Last Friday I went on my first 30K (19 miles) run since the Tiberias marathon (Jan 7th). My plan (which I stuck to) was to run the first half of the run at a heart rate between 140-150, the next 6 miles at a 155 heart rate and the last 3 miles at 160 HR. It went pretty well up until the 15th mile which was when my HR started going a little crazy. The same thing happened last week at 14th mile. What I mean by crazy is that suddenly, without changing my pace, my HR went from 150 to 180 and the only way to get it down was to slow down...

Nuts are one of my closest allies in the war against terrorist blood glucose levels.  I swear to god, if anyone’s looking for Osama Bin Laden, I think that bastard is living in my liver and screwing with my glycogen levels. There’s nothing in the world like waking up in the morning at 240 when all you ate the night before was salad and a small chicken breast. But I digress…. Some nuts are higher in carbs than others, but in general, they’re on the low end of the glycemic scale.  The thing is, I get tired...

Bridget McNulty is a South African writer and journalist, and a Type 1 diabetic. Her first novel, Strange Nervous Laughter, was published in South Africa in 2007 and released in the USA in May 2009. She has written articles for a number of South African magazines, including ELLE, Real Simple, the Oprah magazine, Psychologies and Woman & Home, and frequently writes about diabetes. In 2008 she was voted one of Cosmopolitan magazine’s Awesome Women, an award extended to 30 South African women who are making a difference in their...

My friend Betsy and I weren’t looking for redemption — we’re grownups who work hard to make the world better than we found it, take both vitamins and good advice, and are not given to debauchery — and yet we found it. At a restaurant. Grezzo, a warm and intimate place in Boston’s foodie and famous North End, specializes in raw food cuisine. It’s no salad bar, however. On a cold February night, we sampled the chef’s lively tasting menu that featured Mushroom Tea Soup, Gnocchi Carbonara, Greek...

A new study conducted by researchers at Cardiff University, Wales, found that drastically lowering blood sugar levels in type 2 diabetics may be just as dangerous as leaving them high. The study, reported by BBC News, looked at nearly 50,000 patients with type 2 diabetes. The researchers identified 27,965 patients with type 2 diabetes whose treatment had been intensified to include two oral blood glucose lowering agents – metformin and sulphonylurea. Another 20,005 patients who had been moved on to treatment which included insulin...

A new study conducted by researchers at the University of Chicago found that Obstructive Sleep Apnea  (OSA)  adversely affects glucose control in type 2 diabetics. The study, reported by EurekAlerts,  also confirmed other reports that undiagnosed OSA is very common among patients with type 2 diabetes, indicating that it is a largely unrecognized additional medical risk factor in these patients. The findings have been published online ahead of print publication in the American Thoracic Society’s American Journal of Respiratory...

Are there really such things as Gray Areas?  I am starting to believe less and less in them.  You are or you are not, you have or you have not, you can or cannot, and you do or you do not.  The term Borderline Diabetic really bothers me.  You either are a Diabetic or you are not.  What is Borderline?  If they keep in the direction they are going in they will eventually become one, right?  If they listen to their doctors and do exactly what they are told they might not become a Diabetic, right? As I was watching the Angels vs....

I was just scanning through my daily google alerts and noticed a ton of articles from the Los Angeles Times about diabetes, from a basic primer on diabetes to a multimedia illustration of how diabetes affects blood sugar to pieces about lifestyle changes and  incretin therapy (both relating primarily to type 2). It seems that they’ve chosen October 26th as an unofficial “diabetes day.” But they also ran an interesting piece last week about the chasm diabetes can cause between patients and doctors thanks to our never-ending...

Show Background Information I’ve had type 1 diabetes for 6 years, since I was 25. Usually my blood sugar levels are under control (6.1 A1C). But when I’m sick, even with something like a minor common cold, my blood sugar is impossible to control. Why does this happen, and is there anything I can do to prevent it?