[MMGerard]

A dear friend is in her eighth month and has elevated blood sugar. She has been eating very low carb, only meat and vegetables, but still her blood sugar is borderline GD and she afraid that at her next Dr. visit the OB will want to put her on some kind of medication or insulin. does not want to go on drugs if possible. What else can she do? I read that cinnamon can help regulate blood sugar. Any other ideas? Thanks, mamas!

 

[Pavlovs]

Exercise is a great way to reduce blood sugar levels. When you exercise, even moderately, the body is able to use sugar more efficiently. Also, eating processed foods will spike blood sugars and make the body work extra hard. Eating whole foods, even ones with carbs such as breads and cereals, will help a lot. When eating fruit, try eating it with something fatty. For example, eat an apple with a tablespoon of peanut butter. Fat makes it so that the spikey carbs get processed more slowly, avoiding a spike in sugar. HTH!

 

[brandyk]

Well, I won't comment on only eating meats & vegetables, but I have GD & will second the recommendation for fat. I won't, however, second the peanut butter. If you're adding fat, really add fat - oil, cream cheese, butter, etc. If she's eating low fat this should help a lot. And the exercise. I found for me personally very SLOW exercise (like trawling the mall slooowly) helped best. If it is really aerobic it doesn't really help me.

Eating whole grain carbs will keep your BS up if you have GD.

Your friend may find that the psychotic eating is all for naught and she needs to go on medication anyways. Not saying its impossible to control solely through diet, but it sounds REALLY extreme for a pregnant woman to only eat meat & vegs. There are a lot of us here on insulin or other meds (I take glyburide) that are very happy with our choices and we'd be happy to give support (check the humongous GD thread).

ETA: ok, i commented on only eating meats & veg. oops!

 

[javilu]

I have read that therapeutic doses of cinnamon aren't known to be safe for pregnant women (they aren't known not to be, either, though). Dr. Weil (yes, I know he's a little too mainstream for some) has some recommendations, including alpha lipoic acid, magnesium, and GTF chromium. He does also say that sometimes insulin is appropriate, though.

 

[Mommal]

I'm going to climb on the bandwagon: exercise is the absolute best thing your friend can do to help her blood sugar stay normal. Even a slow ten minute walk after meals can make a significant impact.

And while I wouldn't recommend eating huge amounts of cinnamon, cinnamon on her breakfast cereal or a few cups of cinnamon tea cannot hurt and may help. (Personally, I liked Celestial Seasoning's Bengal Spice.)

 

[soxthecatrules]

I had a diagnosed case of GD w/DD. And, what I suspect was an undiagnosed case with DS. Anywho....I tried all of the recommendations other posters have made (which were exactly what my OB made me try) for a little over two weeks and my levels came down and to me seemed okay. I also lost almost 5lbs during this time. But, my OB is a real stickler with GD and I was put on insulin. And if your levels were even one point above the textbook recommendations he counted it against you. You had to have 80% or better readings over the course of the week (I started weekly appts at week 29) or he would up your insulin. I challenged him on this asking if it was necessary and he gave me a good 5 minute explanation as to why he felt the way he did. So I shot up w/insulin for the last 7 weeks of my pregnancy.

The only reason I didn't challenge my OB more on this was due to the fact that DS was born a month early due to pre-eclampsia. It is suspected that there was an undiagnosed case of GD w/him and by not controlling that issue we actually aggravated the hbp. So to sum this up.....when DS was born early (due to my pre-eclampsia) he actually had all of the textbook signs of a newborn whose mama had blood sugar that was not under control. Taking the info into account I accepted the insulin shots and went on my merry way.