Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Dear Stella Rose,
Mama's food cravings have been limited during her third trimester, since all of it has been spent in the hospital on a gestational diabetic diet. She has been allowed 30 grams of carbohydrates for breakfast and 60 grams each for lunch and dinner. You'd be surprised just how many carbs are in a lot of things!
There are only a few entrees that have little to no carbohydrates. The chicken caesar salad (without the croutons), roast turkey with gravy and the chicken salad plate with vegetables are about the only entrees that are zero carbs, so mama orders them a lot and they are good. The chicken fingers (good), salisbury steak and asiago chicken (just okay) all have 15 grams. Then there are entrees like the pasta with meat sauce (one of mama's favorites) and the chicken quesadillas are each 45 grams, so they pretty much eat up her carb limit for that meal.
As far as sides go, the fresh veggies don't have any carbs, except for peas and corn, but they are hit or miss on whether they are good or not. Mama loves the mashed potatoes and gravy which are 15 grams, and the veggie snack plate and the coleslaw are both zero, which mama orders often. She also normally orders a 2% milk with every meail, so she has to reserve 15 grams for one little carton of it. Mama has grown fond or milk during her hospital stay. There must be something about drinking out of a carton and a straw...like she is back in school (except she always got a chocolate milk back then!)
At first mama avoided looking at the dessert menu altogether. She would rather eat healthier carbs than the sugar filled carb items. Then her dietician told her there was sugar free jello and sugar free pudding. The jello has no carbs and the pudding has 15 grams. Grumpa gave mama a good idea to put a scoop of peanut butter in the chocolate pudding and make it like a Reese's peanut butter cup. What a genius idea! Mama does that whenever she is craving something chocolatey!
For breakfast it is pretty easy to max out the 30 gram limit. Mama started off ordering the ham and cheese omelette every morning because it was all protein and no carbs, but that got old after a week. Her usual breakfast order consists 2 orders of bacon (4 strips total) with either an English muffin with diet jelly and butter, Cheerios with a 2% milk, a cinnamon roll, or a danish. Sometimes mama will order the french toast with diet syrup and an order of sausage. All of those items except the bacon and sausage max out the 30 gram limit. Mama can't forget to order her 2 decaf coffees and a newspaper. Grumpa loves to do the crossword puzzles in the paper every day and he finishes them in a zip!
Weekdays are nice, because the hospital allows their long term patients to order from the Cafe menu during lunch time. It has been a nice change to be able to switch things up a bit. Like barbeque ribs, flank steak, enchiladas, talapia and mahi mahi. The sides are even better tasting!
Mama is allowed one snack up to 15 grams between meals, which mama didn't even realize until a couple weeks ago. A perfect snack to soothe a sweet tooth are the individually wrapped Rice Krispy Treats! One of the other women at the antepartum support group told mama that, so Grumpa bought a big box of them! Mama lets papa eat all of the chocolate candies people have brought for her, since those are too high in carbs for mama to even have a little snack.
For the most, part it hasn't been too bad. It's actually not only been good for you, but healthy for mama to eat a carb controlled diet. The nurses have told her that a diabetic diet is the best diet for any person to be on whether you are diabetic or not.
The part that mama looks forward to being over with though are all the insulin shots and finger pricking to test her blood sugar. For breakfast and lunch mama has to get one unit of insulin injected for every 20 grams of carbs. For dinner it is for every 10 grams. Then if her blood sugar is above 125 an hour after eating, she has to get one more unit of insulin if it is between 125 and 140 and even more units based on a sliding scale if it is higher than 140. Mama's fasting blood sugar needs to be under 95, so she gets pricked in the morning, too.
As a pregnant woman with gestational diabetes gets farther along in her pregnancy, her body's insulin resistance rises. Mama started off having to get a long acting insulin injection before bed that was 6 units and has slowly been increased to 9 units as her fasting blood sugars started to creep above 95. She also used to only get one unit of insulin for every 20 grams at dinner, and that too has increased to one unit per every 15 grams and now it is for every 10 grams.
It's much easier to monitor and keep track of mama's blood sugars and the treatment of gestational diabetes while in the hospital. Mama's diabetes doctor has done a great job watching and correcting the rise in mama's blood sugars, which is great for you!
Don't worry, this has all been worth it just so you can be healthy and in mama and papa's arms in no time!
Love,
Mama & Papa
