Help...
My Dad just came out of the hospital..his blood sugar was way over 400 and he was in intensive care for 3 days and in the hospital a total of 7 days. He also had phenumonia.
My mom is having a hard time trying to figure out what dad can have and what he can't. She also doesn't know what to fix for meals.
Any help, comments or ideas would be most appreciated!
Thanks! MANK

Mank http://www.healthboards.com/ubb/wave.gif

I'm no expert in this area- but have done some research on this subject myself for my father recently- & if you just type in 'Diabetic recipes' & do a search in Google (or your choice) - you'll get many web sites offering diabetic recipes - that you can then print for your Mom.

Once on the web-site, the recipes are usually broken down into categories (ie:main entree, salads, desserts-etc). May want to let her look thru them to see what appeals to her culinary talents the most!

For diabetic cookbooks- I'd suggest checking thru Amazon on the web.

Maybe someone with more experience in their favorite diabetic cookbooks will come along soon - just didn't want you to have to wait too long!

Best of luck!

I think until your Mom gets together a meal plan, and seeing your Dad,s numbers were so high, have him stay away immediately from sugar, white flour stuff, rice, potatoes, pasta, basicaly your high starch and carbs food, emphasis on lean meat, lots of veggies and some fruit. When he gets his numbers under control and with his meds he will be able to branch out a bit more and incorporate a few more things in his diet, your immediated concern is to get his numbers to stabilize.

Tex and Sharon Lee, Thanks for your responses.
The help was useful and I sent mom some links to look at. My sister also got 2 books to send to her.
I know my mom is just so worried that she will give Daddy the wrong food and if something should happen she would blame herself. She is at Wits end!
SO thanks again and any help from anyone about Diabetes Type 2 would be appreciated.
:-) MANK

Please remember that just because a recipe says it is for diabetics, it may still have too many carbohydrates.

The doctor should have your dad see a diabetes educator. The educator will be able to work out a food plan just for him.

Like the other poster said, stay away from starches and sweets. I personally stick with lean meat and green veggies for best control. Other non-starch veggies also.

I saw a dietician yesterday and she approved of everything I was doing except she thought I should try to get 30 gm of carbohydrates with each meal and some before bedtime too. She said that the body needs that much. I was aiming for 15-20 gm a carbs per meal. Should I eat more carbs?

Kre, Thanks for your reply I will definatley let my mother know.
We really need all the help we can get on Diabetes.

Jacque, I am not sure about if you are having the right amount of grams of carbs. My dad is only allowed 2 to 3 per meal right now. I guess it differs for each person in each case.

I aim for staying within 30 carbs per meal.

There are different ways of counting carbs. One way is by ADA Guidelines which gives a food or catagory of food so many grams per serving. This is commonly referred to as "one carb" but is actually 15 mg carb per serving. For instance one starch serving would equal 15 mg carbs.

The other way is to count individual carbs in food. I choose to count individual carbs.

Some subtract the fiber from the total carbs but I do not. This is a way to have a safety net and not go over carb allotment.

Some people think a carb means to have starch food. That is not true, non-starch food is carbs too and must be counted in the total carbs for a meal.

I am assuming her dad is allowed "2 or 3 servings" of carbs per meal rather than 2 or 3 individual carbs.

A certain amount of protein is converted to glucose too but takes longer. We do not count protein in the carb allotment but we must consume only a normal serving or the blood sugar level can go too high. I had too much meat at a meal one time and it took 4 hrs for sugar level to peak and when it did it was way too high. We ate at a resturant that only had meats and starches so I thought going the meat route would be safer. Well, it got the best of be but at a later time. Took 4 miles walking to bring the sugar level back down whereas had I had other foods it would have taken 1 mile to walk it back down. Protein is harder to walk down.

[This message has been edited by Kre (edited 10-10-2003).]

[This message has been edited by Kre (edited 10-10-2003).]

Hi Mank,
When you said that your Dad is only allowed 2-3 carbs per meal, that is SERVING grams, and probably refers to starch/bread servings, each of which is approximately 15 grams.

There are several ways of figuring his diet. One is the exchange system, where food is divided into proteins, milk/dairy, breads/starches, vegetalbles and fruits (both of which also have carbs, but not as much per serving as the breads/starches category). Under this system, each serving is an "exchange", and his diet would have x number of each exchange for each meal.

The other way is to simply count carbohydrate GRAMS, not exchanges. You need a good carb counter book to do this...I recommend two: One is large and not easy to carry around, but it lists just about everything, including many brand name foods, "The NutriBase Guide to Protein, Carbohydrate & Fat". The smaller book, which is pocket-sized and convenient to carry around with you is "The Carbohydrate Addict's Gram Counter." I got one at Amazon and the other one at Barnes & Noble, but I don't remember which I got where.

Your Mom and Dad should also request a vew visits with a registered dietician, who can help determine what your Dad's daily food intake needs are, and also explain the exchange system and/or carb counting to both your parents.

As far as doing damage by serving the wrong foods: Even if your Mom served something with sugar in it, nothing would probably happen in the short term except that your Dad's blood sugar would go up. The problems that occur usually happen over months and years of having poor glucose control. Technically, nothing is off-limits to diabetics; it's more about making wise choices and managing your food intake, exercise and medications to achieve optimum blood glucose control most of the time. Diabetics can even have a treat like ice cream occasionally, as long as "occasionally" doesn't become every day! When I want ice cream, I have it...but I don't have a cone because I don't need the extra carbs from the cone, I make sure my blood sugar is well controlled, and I eliminate a lot of carbs from the rest of my meals on the day I'm planning to have ice cream. And I don't have it more than once every 4-6 weeks!

Your Mom shouldn't have to feel like his entire health and well-being is on her shoulders. Your Dad has to learn to take care of himself and make good choices too. This is going to be a learning experience that they will need to participate in together.

[This message has been edited by SamQKitty (edited 10-11-2003).]

[This message has been edited by SamQKitty (edited 10-11-2003).]

Kre and Sam...

Thanks so much for all your help! :-)

Now the carb counting is begining to make some sense, Finally!

It helps getting all the info and help you can about Diabetes. My mom doesn't know how to look for it so I help her out. I am passing along this information from the both of you to both her and dad.

Mom says they are working on taking some classes to learn more aobut his diet and health at the hospital where they offer them for the patients. The insurance pays for the classes too.

Dad is doing better except he had another chest xray of the lungs and found out he still has phenumonia. So they put him on some more antibotics.
That is part of the reason he ended up in the hospital a few weeks ago along with his sugar level.

OK, Thanks again.

MANK