens.
@jo_jo Up until about 2 months ago I kept pretty much to a low carb diet (under 30 grams of carbs per meal), and it is far easier to avoid post-prandial blood sugar spikes eating that way.
You might want to give it a try if you’re trying to tighten your control, although given your A1C is currently under 7 I’m not sure how much difference it would make for your retinopathy progression .
Whatever you decide to do, I wish you all the best!
I typed it weird, what I meant was an A1C under 7 is my treatment aim. I haven’t yet achieved that. My last ones were 8.2, 10.1, something like that. My clarity is saying I’m getting 7.7 now which would be progress, but I still have until January till I get my next A1C.
@jo_jo If your next A1C is mid or late January you best get started right away. It’s quite doable, my A1C’s haven’t been over 5 since I got a CGM and began eating LC.
I had PDR in both eyes in the mid 90’s, but laser photocoagulation saved / restored my vision.
). About 45-50% calories from fats seems like a high number to me. I do get ravenously hungry around 5:30 pm before dinner some times. I don’t know what that’s all about. Drinking water and having a few walnuts or cucumbers help.
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