I've been thinking of you all as well. Hopefully you are all managing your GD ok and not letting it get you down.
I was meant to go for my post birth GTT at 6 - 8 wks. Lara is now 9 wks and I still haven't been. I didn't want to go before xmas in case I was told my GD hadn't gone away. I am a nervous wreck and dont want to go. I am so scared it wont have gone away. I know I need to go so I am going to book myself in for the test either next week or the week after. My family is still here and don't go back until next week so think I'll wait until they've gone. Excuses, excuses I know. My DH keeps telling me I will be fine coz I managed my GD with diet alone but it I'm not confident. I've been really thirsty lately and I am scared its coz of diabetes, although I do live in Far North Qld and the temp is like 34 degrees everyday.
Sorry for my vent girls. Hope you all had a great xmas and have a happy new year!!!
Leigh don't stress possum. Ethans 5 months old and I still haven't been! Naughty I know but I'm worried too, but shouldn't be. I have checked my levels at home a number of times and they are all fine (even after a huge potato chip and choccie binge!), so should be ok, but what if?...
I guess the dr will smack my hand when I go for Ethans 6 month check up lol
Becci - I've checked my levels at home too quite a few times and all have been fine as well. I am just so scared they are going to tell me that I do have diabetes. God I hated having it when I was pregnant, I can't imagine living the rest of my life with it. Good luck for when you go for your test and please pop in and let me know!!!
I am new here, this is my 2nd pg (late m/c last year) and I got diagnosed with GD about 3 weeks ago. I am coming up 31 weeks pg now. So far I am just trying to manage the GD with diet alone - don't want to resort to insulin unless desperate (needle phobe!!)
I am hoping some of you can help me with something...
Up until this week my BSL have all been fine, but for some reason this week my after lunch results have started creeping up. I haven't changed what I have been eating since I started the changed diet so can't understand why all of a sudden my lunch seems to put me over.
I live in the ACT so the max BSL I am allowed is 6.5 after meals, which I was told was stricter than the other states and this week I have been getting around 6.8 sometimes as high as 7.3 after lunch.
My lunch consists of either a toasted sandwich (Molenberg 10 grains and seeds or Bakers Delight Low GI white bread) with 1/4c baked beans, cheese and Marmite, plus a poached egg on toast with Marmite & tomato sauce and if I am really hungry a small tin of tuna.
Or
2 sandwiches (same bread as above) with cheese and tomato...
I am a big eater hence the huge lunch (compared to what I have read in some previous posts!)
My fasting BSL is usually between 3.9 and 4.5 and following brekkie around 4.6 and after dinner it drops from in the 6's to around 5.7.
Sorry for the huge post!!... I am getting there...
My question is, does anyone have any suggestions on what I could eat for lunch instead of bread (which is obviously not my friend anymore) but still be filling enough for the little piglet that I am!? Also without taking forever to prepare!?!
Also has anyone else noticed that sometimes you can test more than once and the results can be different by quite a bit, like around .5 difference or more? Is my machine faulty?
Thanks so much, and I look forward to getting to know some other GD sufferers!
Another newbie to join this thread! I had my ob appt today where I was told that following the 2 hr gtt, I have GD. I think I'm definitely still in a fair bit of shock but am now equipped with a glucose monitor and all kinds of paraphernalia and hoping I'll be able to manage it with diet.
I'll have to take some time to read back through the posts, but am just so glad there is a thread to talk to other GD'ers as I wrap my poor brain around all of this new info
CAH: Glad to hear things have settled down.. Remember to watch the weight loss. If you are loosing weight then you need to eat more to keep up your energy levels..
blondedoctor: Welcome to the thread. Sorry it's not under better circumstances but trust that you are in a supportive environment where you can ask lots of questions. I'm past GD now but still pop in to see how everyone is going and help if I can as I know how stressful it can be, especially when you are first diagnosed. Remember to ask lots of questions.. Your reading was not too high - my 2hr reading was about 9.4 from memory and I was completely diet controlled but everyone is different and you will soon find out how different everyone reacts to food.. I was like you and very surprised to get GD as I am very healthy eater etc. Ultimately doesn't come down to diet but more to how your body deals with the extra load from baby/placenta - as my OB told me - there was nothing I could have done differently to prevent it..
smudgy: Sorry to hear you haven't been feeling the best with the tablets. Have you considered maybe making the switch to insulin so that you can at least enjoy the last part of your pregnancy without the terrible side effects from the tablets? I cannot speak from experience about insulin but from what I've read I haven't seen anyone say that the insulin injection is more painful than the finger testing.
