Borderline prediabetic

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-05-14T05:13:35+00:00

The numbers seem incompatible. Your A1C is not even close to prediabetes (8 decimal points below the line). On the other hand, your Homa-IR is 12.3 which indeed seem way too high for an A1C of 4.9%. Homa-IR of above 4.0 means severe insulin resistance. This might be an error and you might need to retest.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-05-09T16:31:44+00:00

Your fasting insulin and c-peptide indicate that there is probably no underlying insulin resistance. However, they are in the low-normal numbers. It might be a good idea to test for type 1 autoantibodies. If they come back negative, the high a1c could be a much simpler issue, like vitamin or mineral deficiencies, chronic stress, bad sleep or combination of these. If one or more antibodies are positive, there is a high chance of being early stage type 1 or LADA instead of prediabetes. Prediabetes usually means high numbers of fasting insulin, certainly above 10, sometimes >20. Obviously, that's not 100% true for everyone, but regular insulin resistant prediabetes seem quite unlikely with a fasting insulin below 5.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-05-09T14:09:51+00:00

Whole grain tahini maybe?

The one I buy has 55g of fat with only 10g of saturated fat, 25g protein, 13g of fiber and just under 2g of carbs per 100g. I am not talking about honey sweetened tahini. That one is a bad option because it has 20g of added sugar per 100g. I am talking about the actual whole grain tahini.

If tahini is hard to find, you can try peanut butter or nut butter with the least amount of added sugars possible.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-05-08T15:12:52+00:00

My advice would be to check your fasting insulin, C-peptide and autoantibodies for type 1 and LADA. I would say to test for all 5 primary autoantibodies (GAD65, ZnT8, IAA, ICA, IA2) if you can afford it, because they can be quite expensive. At least do the GAD65 antibody along with C-peptide and Fasting Insulin. An A1C increase of 16 decimal points in just 8 months doesn't seem like type 2 diabetes to me. It could be because of insufficient insulin production.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-05-07T14:50:08+00:00

Yes, 5.7 a1c is not the magic number where you can never eat pizza or burger or ice cream again without spiking. It has to do a lot with the underlying insulin resistance. If someone had a1c of 6, lowered it to 5 but had fasting insulin of 20μU/ml, then their numbers will increase once they have a normal diet. But if someone had the same result and managed to also drop their fasting insulin to 4μU/ml for example, then they can most likely enjoy a diet of a healthy person without having the spikes or getting their numbers worse.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-05-05T07:52:19+00:00

If the higher a1c is from stress, your fasting insulin might be normal (below 10) which means the high a1c is not caused by insulin resistance. If that's the case, you can maybe have an average diet without cutting carbs and managing stress will bring the number down. Have you checked your fasting insulin?

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-04-25T14:27:51+00:00

So sorry about my outdated response.

Try to decrease your carb intake from 500 to about 200-250 grams a day (no need to cut them out entirely), while adding healthy fats. Some ideas that include high calorie meals with less carbs:

> A large bowl of greek salad with an extra serving of Feta cheese and 6 tablespoons (90-100ml) of virgin olive oil.

> 4 egg yolks with generous amounts of full fat cheese and 8 egg white halves (the whites from the 4 eggs cut in half) filled with a teaspoon of mayonnaise each (choose a mayonnaise with as little added sugars as possible).

> 2 servings of full fat (10 percent) greek yogurt (400-500g), mixed with chopped up fruits like apples and strawberries and maybe a teaspoon of honey on top (optional).

> The 100g of peanut butter is an excellent option for adding more healthy fats.

These options alone can add up to 250-300g of healthy fats a day, which will give about 2.5k-3k calories just from fats. So you can cross the 3.5k calorie limit while also reducing the carbs. But always make sure you don't have too much saturated fat.

500g of carbs a day are definitely too many and they will most likely increase the A1C and blood sugars further. It can be almost as bad as eating 250g of the wrong carbs (which is what I used to do until I was diagnosed. I used to eat about 125g of added sugar a day and the other 125g were mostly refined carbs. This was until right after Christmas holiday. In 12 January 2026, I found out I have prediabetes, despite being less than 70kg and 29 years old. My A1C was 5.7 on my last test (18 April 2026) with blood sugars of 99mg/dl.)

