Audio Book Endnotes

A funny thing can happen if you don't stay up to date on your emails. You can miss important information that you really want to know. A couple of days ago, for example, I discovered that I've sold ten copies of my audio book produced by Audible...when I thought I had sold none. Oops! The reason it's an oops is that I included end notes (sort of like footnotes, but at the end of each part of the book) in the paperback and Kindle editions of Your Life Isn't Over ~ It May Have Just Begun! and I couldn't imagine how to include them in the audio edition so I didn't.

I was reminded of a clever option yesterday when I listened to an audio book while running and the author just said the word "asterisk" and then went on to read the extra information. Maybe I'll go back and include those some day. And certainly, I'll use it for the next book I record. But for now, I'm feeling guilty because my audio book purchasers are missing some information I intended for them to have. And to further complicate the matter, I have no idea, of course, who they might be.

Hopefully, at some point, they'll seek out my website and find this blog with the missing information, as I intend to include it all right here right now. It will make for a longer than usual post, but at least an effort will have been made.

Some of you may not appreciate this if you already read the paperback or Kindle edition and so are being handed old news. Others of you who haven't read -- or listened to -- the book as yet may find the information oddly out of context. But I would say to both groups that the information is worth having or at least considering, so I make no apologies. And I'm presenting a lot of good stuff to know in one little package.

Part 1: Mindblown

[1] The amount of carbohydrates the diabetic nutritionist initially instructed me to eat was based on my height and weight and on what I was used to eating. Obviously, if you’re six foot two, weigh 185, and work as a roofer, the diabetic nutritionist is going to recommend more carbs for you than I could have. So keep that in mind.

[2] When crafting your own delicious custom coffee beverage, forget about the whipped cream and sprinkles, but most coffee shops have a range of sugar-free syrups. Try them one at a time until you find your favorites. (Some people, for example, like a blend of sugar-free hazelnut and sugar-free vanilla which makes a tasty French Vanilla option.) Coffee shops that offer flavored coffee give you the option of asking for “Southern Pecan flavored coffee with sugar-free caramel syrup” or “English Toffee flavored iced coffee with sugar-free vanilla syrup,” etc., if you like. Additionally, half and half actually has less grams of carbohydrate than whole milk which has less carbs than skim and you need a lot less half and half to lighten your coffee than either of the others – besides it tasting richly decadent. So you might want to keep that in mind. It’s not like you’re drinking it by the glassful. A cappuccino, by the way, has 12 grams of carb and a latte has 18, but regular coffee with sugar-free syrup and half and half only has about 4. And it took me years to learn all this. You’re welcome.

Part 2: Weight, Weight! Don't Tell Me

[1] One book I found helpful early on is The First Year: Type 2 Diabetes: An Essential Guide for the Newly Diagnosed by Gretchen Becker and Allison Goldfine (Da Capo Press, 2006), written by a nurse who has been living with diabetes for decades. Every other chapter is made up of fairly understandable explanations of the scientific realities of diabetes, which is a good thing if you can handle it and are ready for that level of information. If you’re not, you can just skip those chapters your first time through the book.

[2] I plan on enjoying sex until I’m too old to remember what it is. (Don't act as if you're shocked.) And though I’ve read that diabetic men sometimes develop erectile dysfunction, that’s not necessarily a symptom of diabetes, from what I understand, but rather a complication of medications or of not managing their disease. Which is certainly something to think about.

[3] "Problem-solving" is the term for figuring out why your diabetes, your medications, and your body are interacting in a negative way

Part 3: Diabetes Boot Camp

[1] Some people diagnosed with diabetes while they’re severely overweight discover that their body stabilizes when they lose enough pounds, but this isn’t necessarily the bulk of us.

[2] One of my favorite websites and a great one to begin with can be found at www.dlife.com  If you register there and include an email address, they will keep you posted about all sorts of helpful information in a user friendly format. They also offer training webinars online about pertinent topics. But once you start looking for information on diabetes on Google, in no time at all, you’ll be bombarded with other options.

[3] I’m going to refer to brand names from time to time because it’s information I wish I’d had when I was first diagnosed. Personal preference, needless to say, might dictate that you prefer a different brand of some product or food I might mention, but at least you’ll be starting out with more information than I had. I have not received any encouragement or compensation for mentioning any particular brand.

[4] The lance is what you prick your finger with. Lancets are the little blades that fit into the lance. Since I use a Freestyle Lite glucometer to check my glucose level, the test strips I use are the ones that fit that glucometer and the lance I use came with the kit. The Freestyle lancets I use in the lance are 28 gauge sterilized stainless steel. Gauges run from 23 to 30. The lower the number, the bigger the hole will be and the more the pricks will hurt. Apparently, my skin isn’t too thick, so I can use a lancet that makes a pretty small entry hole. Thank goodness.

