Mastering Diabetes made easy
There’s a question I’ve been pondering lately, and I have to admit it’s been having some practical impact in my daily life. The question is: “How would it look like if it was easy?”, and I must pay due credit to Tim Ferriss for placing it on my horizon.
Life is a giant bundle of tangled mess, and so is managing diabetes. Is it? Well, it can be, but it doesn’t have to. This innocent small question made it evident to me that life - and diabetes, the topic of this post - can be such a tangled mess only to the extent we allow them to be, but they absolutely don’t have to be so! The trick is to reduce any issue, problem or process to its minimum, to its skeleton, and focusing our resolution to solving that and that only. Dealing with the essentials, or the root of a problem, will most likely cause all the rest to fall into place automatically, like a wonderful domino.
This way of thinking and acting automatically eliminates everything that is extra, the “yes, but”, the “what if” that we readily add to our narratives and that quickly grow into self-imposed additional hurdles we create for ourselves on an otherwise much smoother path.
The good news is that, being mental hurdles they can be removed just as easily. In fact, the true skill is to avoid creating them in the first place. Do that, and whatever you’re up to will become surprisingly easier to do.
In this post I will offer some examples and ideas of how I am applying this to master my type 1 diabetes, maximize my insulin sensitivity and my time in range. Feel free to copy, adapt and innovate!
Diabetes management
Managing diabetes is no trivial thing: you have to log in the foods, count the carbs, calculate the insulin needs, account for physical exercise, for heat, for stress…this, that and the other. Yes, there are a lot of moving parts that overwhelm us. It can be a mess, but there’s a way to make it less so.
Asking the question
Sometimes life gets the best out of me, and in these periods I witness that things are sliding down the dangerous road by four simple signals: my BG is all over the place, my insulin needs increase, my appetite is out of control (which only adds up to the previous two) and I can’t sleep well (this factor alone being at the root of the previous three). Because in these periods I tend to be less rational and less able to discern the good from the bad, I focus on one thing that, based on my personal experience, will put the domino effect in motion, move me away from the vicious cycle and towards the virtuous one.
“How would diabetes management look like if it was easy?”
For me that one thing is exposure to food.
That is the trigger.
I know that when I am stressed I am prone to overeating, and this generates a waterfall of consequences:
Since I am eating more than allowed and more often, my food logging is not reliable anymore;
Since I am eating without correctly tracking my carbs, the carbs:insulin ratio loses relevance;
Since I can’t count on my ratios anymore, I run after my blood glucose with some “intuitive” corrective injections;
Because these injections are intuitive, they’re mostly wrong, hence…
the frustration this generates piles upon the existing stress;
As a consequence I sleep less or worse, a factor that alone would disrupt any diabetes management strategy.
Looking at this trickle of stuff one would just put their hands in the hairs and run away in despair. I used to do that.
But running away is a Plan B type of strategy. Plan A is to take a sit, breathe a minute, ask the question: “How would solving the overeating problem look like if it was easy?”, and put the domino effect in motion.
Finding an answer
The simplest thing I can do is to minimize the occasions where I know I would indulge on food. That alone will not fix everything nor laureate me as a Diabetes Master, but applying the 80-20 principle, I know it will fix most of it.
Step 1: the path to diabetes mastery starts at the grocery store
The first step to eat more moderately is to simply buy less food and to put some additional steps between the unpacking and the eating. I know myself pretty well: if for some reason I buy a loaf of bread intended to last me a week, you can rest assured it won’t make to the end of the day (for the record, sometimes I eat it all on my way back from the shop).
If instead of bread I buy a pack of rice, eating it on my way back from the shop is not an option anymore, because I first need to cook it. I call this type of foods “friction foods”, because they add friction between my craving to eat and the eating itself.
The same logic applies to other foods:
instead of 10 apples, I’ll buy 5.
Instead of a jar of peanut butter for my salad dressing, I’ll take some beans and vegetables to blend into a vegetable spread.
Instead of an entire loaf of bread, I’ll take one small piace or a small package of rice cakes.
Actually, instead of bread, I’ll fill my cart with green light foods: whole, plant based carbohydrates rich foods that are low in fats. No bread, no processed stuff.
Simply put, I am transforming my environment from one full of temptations I know I am not able to resist when I am stressed, to one that simply does not provide exposure to the unhealthy stimuli, and that promotes diabetes health through green light foods
What I choose to put in my cart is what I eventually have to make do with at home to assemble my meals.
The more I buy, the more I eat. The less I buy (or the more “friction foods” I buy), the less I overeat. Simple.
Step 2
There is no step 2.
This is supposed to be easy, and while there are many other facets of the problem that are important to address, dealing with step 1 - the root cause - is more than enough to build the momentum necessary to keep going.
Less food overall, and more “friction foods” in general, fix most of my problems:
Overeating is harder because there is physically less food around to eat;
I am surrounded by green light foods, that promote insulin sensitivity and keep blood glucose in the ideal range by default;
Since I eat less frequently, and with planned quantities, I can now log my foods and rely on my ratios more;
My insulin dosages are under control, so as my blood glucose;
The food induced dopamine rushes are not there anymore to make me binge eat and add up to stress and frustration;
I live better.
Let me be clear: I am not promoting any extreme caloric restriction here. I am still someone who runs, lifts weights and does everything with his body if he can. Eating enough is essential for me to maintain physical and mental energy and to recover properly.
However, it is crucial to understand where is the line in the sand, the point where we know we’ll add fuel to the fire we’re trying to eradicate. Eating enough and eating too much are not the same thing, and for how trivial this may sound I need constant reminders.
There’s always an easier way
This way of thinking can be applied to any situation, and not only to stressful ones.
For instance, you might be trying to figure out a healthy meal plan for the week. Instead of drowning into all possible ingredients combinations, an easier way could be: open the green light food list, pick a couple of items from each category that you can easily find and cook, rotate among those for the week. Next week, you’ll pick different items.
Or maybe you’re trying to exercise more. Instead of figuring out the logistics and carving out the time to go to the gym, getting a personal trainer, learning how to use weights in a safe way, etcetera, the simpler way is to lay a yoga mat next to your bed and do some squats and push-ups. Start there, you’ll figure out the details later.
While nothing is easy, everything can be simplified. What about you? What can you simplify, and how would it look like if it was easy?
