Gestational Diabetes

Hi Ems29
Sorry to hear about your GD diagnosis, though from experience I think the shock of it is often worse than the reality!

First off, do you have a nurse in the diabetic clinic that you deal with? I did, but was under the Waikato DHB, so may depend on where you are. If so, I would be calling them and discussing the issues with your meter as throughout the times I used mine (which Im not sure of the brand - its long been binned!), I got pretty much the same results if I tested one after the other, give or take a few points. Otherwise talk to your midwife or ob.

I, like you, had no symptoms of GD other than a high reading on the polycose and GTT tests - was a bit of a surprise. I am slim, eat well, exercise regularly, and have no other real risk factors apart from a family history of diabetes, and even that was minimal. I managed to control things with diet alone, delivered a healthy 7lb 10 baby girl with no problems postnatally with her blood sugars. I also went on to have another pregnancy with no GD (though the obs did accuse me of 'tricking' the tests when I had a considerably larger baby - again, no blood sugar spikes afterwards so I dont think that was the case, neither does my midwife who went on to have a go at the ob in question!).

I found it was easier to manage my diet with several small meals and only had spikes if I had been naughty (like had a massive feed of mcdonalds or something), so could be worth a shot - my issue was three large meals a day and no snacks, which would spike my sugars super high then super low all day. Carbs were also bad, so I would load up on protein, and fruit and veges. Try to drink mostly water - juice and fizzy drink was a big no-no - and no or minimal sugar in tea and coffee. Id have vege sticks or nuts for snacks, stir-fry was good for dinner, most 'normal' dinners were fine - Id just minimise the carb part - so a roast would be more meat and green veges, less potato/kumara etc. Pasta was out of the question which was the hardest thing for me! Id often have two poached eggs on one piece of toast for breakie, then maybe some fruit with it. Youll soon find what foods spike your bs through testing.

All the best for the rest of your pregnancy x

Hi Ems29,

I too was diagnosed about a month ago, and have found it all a bit bemusing to be honest! I also have the care sens meter and have got some surprising results. The dietician/physician team are incredibly strict with the numbers, and had a couple of "high" readings (5.4- 7.6) so am now on metformin, twice a day.
I have tried to play around with my diet but definitely my breakfast is minimal because that is when my sugars are at their highest :( It seems that my numbers vary even if I eat similar things.
Not long for you to go now, I do hope you're managing ok.