I lost about 60 pounds between diet and a bit of exercise. My diet has been one of basic carb counting - not too difficult to understand or track. But, and this is a revelation from yesterday during my walk - counting carbs is not enough; you have to look at the fat content! What a concept, right?
For me, it was pretty basic diet - about 55 or 60 carbs per meal with snacks not to exceed 15 carbs. That was it. I just could not fully understand that diet in which you can exchange this for that to equal a number. It just seemed a very difficult way to figure out what I could have to eat. My carb counting was pretty easy once I knew what the carbs were and the portion size.
So, I get close to where the doctor wants me. I had a BMI of 25.0, as I recall. He wanted me at 24.9. You remember about good ol' BMI's right? Body Mass Index. If you are above 24.9, you are overweight. Need to check your BMI? Look here. And, if you want to understand more about BMI, read this article.
As I write this, I have a BMI of 25.3 - not great, but not too bad either. And, it seems as though I have been unable to get much below 25.0. Kind of frustrating for a guy who thinks he knows how to lose weight, right? Well, I have to begin to learn more about fat and fat content, which I have never paid attention to in the past.
I mean, catbs turn into sugar so if I counted carbs, I would not only lose weight, but manage the diabetes. How great is that? And it worked for a long time. If you are just starting out, I think carb counting is a good way to begin to manage and control diabetes. But, if you want to make that breakthrough to getting to the right weight, you may have to look at fat.
Perfect example: I eat granola-type bars for snacks. I found one very low carb bar - I mean it was like 9 net carbs - nice and low. And, I sometimes use another type of bar in which the total carbs is about 18, or so. Much, much more. But...and this is an important but...the fat content was double in the low carb bar. Double! So, my current solution is to just eat about half of the higher carb, lower fat bar. I emphasize current, because i have to look at the labels and might find a better balance.
Yes, there is a lot to think about when you have diabetes and it comes to your diet, but it soon becomes second nature. You begin to look at the labels on all foods to find out what is good for you to eat. I imagine I should do a food label explanation pretty soon. That might be a good idea, huh?
So, I keep counting carbs. But, now I am beginning to count fat - and I am sure I will come back to fat in a future blog because even I know there are different kinds of fat. I will try to de-mystify and simplify fat when I blog about it.
I will continue to let you know about my adventures in weight loss. By the way, when my doctor told me I had to 'lose a little weight' my BMI was 32.55. Of course, I had no idea what a BMI was at that point, or I think I would have been discouraged. But anyone can lose a little weight, right? Sure glad that my doctor did not tell me I had to lose about 67 pounds, total.
As always, thank you for reading.
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