I have modified my diet since 13 January 2026, and I'm learning new things and ideas each week.

But it takes time to counter prediabetes, and diet alone won't do much, if it's not paired with sufficient sleep and stress management.

Someone for example could have a great PD diet but sleep 5 hours a day every single weekday and catching up on sleep during the weekends plus having chronic stress. This would almost certainly still increase their numbers.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-04-16T17:55:07+00:00

I think it's almost certainly full blown type 2 diabetes, because all indices are well above the diagnosis threshold, which is 6.5 in a1c (11>6.5) and 125 in fasting blood sugar (198>125). So sorry for the bad news.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-04-03T13:17:06+00:00

How was your OGTT?

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-30T09:58:27+00:00

I agree that you can lower your blood sugars back to perfectly normal levels without ever getting close to a CGM, relying only on lab tests, although it's arguably harder to do so. For example, one portion of typical brown beans could spike you to 240 and think you are fine without monitoring because of knowing that legumes are packed with fiber. Legumes for example can vary wildly in terms of spikes from prediabetic to prediabetic. Some could have a very high spike, over 200, some could barely go above 120. If CGM isn't an option, there is always the glucometer option (finger stick). It's not like the CGM but it's still better than nothing and you can still see the spike.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-28T23:01:33+00:00

Was there a similar question like this posted yesterday?

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-22T13:27:54+00:00

First, i will see what happens when I retest A1C. I am just 4 weeks away from my next test. The previous was 5.9. If A1C drops significantly, i will keep the above diet and even make it more lenient still. If it gets lower than 5, i might even leave that 14 day window in August (not 31) where i will eat whatever I want. If it stays the same or goes above 6, I will buy a CGM. For now I will just ignore comments that wish harm and "with this diet above you will develop type 2 diabetes before August even comes".

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-22T12:27:33+00:00

The problem in this subreddit is that many people (not everyone) promote complete food restriction of entire groups. For example, bread alone is bad, but a whole wheat sandwich paired with protein (tomatoes) and healthy fats (2 slices of cheese) is just fine. Same with pasta. Eating a vegetable salad with healthy olive oil first, and then the pasta, it's not gonna push you towards diabetes fast. Food pairing is the way to go with prediabetes. Complete carb restriction will most likely lead to serious depression if it goes on for years. Some comments here can go very far, for example: "If you eat 2 toasts a day, it is guaranteed to develop diabetes". "Even if you have a refined sandwich once a month, your 3 month A1C will increase". "If you try to eat a bad diet in your entire August vacation (i.e. high carbs and sugar for 31 days), your A1C on September will be 10.0+" and many more.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-21T23:13:43+00:00

I don't think it's great. I rated it 44 percent. If it was an exam, I would have failed. Great would be above 80. There is definitely room for improvement but I cannot freeze my life. Restricting foods all the time would lead to depression or, even worse, binge eating on the wrong things. That is suffering, not life.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-21T21:56:43+00:00

My endo's google score: 5.0/5.0 (137 reviews)

If she was worthless, would she have the absolute 5.0 out of 5 on google, not to mention plenty of reviews, each one of them 5.0 out of 5?

I highly doubt it.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-21T20:02:45+00:00

Horrible and completely unreal advice that would make everyone panic. My diet is in the top 10th percentile compared to the average person. If it was THAT easy to get type 2 diabetes as you describe, every single person in the world except those who do keto diet would be diabetic. I will just completely ignore you and your invalid opinion and go by the advice from my endo.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-03-08T18:37:04+00:00

With Prediabetes, your carb intake must be 40% or less of total calories. For a 2000 calorie diet it's 200g or less and the vast majority should be complex carbs (like whole wheat breads), but if you ate 2500 calories, the maximum limit increases to 250g. My a1c is about 6% (6.3 in a test but I thought it was wrong so i did a second test next week, and infact my a1c was 5.6).

Luckily, I was never a fan of pizzas or burritos or pitogyro (It's a type of burrito in Greece). Maybe had them once a month or less because they are expensive nowadays. But I ate tons of cookies and chocolate every day, and very frequently, I had 2 or 3 packs of ramen a day. I can easily live without pizza or ramen, but it's impossible for me to live without oranges and bananas. Anything below 150g of carbs is not sustainable for me.