Regarding the milk - have you tried some milo instead? Or even warm milk actually tastes different to cold milk. I used to have a cup of warm milk with a few biscuits (RICH TEA biscuits - Low GI and yummy - I still eat them now as a snack) before bed. I used to have the occasional bit of coke or a cake and no problems. You cannot completely cut sweet stuff out and towards the end I was having a small piece of plain cake or a few biscuits without problems. You won't hurt the baby and bub would be fine with a small amount of sugar.
blondedoctor: The average weight gain during pregnancy is said to be between 9kg and 13kg but everyone is different. I have a few PG books which actually gave average weights for the baby/placenta/fluid to show where the weight gain comes from. The OB and DE would be wanting to watch your weight as it may not be you who is gaining the weight but in actual fact bub which puts you both in a higher risk of requiring an induction and/or intervention. Good luck with the DE appointment and let us know how you go.
sloane: Glad to hear your hospital doesn't have an automatic induction policy for GD. Mine didn't either and I was allowed to go into labour myself (11 days early) and did not require intervention. My OB had told me he wouldn't induce me unless medically needed and because my GD was under control he'd even let me go over my EDD if everything was ok.
navywife: Welcome to the thread navywife. I'm a needle phobe also so right there with you on that front. I hated the idea of doing the finger testing but it wasn't too bad once I got the hang of it and really didn't give me much pain at all.
Regarding your food question.. Have you tried a different bread? You can find that a food that was ok last week is no longer ok so you could try using a different bread. I found the bakers delight (wholemeal vienna) was the only bread I could have.
Yes your BSL level sounds more strict - I had to keep mine officially under 8.0 but anything over 7.0 I had to let my endo know about.. The other thing I would have suggested would be the quantity but as you say you are a big eater so I'm not sure what I could suggest. I used to have a sandwich with tuna/salmon with cheese and tomato plus a piece of fruit for lunch and just varied it around that. You could try substituting some of the bread for some fruit or a huge side of vegies. I used to top all my meals up with huge quantities of vegies to fill myself up and that always worked. I was rarely hungry while I had GD. Also I went through a huge amount of strawberries. My Endo told me they were my "free food" and I could have as many of those as I wanted so I was going through about 4 punnets a week of them. If I had a sweet craving or was hungry I'd snack on a few of those.
Have you tried a Low GI soup, essentially a wholemeal pasta based soup)? I used to have a soup with a side of steam vegies (from the microwave)..
Yes the testing thing is normal. The glucose meters are not 100% accurate so you will get some variance on testing. I used to test once, then test again to double check and get a different reading. Need to be sure you wash your hands before you test as if you'd handled food you could still have sugars on your skin from the foods which will give you a higher reading etc. Just test once and use that reading or you'll be testing 40 times a day..
jenushka: Welcome to the thread..
Recommend you read back through our posts as there are plenty of good tips and ideas to go through and they will certainly give you a good place to start things. Can be daunting at first but you will get the hang of it and then things will feel a little easier..
I was diagnosed 4 weeks ago, am now 28+4 and so far controlling my levels with diet. I have been quite strict with my diet and that gets frustrating, but the results have been good. I really want to eat cake or something, but am so afraid of the consequences. My morning levels were quite high before so I was put on insulin in the morning which only made the levels higher again - I think it was psychological cos I really didnt want to have to start injecting! I also was quite bad at doing it and most of it ran out. So we went back to the diet and it's been ok only in the last week I've noticed that the morning levels are getting higher so it looks like I might have to inject at night or maybe again in the morning. Pain in the proverbial!! Does anyone have any tips on getting low morning levels? I'd like to avoid the insulin as long as I can.
I'Ve also lost a bit of weight since changing my eating habits, I only hope I'Ve not lost too much. Going to see my midwife today, so will find out then.
It's so reassuring and encouraging to read your stories/experiences. Pregnancy Diabetes is more common than I had thought.
Hil444, Janushka - Welcome to you both! I am a newbie too and just getting the hang of all this too.
Navy wife - Welcome! I work from home so my food choices are usually easier than those of you working in an office or somewhere without a kitchen. I'm not much of a bread eater and the things I usually have for lunch are:
* big green salad, some chopped cheese, a few boiled eggs with a splash of olive oil
* scrambled eggs with mushrooms and tomato and spinach
* microwaved potato with mushrooms, spinach, chickpeas (anything really),sour cream and cheese
* spinach and rice soup
* pumpkin soup
As Snowchickie said, maybe a change of type of bread might do the trick too? Good luck
Snowchickie - Thanks for the kind words of support. Its been a really stressful so its great to have an online community like this to go to.
AFM - Well, after my visit with the diabetes educator, I am now testing my blood sugar levels 4 times a day and if if goes over 8.0 more than twice a week they want to put me on insulin. I am a little stressed about this because the small country hospital where we are booked in won't take me if I am on insulin, and I'd have to go into Adelaide instead which is over 2 hours away. I really don't want to do that because apart from the distance from home, I wont have my doctor (whom I love!) , or any of the midwives that I have come to know through the prenatal classes. So I just really have to keep my sugar levels low. Its frustrating because I think doctors carry on a bit much about it, but now I'm kinda stuck in the system and have to follow through, if you know what I mean.
I am still confused why my readings are so high. Today for example, for lunch I had a big green salad (lettuce, tomato, cucumber, carrot, some chopped cheese) a few boiled eggs with a splash of olive oil with one slice of multigrain toast and I got 8.2! Seems crazy, but I'm guessing I'll need to cut out all carbs to stay within the limits the doc wants. Its silly because I wouldn't normally have the bread with the salad, but the diabetes educator said I had to increase my carbs to three serves a day!!! I don't think I'll be doing that again!
Also without taking forever to prepare!?!
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