Part 4: Eating to Live, Not Living to Eat

[1] In the book, I write about the fact that natural peanut butter (unlike the "popular" brands) has no sugar in it -- at all. It should also be noted that homogenizing peanut butter so it doesn’t separate from the oil in the jar before it’s opened makes the protein hard to assimilate. If you want peanut butter that does your body good, you can try Smucker’s old fashioned smooth or crunchy style peanut butter. You’ll see that the oil has separated, so when you open it at home the first time, just take a sturdy knife and stir the peanut butter (all the way to the bottom) until it’s thoroughly mixed, close the lid and refrigerate the jar. It won’t separate again until it’s all gone and you’ll be getting excellent protein with no sugar added.

[2] I made a big mistake a few times when I bought and ate something I thought was only a small carb splurge and then later realized that it supposedly had two or even three “servings” in the package – meaning that I had just eaten two days worth of carbs all at once. There is apparently no standard for what constitutes a serving. So don’t be caught off guard.

[3] Unfortunately, the nutritionists who talk about “portion control” and whoever chooses the recipes for magazines are not always on the same wave length. I wish I had a nickel for every time I’ve looked longingly at a beautiful dish of food in a magazine for diabetics, wondering if I should break down and make it, only to discover that it has 45 grams of carb in ¾ of a cup. What would be the point of making something I could only have ¾ of a cup of?

[4] Aspartame doesn’t just show up in diet soda. So look out for this killer. Sometimes it’s also added even when a product advertises itself as containing stevia or some other “natural” sweetener instead. But the aspartame will be embedded in the list of ingredients, if you read them. There is a growing backlash against aspartame, however, which is why some products actually declare “No aspartame” on the label. They know.

[5] Pepperidge Farm Bake Shop Sausalito cookies are chocolate chip cookies with macadamia nuts that are the real deal and only have 17 grams of carbohydrate. That's right.

[6] If you’re eating at home, Newman’s Own has a great raspberry walnut vinaigrette salad dressing that’s all natural and delicious -- and all the profits go to charity.

Part 5: To Market, To Market

[1] When I go on a road trip, I take a little bag of Deep River Original Salted Kettle Cooked Potato Chips (17 grams of carb in half of a 2 oz. bag) so I’m not tempted to pick up something worse at a roadside convenience store. And I don’t eat the whole bag at once.

[2] There’s only been a few occasions in eight years that I’ve needed something faster acting than a piece or two of Werther’s Original hard candy and I drank 4 ounces of regular soda or apple juice in those cases. On the other hand, I work pretty hard to keep my glucose numbers as stable as I can.

Part 6: Hut! Two, Three, Four!

[1] Wonderslim makes a tasty "meal replacement" product (called "pudding/shakes") that I sometimes use to balance my glucose when I crash after a work out (available from www.wonderslim.com). I particularly like Chocolate, Mocha, or Strawberry Cream, but they do have other flavors. And they all have 15 grams of protein and only 7 grams of carb. Do avoid the ones that have aspartame as an artificial sweetener, though. They make the product available with or without it. Unfortunately, the kind without it has corn syrup solids instead, which are also touted as very bad for the body. But no more of these than I drink, I choose the corn syrup over the aspartame. If I intended to drink them more regularly, I would find a different product or use my handy-dandy sports blender to create something myself.

[2] My favorite exercise cd is Leslie Sansone’s Walk Away the Pounds Ultimate Collection, which gives me the option to do one, two, three, or four mile challenges depending on how much time I have. It also comes with a stretchy resistance band she uses for part of the routine, but a couple of discs in my neck are herniated, so I get on the floor and do leg lifts or break out the five pound weights when that’s going on.

[3] Once I started taking insulin, I had to be more careful when I went to the gym because my glucose level could actually drop so low that I couldn’t continue my workout. One of the staff members suggested that I do my machine work first and the bike riding second and my glucose level wouldn’t drop until I was ready to go home anyway. Any aerobic activity (exercise that makes the heart beat faster) pushes the glucose level down at a quicker rate than other forms of exercise.

Part 7: The Tool Kit

[1] I take R-Alpha Lipoic Acid to prevent neuropathy (nerve damage in my arms and legs due to poor circulation and often occurring in diabetics, especially when they don't manage their glucose levels). I compared the information and price on a number of brands of this supplement and have chosen to take Dr. Danielle’s R-Alpha Lipoic Acid (300 mg capsules) because it’s all natural and non-synthetic. Apparently, the synthetic ALA doesn’t assimilate into the body as well as the natural ALA does. If the R doesn’t appear in front of the word Alpha on the label, it’s synthetic.

[2] When we breathe in deeply through the nose and then exhale through the mouth until we empty our lungs completely – which we often don’t do – it slows down the heart. Which slows down our mind. Which calms our body. Which can help to lower our glucose level. Nice, huh? So breeeeathe.

Parts 8 and 9 (Takin' My Best Shot and What You Plant Grows) don't have any end notes. Nor does the Appendix (How I Manage My Diabetes Without Health Insurance -- While Going to College Full-Time and Working Two Jobs by William Schmidt). Additionally, at the end of the paperback and Kindle editions are a series of questions related to each section of the book for discussion groups to use. I'll publish them in a later post so audio book listeners can access them.

I hope you found this helpful. And encouraging. And inspiring. It's a compilation of tips and hints learned during eight years of successfully living with diabetes. And you can do it, too.