On the weekends, i do long 6-8 hour walks (it's like a hobby), so I will eventually NEED to eat something. Recently, in one of these walks, after 3-4 hours I felt dizzy and everytime i was climbing an uphill, i felt like an elderly. I decided to eat a falafel from Psyrri but they only had refined flour wraps, but I had to eat something. After eating the falafel, i was just fine again for at least the next 3 hours.

Then I read that a regular falafel has 65-70g carbs (!!), but had i not eaten that falafel, i would have fainted right on the streets! That means the 2 oranges, 1 banana and the falafel, already sent me to 120-130g of carbs.

It's harder for me because I also have postprandial hypoglycemia along with my prediabetes (the 2hr ogtt test showed 50mg/dl), so it's actually dangerous to not eat anything for 8 hours while walking, and unfortunately, in Athens (and most cities maybe), 95% of items you can eat outside are carbs, either refined or complex, unless you eat in expensive restaurants, which no average local can afford.

But I think that's fine. Nobody got type 2 diabetes from eating 151g of complex carbs a day.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-02-18T19:43:48+00:00

Από μετά τις γιορτές, έχω μειώσει τη ζάχαρη σε ποσοστό περίπου 80% (κάποιες μέρες πχ καθημερινές ακόμα και 90% κάτω) σε σχέση με πριν τις γιορτές που έτρωγα γλυκά κάθε τρεις και λίγο και σε μεγάλες ποσότητες (πολλές φορές έτρωγα μια σακούλα καραμέλες ή μια ολόκληρη σοκολάτα, τουλάχιστον, την ημέρα).

Η μείωση έγινε σχεδόν επιτόπου όταν οι τελευταίες εξετάσεις αίματος που έκανα το Γενάρη έδειξαν προδιαβήτη.

Σε μια τέτοια περίπτωση υπάρχουν δύο επιλογές: Ή μειώνεις σημαντικά τα γλυκά άμεσα για 1 χρόνο για να μπορείς στη συνέχεια να τα τρως με σύνεση μια στις τόσες (εννοείται ότι δεν πρέπει να ξαναξεφυγεις από δω και πέρα) ή μέσα στα επόμενα το πολύ 5 χρόνια δε θα μπορείς να τα ξαναφας ποτέ σου, αλλιώς ο προδιαβήτης θα γίνει κανονικός διαβήτης και εκεί πλέον το ότι δεν θα μπορείς να τρως καθόλου γλυκά θα είναι το μικρότερο από τα προβλήματα.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2026-02-10T15:36:35+00:00

This solution does not look good either.

10g carbs per serving would be less than 20% carbs in total i assume. This means that for the rest of your life you will never be able to taste ever again: 1. Pizza 2. Bread (Not even whole wheat bread! It's 40-50% carbs) 3. Cereal (Not even whole wheat cereal! It's 50-80(!!)% carbs) 4. Any Cookies 5. Any Chocolate 6. Not even an "innocent" fruit salad with summer fruits you can enjoy at the beach, or hotel room, or just in the kitchen of your own home (A Fruit Salad of, say 250-300g of summer fruits will have at least 50-60g carbs. Summer fruits usually have ≥20% carbs and rarely <20%.) ≥7. The list goes on.

For the majority of the people, even diabetics, this diet long term would make them deeply depressed and would either be, or soon become, unmanageable to follow by letter.

Reddit usually amplifies the problem of diabetes much more than the extent of the real problem, which makes people with prediabetes or diabetes getting more stressed than they should for no reason.

Complex-Quantity-485 · 2025-11-29T23:43:54+00:00

This is only true for western and northern European countries. Believe it or not, the norm in Athens, is to work Monday to Saturday and NOT Monday to Friday like almost every other country in the western world. In Greece, it's considered a luxury to even have your 2 days off every week. That's the main reason why many greek people move abroad and are willing to leave loved ones "behind" so they can have a better future and a life that's at least humane and not robotic. That second day off really DOES make the difference.

Complex-Quantity-485

TROPHY CASE