Pregnancy is not easy. I envy those who "loved" being pregnant and those who tell me, "just enjoy it." I have enjoyed maybe 2 weeks of this entire process (I'm at 32 weeks now).
Thanks to Kaiser and their preventative medicine, I was diagnosed with Gestational Diabetes (GD) at 15 weeks. Just when I finally stopped feeling nauseous all the time and wanted to eat again, I had to completely change my diet.
25 weeks is a LONG time to be on the "Diabetes Diet" when you're pregnant and already limited in what you can (should) eat.
By week 30, I was starting on 6 units of insulin at night before bedtime. I felt like a complete failure. Even though I know it was my body that failed me and there was nothing I could do about it, it was still awful. Basically, my body can't control my sugar over night so I was waking up with a higher sugar level than I should. The insulin controls that. Now in addition to the Diabetes Diet, I was looking at 10 weeks of giving myself an insulin shot every night. I also later found out that I'm considered "high risk" due to the insulin. At week 36 I have to start going to the hospital twice a week to do a "non stress test" to see how BabyBaby is doing. And there seems to be a chance that I'll end up getting induced if BabyBaby doesn't come out by 39 weeks. I do not want to be induced! So, at 38 weeks, 'operation, get this baby out!' begins.
Through all these ups (a few of them!) and lots of downs, in a way, GD has been a blessing in disguise. It has forced me to be the healthy pregnant woman I always wanted to bed. Trust me, I'd be eating mac & cheese and cake every weekend if I could! I'm lucky to be pretty much all belly. So far I've gained 16lbs. Most of my body- like my arms and legs are thinner than they were before I got pregnant.
On to the eating! Figuring out what to eat was a challenge. Everyone reacts differently to carbs, so you have to figure out what works and what doesn't. For me, the most frustrating thing was the night time, before bed snack that was supposed to control my blood sugar. Nothing ever worked consistently and I'd feel so defeated. I played blood sugar roulette 4 times a day. Some things I expected would give me high blood sugar didn't, leaving me to think, "man, I could have eaten more of X carb!" I think it was around week 30 that I had a breakdown. I'd been eating the SAME THINGS for 15 weeks and was just feeling so defeated and tired of eating. Luckily my friends and family helped me come up with some new ideas.
I found that eating out was okay for my blood sugar but caused me to gain weight faster. I also found weekends to be the hardest. I would meal prep Mon-Fri for all my meals and snacks, and by the weekend I had nothing made and really didn't feel like cooking. Since my husband was deployed, I'd do all my cooking/ prep on Sundays and basically eat the same thing all week. I'd have dinner w/ my parents at home a few times a week which helped to change things up.
Another thing I found important was sticking with my eating plan. Because my meals all focused on protein, I didn't usually snack unnecessarily. And I always had the diabetes approved snacks on hand. I found when I didn't stick to my normal meals, I'd get hungry at odd times. For example, 2 tofu summer rolls filled me up but didn't have enough protein so I was starving 2 hours later, and my sugar wasn't great when I tested it.
Here's a list of what I'd eat for different meals:
Breakfast:
Mon- Fri, 6:30am while driving to work.
- 2 hard boiled eggs & 1 thin bagel with cream cheese
- Breakfast burrito (usually chorizo & eggs)
- Egg bites (egg, cheese, bacon, bell pepper) These are great because you can make them on Sunday for the whole week. Unfortunately, early on Arianna decided she did not like these at all!
- Starbucks bacon, egg, gouda sandwich
Weekends:
- 2 fried eggs, 1 slice toast, bacon
- Gluten free waffle with peanut butter and a little syrup on top with 1 or 2 eggs. If I ate just 1 egg, my sugar was higher than with 2 eggs
- Omelette w/ cheese and veggies
Morning Snack:
Monday-Friday, pretty much without fail, 9:30am
- Smoothie- strawberries, plain greek yogurt, spinach, almond milk (unsweetened), and ground flaxseed. (I'd prep for 2-3 days at a time and add the almond milk and blend each morning). I used to use unsweetened coconut milk but was told by the nutritionist that it has too much saturated fat)
- Belvita crackers (in addition to the smoothie if I was really hungry)
Lunch:
Mon-Fri, 11am-12pm ish
- Chicken salad (I used costco canned chicken w/ ranch dressing because I hate mayo). I can would make 3 days worth of lunches; baby carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers, and bell peppers; hummus; crackers or chips (sometimes); avocado (sometimes). This is what I ate 90% of the time
- Costco rotisserie chicken with the veggies & hummus
- Tofu & rice
- Leftovers from dinner
Afternoon Snack:
Around 3pm
- Avocado
- Healthy Trader Joes Trail Mix
- Almonds or macadamia nuts
- Spam musubi if I was really hungry
Driving Home Snack:
4:45pm
- Raspberries or blackberries
- Apple
Dinner:
7pm ish
- Skillet Lasagna (https://www.ourbeefkitchen.com/skillet-bow-tie-lasagna/)
- The key here is not using a lot of pasta, and using all the ground beef. I use a recipe similar to this one, but I don't use cottage cheese). This was my go to meal. It also freezes well. You should also use whole wheat pasta.
- Beef broccoli and rice (you should use brown rice). I would have maybe 1 scoop of rice
- Tacos. I was told that pinto beens have more protein than carbs, and I did find that I could eat pinto beans. I just cut out the mexican rice.
- Pesto Chicken (https://tasty.co/recipe/pesto-chicken-bake)
- Chicken breast and salad
- Cheese burger with no bun
As you can see, you can pretty much have any kind of protein and just limit the side carbs
Bedtime Snack:
This is where I really struggled. I usually wasn't hungry, especially on the nights I was going to bed at 8:30pm. Also, the point of the bedtime snack is to control your sugar over night and nothing consistently worked for me. Guess thats why I eventually ended up on night time insulin.
You will really have to experiment with what works for your body.
- 1 piece of wheat bread with peanut butter (this worked the best for me)
- 1 piece of wheat bread toasted with cheese
- Almonds
Foods that have a lot of sugar that you may not realize:
- Milk
- Yogurt
- Oranges
- Grapes
Last things- I'm no saint and I definitely cheated and ate things I probably shouldn't have. BUT, I did try to do it in moderation and if I was eating sweets, it was after I'd check my sugar 1 hour after eating.
- 6-8 m&ms
- 1 chocolate chip cookie
- 1 brownie
- Small gelato
- 1/2 donut
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