Planning Your Meals

The goal of a meal plan is to control your blood glucose levels, maintain a healthy body weight and feel good. Your health care professional can assist you in meal planning by suggesting the right amounts, types and timing of the foods you eat.

Different types of foods have specific roles within the body. Keeping track of what you eat, when you eat and how much you eat, along with regular testing, can help you and your health care professional understand how the foods you eat affect your blood glucose levels.

As you develop your meal plan, think about the foods that you normally eat. One way to identify this is by creating a list of everything you eat for 3 days. After completing your list, work with your health care professional to analyze your list and ask yourself the following:

• What are my favorite foods?
• Do I have "problem foods" that are not healthy or that I may eat too much of?
• What size are my food portions?
• How often do I eat?
• How frequently do I overeat?
• Is there a time of day when it is more difficult for me to follow my meal plan?

Eating at regular intervals gives your body a chance to use up blood sugar between meals. In general, you should eat every 4 to 5 hours. Skipping meals may lead to overeating at the next meal, leading to higher blood sugar levels.

If your blood glucose is high before a meal, wait an hour or so before you test again or eat. If you take insulin, talk to your healthcare professional about using insulin with meals and snacks.

Glycemic Index

Studies show when considering the affect of carbohydrates on blood sugar, it is not just how many carbohydrates you eat but their source as well.¹ Some foods cause a quick rise in blood sugar after a meal, while others cause a smaller peak and more gradual decline in blood sugar levels. The measure of how fast a food causes blood sugar to peak is called its glycemic index, or GI.

What a Glycemic Index (GI) Number Means

High-carbohydrate foods are ranked on a scale of 1 to 100, with 100 representing the effect of pure glucose on the body. The lower the GI of a food, the slower its peak. The way the food is cooked (for example, frying vs. baking) can also determine the GI level of the food. The GI breaks foods into 3 levels:²

• Low: less than 55
• Intermediate: between 55 and 70
• High: above 70

A few low-GI foods include:

• Whole-grain breads and cereals
• Brown rice
• Dried beans and lentils
• Old-fashioned oatmeal
• Sweet potatoes
• Dairy products
• Apples and oranges

Meats and fats are low in carbohydrates and do not have a GI ranking.

Used in combination with carbohydrate counting, looking at food GI levels may help you stabilize your blood sugars throughout the day. The rule of thumb is that the higher the GI, the smaller the portion you should have. Conversely, you can eat more of lower-GI foods without overloading your blood sugar.

You can choose foods from the low-GI category more often and see if it helps you maintain closer-to-normal blood sugar levels.

Maintaining a Healthy Weight

If you have diabetes, maintaining a healthy weight positively impacts your health.¹

It is important to involve your health care professional in weight-loss efforts. This is especially important if you have type 1 diabetes, because losing weight involves virtually every aspect of your diabetes self-care program, including your meal plan, physical activity and insulin.

Some people gain weight when they begin using insulin, as your body may be trying to restore itself to a healthy weight. By working with your healthcare professional, you can set up a plan to maintain a healthy weight and achieve weight-loss goals.