Diabetic Carbohydrates

How do diabetic carbohydrates affect a diabetic diet? Carbohydrates or “carbs” affect the diabetic diet in several important ways. First of all, carbs provide the body with energy which you use for walking, thinking, running, and pretty much everything else your body does, so they are very important! They also can have significant amounts of fiber attached to them, like in the case of certain breads grains, and fruits. We all know fiber is important for several reasons, too.  With Diabetes carbohydrates are kind of like luggage…….if that makes any sense.  diabetic carbohydrate intake should be closely monitored to avoid sharp spikes in your blood sugar readings.

Carbs are also the thing that raises your blood sugar the most! That is why diabetics are known to avoid table sugar, and other high carb substances because of the high carbohydrate content, and high glycemic index (fast to raise blood sugar.) Good old normal pasta is loaded with carbs, and potatoes are packed with them, too. Just start reading your food labels and you will soon realize carbs are literally everywhere! Diabetic diets have to be careful with carbs.

Most diabetics I know count their diabetic carbohydrates so they know exactly how many carbs they are about to eat. This is very important for diabetics using insulin to control their blood sugar. Based on how many carbs are in the food, they know how much insulin to dial up to help the cells in their body accept the glucose inside of them. This is how the blood sugar goes down. So you see why carbs are always so prominent in conversations about diabetic diets. They quite simply affect our blood sugar more than any other nutrient. In the diabetic diet carbohydrates need to be limited to only low GI carbs.

Our bodies need carbs to survive, and too many carbs make our blood sugar go up too high, and not enough and we can experience hypoglycemia which is not pretty at all, I can assure you. This is just the tip of the iceberg in the ongoing struggle of diabetics to maintain a healthy body. If you do not have diabetes, you need to keep it that way by any means necessary. If you already have the disease, like me, you need to stay positive, and keep fighting.

When it comes to diabetic carbohydrates foods should always be carefully analyzed before you eat them.  Ask yourself if this is a low GI carb, is this carb offering some fiber with it?  Is this a natural carbohydrate or a processed junk carbohydrate?

diabetic carbohydrate counting

This will be a page in itself when I can get to it. But for right now let me quickly explain how this is done as well as I can. First find out how many carbs are in a serving by reading the label. If it is a fruit or veggie, they all differ but you can quickly find out by typing the name of the fruit or veggie and then “how many carbs” in google or yahoo. I find that most fruit is about 15 carbs per serving. Veggies for the most part are almost of no concern carb wise…with some exceptions. More on that later.

Then find out how much fiber is in the food in the same way. Now subtract the fiber from the total carbs. That is it. Now you know how many carbs you are going to eat. Just keep in mind it is per serving, so if you eat a small apple at 13 carbs…..but then you like it so much (I know I do) that you eat another one, that is 26 carbs now.

I have never really gotten into the whole diabetic carbohydrate exchange diet. It is just not my thing, I have good success with my blood glucose without having to remember all that junk, besides it is much to generalized to be accurate for everyone. Just my opinion.

That’s about it for now you guys. I will be building this page as time allows.