Sugar Sugar

Having grown up in the 80s and 90s when there wasn’t as much known about CF and people with it weren’t living as long, the priority was gaining/keeping on weight. My whole childhood my parents were told to get me to eat as many calories as possible. They were told to keep candy in the house at all times so that I could eat it any time. Based on what we know today this sounds pretty terrible, but that’s just how things were done. Fast forward some years and I’ve spent the majority of my life eating anything & everything that I want. Unfortunately, I also happen to have a very strong sweet tooth and very little will power.

Blood tests are a regular part of clinic visits. They check vitamin levels, liver functions, and sugars, among other things. The last year or so, my sugars have been running at the high-normal end, so this summer my doctor had me do a fasting 2-hr blood glucose test. This entails a blood draw, drinking an orange flavored, super sugary drink, then drawing blood again at one hour & two hours to see how the sugar is absorbed into the body. I was able to find out my results during my visit that day as I had clinic scheduled at the same time. Well, my doctor read the results and said that I was officially at the high end of pre-diabetic. Cystic Fibrosis Related Diabetes (CFRD) is different from Type 1 or Type 2, but can be treated with insulin. Since I didn’t have diabetes just yet, I met with the nutritionist and went over how to control my sugar levels with diet. Ugh.

I had to give up all candy & soda and start making sure that every 2-3 hours I ate a balance of protein and carbs. My body still needs sugar, since my levels also tend to get really low, it just has to be the good kind. Eating all of the time wasn’t a problem since I pretty much snack at my desk all day long anyway, but having to cut out the junk food was awful. I craved it so bad. It doesn’t really help that the kitchen at work is stocked with candy & we have a soda fountain. They sat there and stared me down every day at lunch. And I have to say there were a couple of days that I went and stared longingly at the pantry shelves and had to talk myself out of having “just one”. I was counting the days that I’d gone without junk food and congratulating myself every day on a job well done. After about 7 days it started to get easier and I found some substitute things to eat that sort of satisfied my sugar needs.

At about this time I got my test results in the mail and come to find out that my doctor read the 1 hour test as my final instead of the 2 hour test, so my results were that I’m actually high-normal, and not even pre-diabetic at all (yet). Well I tried to convince myself to continue eating healthy, but my aforementioned low will power took over and I ended up saying a giant fuck it and started back on the candy & soda. All of it.

I'm making sure to drink at least 4 liters
of water a day, along with making
good decisions on my snacks.

Now it’s a new year and I’ve decided that I really need to get back on the no junk wagon. I’m pretty sure my body will thank me in the long run, but it’s still not easy. A little easier since it’s my decision and not forced upon me. I really don’t do well with being told that I have to do something, never have. 

I’m drinking a literal gallon of water every day and substituting all of my usual candy with fruits, veggies, nuts, cheese, and popcorn. I still have bad days where I want nothing more than to drink a root beer and stuff handfuls of Cracker Jack in my mouth, but I know that if I give in I’ll end up telling myself that I can have one thing every day and then it will spiral out of control again. So for now I eat with my back to the candy-filled pantry and pretend that my sugar snap peas are of the sour patch variety.