The 60-Day Diet Challenge AKA "Eat Like a Diabetic" update

First: I am up to $130 on a goal of $500 for the American Diabetes Association! Woot!  http://main.diabetes.org/goto/megganann

NEXT: I promised to post about little changes I'm making as I try to "eat like a diabetic" this next two months.  The first thing to note is that I've been aware of sugar for a long time, since mom was diagnosed when I was in my teens.  I don't eat much of it.  I don't even use much agave or honey.  I use a little pure maple syrup to flavor my oatmeal sometimes because it's less refined.  But I don't do sugar.

However, as I learned when mom was diagnosed, sugar is EVERYWHERE.  We went grocery shopping with  new awareness after she found out, scanning everything from the obvious (sugar itself) to the slightly obvious (fruit juice) to the not-so-obvious (cans on the bean aisle) for that dirty 5-letter s-word.  (Did you know that it is almost IMPOSSIBLE to get canned tomatoes or kidney beans without added sugar?  I mean, all we wanted to do was make chili.   Seriously.  Who even WANTS sugar in their chili???)

The next, and most important thing, to note: I HATE artificial sweeteners.  Aspartame, saccharin, sucralose, stevia, Equal, Sweet'n'Low, Fat'n'Sassy - WHATEVER.  They all taste bitter.  Don't like 'em.

HATE.

hatesomuch.

But, since I already succeeded in so many ways, I figured I'd take it a step further.  Just so you know, I had a nice vegetarian meal this week (one of the ADA guidelines is lowering saturated fat, and swapping out a meat meal is a good way to do it), managed to leave a lot of my rice behind the day I could only get the white variety, (they didn't have brown), and succeeded in getting the B to work with my customary dinner plan of two veggies plus protein instead of 1 veggie, 1 protein and 1 carb most of the week.  So, I decided I'd try my iced coffee yesterday with Splenda.

Guess what?

I still hate it.

And, by the end of the night, my stomach rebelled.  I went for my 4-mile run and made it 2 miles thanks to horrible stomach cramps.  I spent the night and much of today eating bland soups and sandwiches.  (I also dislike sandwiches - I only eat them when I'm sick or they're really amazing.)  I didn't even ride this morning.

My tummy still hurts.

I know it could have been something else.  And, as a researcher, I know that you must hold all other things constant in order to assume your research results indicate any kind of relationship between two variables, but I can tell you the one - and only - thing I did different yesterday at any point of the day was use Splenda.

Whatever it was, what I learned here is the same thing my mom learned when first diagnosed: when you learn you're diabetic, you have a few choices regarding sugar.  You can reduce it (depending on the severity of your diabetes), you can drop it, or you can fake it.  The very few times I legitimately use sugar - baking once per month, an iced coffee - I would rather eat no sugar at all than fake it.

So there's my report on how my 60-day challenge is going.  How about yours?  E-mail me or comment and let me know.