We are one month in to our 8 yr old’s diagnosis. Are there any good websites out there you find helpful for diabetic recipes? Remember he’s 8, so kid friendly recipe’s would be nice.
hi @dfwjwb WES and welcome to Type One Nation. Dealing with a new diagnosis is a lot like learning anything new: first the basics and then the more advanced stuff.
I hope you have access to a great endocrinologist and hopefully an available CDE to help you through this first year,
I always recommend a book “Think Like a Pancreas” because it explains all the basics for your new routine. I have had type 1 for over 40 years and I refer to it from time to time as well.
In regards to your question: your kid is 8. there is no need for a restrictive special diet, once you learn about carbohydrates, counting them, and the use of insulin. I have taught myself how to eat candy, cake, and ice cream and I can do so whenever I decide to.
If you allow me to say: I would stick with the foods he likes, and learn to carb count them, and how much insulin for these foods. if you are not sure, then very small portions at first can be very helpful. (the law of small numbers = small numbers means small mistakes)
hope you and your family are well. Hope to see you around the forum.
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My son was diagnosed this past June. We’ve found that it’s easier to keep his blood sugar in range when he eats a lower carb diet. Joy Filled Eats and All Day I Dream About Food are great websites with kid friendly recipes that are lower carb. He still eats and enjoys chocolate chip cookies, cinnamon buns, muffins, and other foods - just with fewer carbs. There are also kid friendly dinners on there.
Hello
Over my many years of having type 1, i have come to an understanding that their is no need to have a special diet. Once you get good at counting carbs and have all the correct insulin settings, then you should be fine and not have to worry about a special diet. My parents used to make me eat specifically and it used to make me feel bad about myself. I feel it’s important to treat your child as normal as possible, and feeding them normal is a big piece of that picture
@dfwjwb Hi Wes and welcome to the TypeOneNation Forum! I expect that on this site you will receive many good tips for how to feed an 8 year old who is just beginning a life-long journey living with diabetes. You have already received some good advice.
My thought, developed while living with diabetes for more than 60 years, is to eat healthy, nourishing meals suitable for a growing child - and that means, having plenty of tasty foods available that s/he enjoys eating. Assuming your entire family has “good” eating habits, continue eating as you have and do not prepare “special” dinners for your child with diabetes.
If I may travel beyond the scope of your question, let me say that diabetes, in itself, is NOT any reason for not letting your child live a normal, active, happy, and fulfilling life. What your child will need to learn is how to balance food, activities with insulin - it isn’t an easy task, but beginning at age 8, it will become second nature by teen years.
Best wishes, and stay in touch.
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Hi @dfwjwb and welcome to the forum. As has already been said I think by everyone so far, learning to count carbs - and figure out his response to fat - is key. Some diabetics may recall being told to select or “must have” foods and doc would let us work them in now and then to an otherwise strict regimen; but the dynamics of carb counting gives us more options and freedom. Check out the smartphone apps that populate the carbs, calories and overtake nutrition info for a huge database of foods, including menu items from chain restaurants. I use Mynetdiary. Diabetes Forecast also has menus, as do diabetes magazines you can buy at the store or subscribe to.
Think Like a Pancreas was recommended - the last edition is a few years old but a new one is coming out in a few weeks.
Wishing you and your family the best. Stay well.
Hi @dfwjwb. I would say that it is most important for your 8 year old to continue to eat what he enjoys eating. I would recommend staying underneath the total number of carbs per meal that was given to you (for me it was 100). For me, I have found that it is easiest to stay to not worry about food specifically, but to try to stay underneath this number the majority of the time.
I can suggest that you look for lower carb versions of the same ingredients or food at the grocery store, for example, ALDI has low carb tortillas that have 11g per tortilla instead of 21g or 22g, which is much more common.
Thanks everyone for the well wishes. We have read the book think like a pancreas. Just a clarification to my question above. We are not looking to change his diet. We are looking for different ways to prepare the foods he likes and will eat. We’ve got the carb counting down but just looking to change how those foods are prepared. We’re kind of in a rut of the same ol same ol.
My nutritionist recommended Diabetes Food Hub (https://www.diabetesfoodhub.org) a couple weeks ago. Apparently they partnered with Blue Apron so you can access all their recipes without needing a subscription.
I switch things up by checking what ingredients are in season (http://www.eattheseasons.com) and then doing a Google search for whichever ingredients in the list spark my interest.
Cannot recommend any website cause it’s just easier for me to go through YouTube or any app with recipes.
My favorite channel is HappyDiabeticTV, nice recipes and easy to follow.
I found an app/website called Yummly that has lots of different recipes including ones listed as for diabetics. To be honest I’ve never used any of those as I base my insulin on the carbs in what I eat so I bolus accordingly. Most but perhaps not all of the recipes provide nutritive info; but for those that don’t, or if I want to cross-check, I enter the individual items in my Mynetdiary diabetes tracker and it does the calculations for me.