dsi1 wrote:
> Julie Bove wrote:
>> > wrote:
>
>>> My son lost a bunch of weight and apparently cured himself of type II
>>> diabetes. A year ago, he was in poor shape and had to take insulin by
>>> injection. He's on some diet where he drinks powered material of some sort
>>> for meals. My guess is that this restricts his daily intake to about 1500
>>> calories or less a day. Anyway, he no longer takes any drugs to regulate
>>> his blood sugar. Pretty amazing stuff.

The 600-800 calorie per day level is gastric lap band level. It tends
to turn off diabetes symptoms so they started looking for non-surgical
means to acheive the same goal. The result looks a lot like OptiFast.

The question is what's the maintenance phase like. There is no way that
600-800 calories is sustainable in a world where unlimited food is
available. Some system is needed to keep from binging and regaining it
all. Some of the more extreme diets suggest Jenny Craig as their
intermediate step and Weight Watchers as their maintenance plan.

>> Just because he's not on meds doesn't mean his diabetes went away. Diabetes
>> can be controlled by diet alone or diet and exercise. Not everyone can do
>> this. And sometimes weight loss alone brings it under control. Sometimes
>> it doesn't. There are over 300 variants to diabetes. Yet most of us are
>> lumped into either type 1 or type 2.
>
> You're right about this - he's not cured. He just doesn't have to take
> any medication. My guess is that he'll have to watch his weight or it'll
> come back.

There are two valid definitions of cured -

1) Stop taking the poison and the symptoms go away without medication.
If you view carby foods as poison to a diabetic then maintenance diets
that are low carb count by this definition. It only works for folks
whose panceas damage is below some level.

> My wife's friend might have been cured. She had sky high A1C numbers and
> had a gastric bypass surgery. She lost some weight, gained it back, but
> seems to no longer have T-2 diabetes. My wife says she drinks 2 large
> bottles of soda a night plus some 12 oz cans which could mean she drinks
> as much as a gallon of so each night. Holy smokes!

2) Damage is reversed and you can go back to going what you did before
you started. This type of cure is very rare. Also eating the way you
ate before the diagnosis caused or contributed to the diabetes in the
first place.