Do you remember playing the game “telephone?” It’s when someone whispers a message to the person next to them, that person whispers the same message to the person next to them, and the chain continues until reaching the last person in line, who repeats the message out loud. Everyone laughs because, without the fail, the original message has drastically changed.
Unfortunately, the telephone game is a fairly accurate representation of how nutrition messages mysteriously change, or lose important context, when they reach the person at the end of the line. Misconstrued nutrition messages, however, won’t likely end with a group laugh. Accurate nutrition information can be essential, especially for those managing chronic conditions like diabetes. And the details are often the most important part of the message.
[READ: Mediterranean Diet for People With Diabetes.]
Nutrition Myths About Fat
Fat is a perfect example. My best nutrition message to my diabetes clients: “Replace saturated fat in your diet with healthier unsaturated fats whenever practical, but manage portion sizes because all dietary fat packs a lot of calories.”
But when I tell them that, they often hear something else.
One friend with diabetes, for example, recently informed me that she found a way to get more healthy fat into her diet: She now adds an avocado to her usual fruit, almond milk and kale smoothie.
During the same week, another friend with diabetes dredged his bread into a plate of olive oil at an Italian restaurant, arguing that adding the healthy oil to bread was better for his diabetes. In both these cases I say, “Kudos for choosing healthy fats, but, what happened to the ‘replace’ and ‘watch portion sizes’ parts of the message?”
The healthy avocado added 320 calories (250 calories from fat) to the breakfast smoothie, which had already been healthy when it was avocado-free. And every added tablespoon of olive oil adds 120 calories to an 80-calorie slice of bread, which would only be a good choice for diabetes if my friend otherwise would have slathered on a pat of butter.
The lesson: Adding fat to your daily diet — even healthy fat like olive and canola oils, nuts, avocado, olives and fatty fish — can add calories to your diet and inches to your waistline if you miss the details of the message. Added body weight, no matter the source, can make blood glucose levels hard to manage.
Including healthy fat in your diet can be a good blood sugar management strategy. Fats do not spike blood sugar levels and are slowly digested, which offers a blunt in rise of blood sugar. But, as a word of caution, eating too much fat can cause insulin resistance. Ultimately, too much fat — any fat — can make achieving diabetes management goals like weight loss, blood sugar management and avoidance of complications more elusive.
[READ: How Meditation and Mindfulness Can Help Manage Diabetes]
Good Fats vs. Bad Fats
So, what’s someone with diabetes to do about fat? It’s important to know how much total fat and “good” fat you should be eating. The 2020-2025 Dietary Guideline, the American Heart Association and the American Diabetes Association state 20% to 35% of total calories should come from fat, with less than 10% coming from saturated fat.
[READ: Best Snacks for Diabetics.]
Diabetes Menu for a Day
If you are eating 1,800 calories per day, that may look like this:
— Breakfast: 1/4 cup of low-fat cottage cheese, six almonds and 1 1/2 cups of cooked oatmeal.
— Lunch: 3 ounces of grilled chicken salad, 1/2 cup garbanzo beans, 2 tablespoons of avocado, 1 tablespoon regular Italian salad dressing, 12 round crackers and an apple.
— Snack: 1 tablespoon of natural peanut butter with six graham cracker squares.
— Dinner: 3 ounces baked cod, grilled vegetables with olive oil and 1 1/2 cups of quinoa salad with dried apricots and pistachios.
— Snack: low-fat Greek yogurt.
This day’s menu has 63 grams of total fat — 30% of total calories from fat — mixing 58 grams of unsaturated fat with 5 grams of saturated fat from some of the protein foods, salad dressing and crackers.
And don’t forget: Adding healthy fats to your diet is healthier if you eat them in place of less-healthy fats. Otherwise, that single avocado in your smoothie can increase your daily calories by 15%. That’s something you may not hear if you’re playing “telephone.”
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How Much Fat Should People With Diabetes Eat? originally appeared on usnews.com
