Hello!

Just thought I'd say hi!

I'm just starting my fitness journey in earnest.

My husband is recently diagnosed with diabetes, so the changes that we were already making with the food we were eating have been thrown into high gear! (I'm so proud of him! He's done everything the doctor and nutritionist have suggested - and with our food choices already changed in certain ways, there wasn't that much left to tweak! Yay!)

What this all means for me, is that dinner at night and food on the weekends are becoming healthier and better portioned. It's just the REST of the days that I need to bring into line foodwise. That, AND I need to do more exercise.

SO!!! I've decided that the first small changes I'm making are:

1) walk at least 100 extra stairs a day.

This does not include the stairs I would normally have taken - like up and down in my own house that I do normally. These are 100 stairs in addition to that. I've added them in by walking up one floor and then back down on my way to and from the bathroom at work. I can go up a floor and then to a back stairwell and come back down to the loo. Then I just reverse the route on the way back to my office.

Oh! And I'm only counting the stairs I walk UP. I will add more onto that number when it doesn't wind me to go up ONE flight. Heh.

2) Count the calories. No matter what. No matter how much I didn't want to look up the kcal for my egg mcmuffin this morning, I did anyhow and wrote it down. It didn't discourage me, but I have to be real and "own" what I'm putting in my mouth. Every bite is a choice and I can't delude myself about what choices I'm making.

3) Water! Water! Water!!!!! I like water. Cold water. The water cooler is in front of my blinking desk at work. Why am I not drinking enough water??? LOL! I'm trying to get in three large glasses of water a day at work. That is my first water goal. I know I need MORE than that, but trying to make large changes has not worked for me in the past, so I'm taking a different tack this time and setting small "mini-goals" that seem achieveable. Going beyond them will only be a larger success but I derail if I set goals like "I'm going to drink NOTHING BUT WATER from now on."

I want these changes to stick, so I'm trying to start small and smart. This is not a diet. This is my LIFE.

So, um...yeah. I guess that's all I'll say for now! Nice to be here! Nice to meet you all!

-B

Congrats on your first steps Barbara! South Beach has been very good to me -and it's a good diet for diabetics, I do believe. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!

Hi!

I have done South Beach previously and liked it. Right now, we're only about six weeks in from my husband's diagnoses so we're following the nutritionist's guidelines which recommend that he have somewhere between 30-50g of carbs at each meal. I am also learning a lot about balancing carbs with protien, as well as how fiber affects the carbs.

From what I remember of South Beach, it was really similar. I'll add that in to my searches when I'm looking for new recipes!

Anyone else here making changes due to a diabetic diagnoses?