Jolly Cheeks


I remember the good ol’ days when I was a size 4, I was also a teenager and on a dance team dancing almost everyday of the week and I could eat what I wanted to eat and not think twice about it. Now, I am 25 and have pretty much doubled in size. I am not on a dance team or dancing all the time and have to pay attention to what food is being put into my body. On top of all of that I became a diabetic had to get used to giving myself daily injection of insulin.

I didn’t really notice or care how much my body was expanding until I saw myself in one of my girlfriends wedding photos and just about died. I had jolly cheeks, back fat, and large arms. When I saw those photos I couldn’t believe how much my body had changed over the years and it was really upsetting. I started to reevaluate my life style and think of things I could change so that the girl with the jolly cheeks in those pictures would go away. I changed my diet, tried a few fad diets and failed miserably. I decided to try to become more active, but I don’t like to wake up in the morning and at the end of the day I would much rather sit in front of the TV. I needed to find something that worked for me.

I joined a boot camp class and finally found the workout motivation I needed. I started to notice a change in my arms and my fat face has slimmed down. I thought things were going great and felt great…except my pants size was still too much for me to handle and the weight wasn’t coming off, in fact I was still gaining! I needed to find a healthy diet solution on top of my work out routine if I was going to get serious about saying goodbye to jolly cheeks. I turned to my friends on TuDiabetes. The main response I got back from other insulin pump users was low carb. They all mentioned how while you can eat what you want while using an insulin pump, you need to take into account that using excess insulin makes you store excess fat. This totally hit the mark for me. I have decent control of my diabetes (I say that because my A1c is in the 7% not the 6%) but I do love food and still eat as if I don’t have a broken pancreas and give myself insulin to cover the carbs. Meaning, I am pumping (literally) an excess amount of a hormone that makes my body store extra fat. So, I have been trying to keep my carbs below 100g a day and so far it isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. This small transition has been more about planning ahead, if I know I am going to have a big dinner I need to have smaller carb portions throughout the day. Yes, apparently self-control is a big deal in the diabetes world.

This is just the beginning of my new diet regime; I hope that I will see the difference that others did when they took this route. I will keep you guys posted and let you know when jolly cheeks has finally disappeared. 

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