It’s a hard pill to swallow — “your blood glucose test came back high.”

You just learned you have gestational diabetes. What now?

If it’s anything like my experience, you don’t get the counseling the same day you hear the diagnosis. Most likely you’ll run home and get online to search for information. It’s torture while you wait to learn what you can/can’t eat. You are afraid of hurting your baby by eating the wrong foods.

TIPS

Here are my tips on the first steps to take while you wait for more information from your doctor:

1. Don’t stress out
2. Stop eating anything that you know has sugar in it
3. Stop eating all white food: potatoes, rice, bread, flour
4. Drink lots of water
5. Eat smaller meals, more often. Strive for three meals a day with two snacks in between.
6. Watch the fruit. Don’t eat fruit in the morning or at night.
7. Skip all juices. Yep, you can add OJ and all fruit juices to the list of things you can no longer drink. For me, this was hard. I was drinking specialty juice drinks in place of a cocktail at parties and special outings. I had to get used to drinking water more often. Diet soda is OK.
8. Exercise. (Walk if that’s all you are allowed to do.)
9. Go to the library and check out some books. Here are a list from Amazon.
10. Join an online forum where you can find other mothers dealing with the same issues — sample forums TuDiabetes.org, iVillage.com’s Pregnant with diabetes board.
11. Tell people about it. You’ll be surprised about the support you’ll get and I bet you’ll find another woman you know who had to deal with the same thing. I was very worried when I first found out and was telling people at work about it, saying I didn’t know what to do. A coworker told me she had it with her second pregnancy and gave me tips. It immediately calmed me down.

Resources:

• American Diabetes Association Gestational Diabetes Resources
• “Gestational Diabetes: What to Expect” book

Trackback URI | Comments RSS