Healthy eating

The deal with my Dad's health has caused me to really study my own, and I'm not living so well. I have Type II Diabetes and high cholesterol. I haven't been watching my diet as closely as I should, and I haven't been doing enough research into what I should be eating to begin with.

I've known about the glycemic index for awhile, I just never paid attention to it until now. I found that quite a few "healthy" foods have a higher GI value, which means that they break down into sugar in the bloodstream faster and cause sugar spikes.

And I also found that foods I've been avoiding, like pinto beans, have a low GI. And some of the combinations of foods that I've been eating are bad - the pinto beans don't impact my sugar anywhere nearly as quickly as the cornbread I pour them over does.

I just learned about the glycemic load, which takes the glycemic index of a food and combines it with the number of carbs per serving, so that's something else I should be paying attention to. I found a chart at http://www.mendosa.com/gi.htm that lays it all out there you. The author of the website, David Mendosa, has done a huge amount of research about foods and diabetes and how different things effect it. He's diabetic himelf. I haven't been through the whole website yet, but I suspect there will be a lot of useful information there. The sidebar lists a directory, food, exercise, medication, meters, basics, complications, people, and a newsletter to subscribe to.

So... I guess I have to retrain myself how to eat. Lower GI, lower GL, and lower fat. The fats I do eat should be healthy fats if possible. And I need to really start paying attention to the portions.

In my meanderings, I found a list compiled by MSNBC of the staple foods you should keep on hand that are considered healthy. It's called Eat Healthy on $7.00 a Day. Those foods are:

1. Whole grain pasta
2. The Incredible, Edible Egg
3. Nuts
4. Potatoes
5. Canned tomato sauce
6. Organic brown rice
7. Beans & tofu
8. Organic bulk oatmeal
9. Bulk cornmeal
10. Fresh green veggies

I find it interesting that out of all of these foods, only 4 of them are considered low glycemic - eggs, nuts, beans, and green veggies. If I chose to eat any of the rest of the stuff on the list, I really need to watch how much I eat, when, and what with.

Now I guess I really need to find something other than a sausage biscuit for breakfast, eh?