I am just curious to hear if anyone else has experienced rising blood glucose levels over time? It isn’t serious and isn’t something I am super worried about but I am trying to understand what is happening.
Here’s my background. I started keto about 3 years ago after suddenly gaining weight (all around my waist) even though I was working out like a mad women 5 times a week and was following a nutritionist’s food plan (yes the standard diet plan). My mom and brother both have Type 1 diabetes and have had it their entire lives so I knew that I was prone to Type 2 and at 36 years old women who had two little kids, I knew I had to do something! That’s where I learned about Keto. The first month I lost 7 lbs and stalled out. But early on in keto, I noticed that my BG went high-ish (around the 6.0 mmol) for a non-diabetic. 2 months later into my keto journey and I had not lost any more weight. While I gave up strict keto in frustration to my lack of weight loss despite all the tweaking (remember there was still minimal support for keto back then), I stayed low carb because I felt amazing on it (I say low carb because I stopped counting my macros by that point but kept with the heart of it). Flash forward to last March 2017. By this point, I had accepted my new “fluffiness” and just assumed I was genetically going to be bigger. That was until I had gotten my hands on Obesity Code and The Complete Guide to Fasting and everything clicked for me! Up until this point, I had always been told that while doing keto, you would naturally fall into fasting and stop feeling hunger and you were not supposed to force it. If you were constantly hungry to add more fat! But that did nothing for me! After reading those books, I knew it was because I was insulin resistant and no amount of added fat was going to solve my metabolism. I immediately “forced” myself to begin fasting! And it was not that hard! First 2 months I lost 24 months and the inches just melted off! It was amazing. But during those 2 months, my blood glucose shot up to a daily average of 6.0mmol (I know not super high compared to T2D) but still not ideal. From the books I understood that my body was finally dumping all that stored fat and glucose and the science said that giving it time it would begin to drop.
As predicted by month 4, my daily average BG was 4.5 (morning or night). It was like a miracle! My weight loss has slowed significantly to one or two pounds a month (which is not a big deal since I am very close to my goal weight). I weighed less than I did before I had kids and was slimmer than I could ever remember!
But the last month my blood glucose levels have crept back up higher and higher every week. They now average 5.5 mmol (but it is not surprising to see regular 6.0 mmol in the morning). Other than the occasional glass of wine, I don’t cheat. I still fast a lot and eat keto on my feeding days so why the increased trend in my BG readings? I now only get the lower readings when I am fasting.
I recognize that my insulin resistance is not cured but I figured if I stayed true to keto this would always stayed managed. But despite no real changes to my eating, its creeping back up. I still don’t measure my food (so I can’t say with 100% certainty there isn’t carb creep) but I avoid processed food like a hawk! My food is pretty basic with no sauces and I like it that way with lots of added fats. My protein is fairly low (since I have zero time to workout). Dairy is minimal other than butter (love cheese but for some reason I have not eaten much in the last few months). I even resisted over Halloween and didn’t even eat one piece of candy! Is this a second wave of glucose dumping like my first wave even though I don’t have much weight to lose? Has anyone else experienced this?