Question about Hex and Syns

[dietmad]

As a diabetic and having to eat gluten free, am on 2nd week of SW plan. The first week though, I have struggled to make sense of what am reading up on and if I can make it work for me..I did only lose 1/2 pound as I only really started the plan the day before weigh in ( last night )

I was wondering , as SW recommend you use the low fat / no fat products, if I was to substitute with full fat same product and deduct from my syns allowance if that would work?

When I was first diagnosed with type 2 diabetes I was in shock but found an excellent message board whose advice to us newly diagnosed, as invaluable....one of their main advocates is that eating low carb and a little of the real stuff eg/ full fat mayo / butter / cream etc helps blood sugar control helps with weight loss, and its so true, so am sort of reluctantto go low fat ...ahhh. The general advice given to diabetics is to eat lots of carbohydrate loaded foods which then keeps those with high blood sugars needing prescription medicines to lower them!! They are slowly changing their advice so am not attacking the medical profession...

 

[coughdrops]

If you want to have full fat products, it's absolutely fine, just use your syns for them. Most generic items like dairy products are listed in the book or you can look them up on SW website.

For Hex- I'm not sure if I am picking you up correctly- do you mean for example having a full fat dairy product for your HEX A, and somehow allocating syns to the "difference"? If so, I don't think you can really do that. The HEXs are measured and allocated by SW, so they have the correct nutritional value. Switching them about ourselves isn't going to work.

Have you gone through the HEXs that are allowed? There is quite a variety of cheese under HEXA, which aren't reduced fat, or you can have whole milk. For HEXB, if you have to eat gluten free, there are alternatives like dried/canned fruit, nuts, seeds and olive oil that you could maybe use them for instead?

 

[Mrs CC]

There's nothing wrong with having the full fat versions of things, as long as you allow the correct number of syns for them. It seems to be in general now they think it's best to go with naturally occurring fats in small quantities rather than low fat processed foods.

With HEX, you can have full fat options, but obviously, you'll have less. I have the fattier milk just now cos we have to give my son full fat milk and we don't use enough to justify buying two lots. So I just have less than I would of semi skimmed. If you want more you can use syns for that.

If you'd rather eat low carb, you can try red days (in the seperate book in your pack), as this would allow you to have 2 hea's each day.

Can't offer any advice at all on gluten free, but you can use things like startchy veggies and potatoes with skins on as your HEb on red if you didn't want bread/cereal.

 

[dietmad]

thankyou both of you...great advice and am already looking at the red days instead of extra easy as a better start for me.

CD, No, I was not looking at changing the Hex for full fat ( didnt explain myself properly) but reading more, I can see that there is a full fat milk / cheese and I can have nuts so my B's will be fine.

I may use some of my syns for other full fat versions eg/ mayo if neccessary but yer, so far so good...thanks!!