Type 2 Diabetes – Food & Supplements

 

In some cases, lifestyle changes are enough to keep type 2 diabetes under control. Diet is an important tool to help maintain optimal heart health and blood glucose levels that are within a safe range. The diet recommended for people with type 2 diabetes is the same diet just about everyone should follow. It boils down to a few key actions:

  • Choose a variety of foods that are high in nutrients and low in empty calories.

  • Work on being mindful about portion sizes and stopping eating when you’re full.

  • Read food labels closely to understand the amount of sugar or carbs you could be ingesting

    in a serving size.

Foods and Beverages To Limit

If you’ve been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, or even if you’re trying to avoid diabetes and manage your weight, there are certain foods and beverages that you should limit if possible. These include:

  • Foods heavy in saturated or trans fats (like red meat and full-fat dairy products)
  • Processed meats (like hotdogs and salami)
  • Margarine and shortening
  • Refined baked goods (like white bread and cake)
  • High-sugar, highly processed snacks (packaged cookies and some cereals)
  • Sugary drinks (like regular soda and some fruit juices)

While no one food, enjoyed every so often, should knock you off your healthy path, it’s a good idea to talk with your doctor about dietary restrictions based on your blood sugar levels. Some people may need to monitor their glucose more carefully than others after eating these foods

Diet Plans

Other diets that have been suggested to assist with Type 2 Diabetes include the popular Keto and Mediterranean diets:

Research suggests that people with type 2 diabetes can slim down and lower their blood sugar levels with the Keto diet. In one study, people with type 2 lost weight, needed less medication, and lowered their A1c when they followed the Keto diet for a year. If you’re insulin resistant — which means you have higher blood sugar levels because your body isn’t responding properly to the hormone insulin — you could benefit from nutritional ketosis, because your body will need and make less insulin. There are fewer studies looking at the keto diet for people with type 1 diabetes. One small study found that it helped people with type 1 lower their A1c levels, but we need a lot more research to get the full picture of the diet’s effects.

Eating a Mediterranean-style diet may help people with type 2 diabetes keep their disease under control without drugs better than following a typical low-fat diet. A new study from Italy shows that people with type 2 diabetes who ate a Mediterranean diet rich in vegetables and whole grains with at least 30% of daily calories from fat (mostly olive oil) were better able to manage their disease without diabetes medications than those who ate a low-fat diet with no more than 30% of calories from fat (with less than 10% coming from saturated fat choices).

After four years, researchers found that 44% of people on the Mediterranean diet ended up requiring diabetes medications to control their blood sugars compared with 70% of those who followed the low-fat diet. It’s one of the longest-term studies of its kind, and researchers, including Katherine Esposito, MD, of the Second University of Naples, say the results “reinforce the message that benefits of lifestyle interventions should not be overlooked.”

Foods To Choose

Being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes does not mean carbs are off the table. Healthy carbohydrates can provide you with energy and fiber. Some options include:

  • Whole fruits
  • Non-starchy vegetables (like broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower)
  • Legumes, like beans
  • Whole grains, like oats or quinoa
  • Sweet potatoes

Fat is not off the table, either. Instead, it’s about choosing the right types of fat. Foods with heart healthy omega-3 fatty acids include:

 

  • Tuna
  • Sardines
  • Salmon
  • Mackerel
  • Halibut
  • Cod
  • Flax seeds

You can get healthy monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats from a number of foods, including:

  • Oils, like olive oil
  • Nuts, like almonds, pecans, and walnuts
  • Avocados

Prepared with the right ingredients and enjoyed in moderation, smoothies can provide a daily dose of cholesterol-lowering fiber, heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acids, antioxidants, and more. Click here to access an assortment of healthy, green smoothies designed to help increase your fiber intake. For a more in depth diet plan, click here to access a custom built-for-you smoothie diet plan

We took these ingredients tailored to managing diabetes and created a collection of top tier recipes to help you fully optimize your lifestyle for your health. Check them out!

Why Does Diet Matter

It’s no secret that diet is essential to managing type 2 diabetes. Although there isn’t a one-size-fits all diet for diabetes management, certain dietary choices should act as the foundation for your individual diet plan. Your diet plan should work with your body — not against it — so it’s important that the food you eat won’t spike your blood sugar levels to high. Dietary supplements like Glucofort are also available that contain natural plant-based ingredients and naturally occurring vitamins and minerals to assist the body in maintaining a healthy blood sugar level. However, keep in mind that most supplements are not an insulin substitute.

According to the American Diabetes Association, the normal blood sugar range for people with diabetes is between 80 to 130 mg/dL before meals. It should be less than 180 mg/dL about two hours after you begin eating. Your doctor will provide you with personalized target blood sugar values. Keep reading to learn more about how what you eat can affect your blood sugar, as well as which foods you may want to pick up at the grocery store or toss out of your pantry

 

When someone with diabetes has low blood sugar (hypoglycemia), a spoonful of sugar or honey can help raise glucose levels. However, sugar is often considered the nemesis of diabetes because of how quickly it can spike blood glucose levels when eaten alone. If you have diabetes, you should closely monitor your consumption of foods with a high glycemic index (GI). The GI measures how quickly a particular food raises blood sugar. Those foods with a high GI can cause unwanted spikes. This is especially true of refined sugar and other forms of simple carbohydrates like white rice, bread, and pasta.

Make sure that most of your carb choices are whole-grain, high-fiber options. Eating quick-digesting foods with other foods will help slow down their digestion and help you avoid spikes in blood sugar. Due to the high fiber content in most smoothies, they are a great option to add to your diet. Fibers actually dissolve in water and are further altered by the bacteria in our intestines. All fibers can slow the absorption of sugar and fat from food, and therefore help prevent spikes in blood sugar and blood fat after eating, possibly reducing the inflammatory response to food. Check out our collection of free smoothie recipes that you can integrate into your Type 2 Diabetes management plan. For a more in-depth strategy, take a quick look at our custom smoothie diet plan which works together with your schedule and needs to create a tailor made solution for you!