Diabetic and confused as to when to eat meals?

Question

My mother is on insulin, morning and night. She says she has to wait 30 minutes after her insulin to eat. In the morning she is very weak and in the evening after dinner she is also tired and sleepy.

She has recently changed her dinner hour from 6:00 pm to 8:00 something i am very upset about. Her reasoning is to loose weight but she is doing more damage to her system. Any advice on what she should do about her eating times and hours? She is also sleeping very bad and hardly gets any sleep time in the night.

Answer 1

well  I don't know but if you are a type 1 or type 2 you can take 10 or 20 minutes befor and after all meals Im sorry

Answer 2

I am not sure about the insulin part of the question as I am not familiar with insulin taking, however I do know that if a person is trying to lose weight a later meal is bad. She should eat earlier in the day and then because of Blood sugars eat a small snack closer to bedtime. Also no energy and sleepy is usually a sign of poor sugar control. She may need a check up with her DR to see if the insulin amount need to be adjusted. And a diabetic needs 3 meals a day and a few snacks in between and as long as she is eating the proper foods this will help with the weight loss.

Answer 3

I am not sure what kind of insulin she is taking. Novolog and Humalog work within 15 minutes after injecting and I want my food in front of me before injecting. I take the Humalog at each meal and inject Lantus, the long acting insulin every morning as well.

If she needs to lose weight she is taking too much insulin. It prevents weight loss.

She can change her dinner hour any way she wants it to change.

I eat about 6 equal meals during most days. Very small for each one of them, usually around 15 grams of carbohydrate per meal so my glucose stays very level.

Lack of energy and sleeping badly are definitely signs her glucose levels are not in good control. Long time diabetics have lots of nerve damage and it does hurt especially at night.

You might consider consulting a different doctor. It doesn't sound to me as if your mother is on a 21st century diabetes control plan. More like she is stuck in the 1970s or 80s plan.

Do you have a glucometer to check her glucose levels with? And what was her last HbA1c result? These are very important numbers. They are llife or death to a lot of people.

It is 9pm here and time for my bedtime snackie! tonight I am having apple slices with cream cheese dip.