Diabetics Doing Whole30

[00:00:00] Rob Howe: Welcome to the Diabetics Doing Things podcast, where we explore the amazing stories of type 1 diabetics around the world. I'm your host, Rob Howe, Diabetics Doing Things founder and 11-year type 1 diabetic. Help raise awareness for diabetics doing things by sharing this with your diabetic friends. We're also on Facebook and Instagram. Tag a type 1 friend today. Today's guest is the co-founder of Whole30, Melissa Hartwig. She's the New York Times bestselling author of It Starts With Food and The Whole30. Melissa and I are flipping the script today, and she'll be interviewing me to talk about my journey through Whole30 as a type 1 diabetic. I have quite a few people to thank for this episode. First, to Ashley Bright and Amanda Austin for introducing me to Whole30. To Melissa for being so willing to squeeze this interview into her hectic schedule. and to my parents, who are not only Whole30 All-Stars, but who I wouldn't have been able to finish even one Whole30 without, much less three. Special disclaimer alert, diabetics doing things does not provide medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. The information presented here is general information for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical care. Let's face it, I'm not a doctor. You should talk to yours before embarking on Whole30 or any other dietary plan. Hello, everybody. Welcome to Episode 7 of Diabetics Doing Things. This episode is Diabetics Doing Whole30, and it's going to be a little bit different because instead of interviewing another diabetic, I have a very special guest on today, the co-founder and author of It Starts With Food and The Whole30, Melissa Hartwig. And she's going to interview me about what it's like being a type 1 diabetic who is doing Whole30. So, Melissa, thanks so much for coming on.

[00:01:46] Melissa Hartwig: Hi. Well, thank you for having me. I was really excited to read about your story on social media. And I know that we've had quite a few type 1 diabetic testimonials, but I really want to dig in with you to try to help other type 1s figure out how they might be able to implement the Whole30 to help them manage their blood sugar.

[00:02:03] Rob Howe: A hundred percent. And I'm really glad that we were able to get connected, just the power of social media and hashtags and having a lot of really good conversations with some other diabetics, just answering some questions. So first of all, let's just get a little bit of a background of Whole30 and the program and sort of how we got to today. And then we'll kind of go into some of the questions that diabetics normally have and just talk through my experience as well.

[00:02:31] Melissa Hartwig: Perfect. That sounds great. So the Whole30, in essence, the way I describe it is like pushing the reset button with your health, your habits, and your relationship with food. And a lot of people come to the program specifically because their habits and their relationship with food have become dysfunctional over the years. But a significant number of people come to the program as a way to help manage their symptoms, whether they have an autoimmune condition or migraines or digestive issues, or they're looking to better regulate blood sugar as a type 1 or type 2 diabetic. So the essence of the program is essentially an elimination diet. You're pulling things out for 30 days that the scientific literature and our clinical experience have shown to be very commonly problematic in one of four areas. your cravings and your emotional relationship with food, your hormones and your metabolism, which is critical for type 1 diabetics, your digestion and the integrity of your digestive tract, and your immune system and whether or not these foods are upregulating your immune system, promoting chronic systemic inflammation. Also critical for diabetics, type 1 diabetics, well, really critical for everyone. Now, it's really important. One thing we were talking about before we started kind of formally recording is that I'm not a medical doctor and you're not a medical doctor and it's absolutely mission critical before you start a program like the Whole30, especially if you have a condition like type 1 diabetes, to work very closely with your doctor before and during the program because I'm sure as you experienced, blood sugar regulation can change very, very quickly when you're making these kinds of dietary changes. And very, very

[00:04:14] Rob Howe: quickly. That's a great point. I think I'm very fortunate to have a really good relationship with my doctor. She's a close friend of the family, worked with her for a long time. So we were able to sort of preface the Whole30 with, hey, this is what I'm going to do. Do you recommend it? Gave her the time to look into it. She signed off almost immediately. And then we checked in really just over the phone over the course of my first Whole30. And then when I came back in for my checkup a few weeks after. That's sort of when we went over the entire results of what I experienced from the Whole30 in terms of blood sugar levels, as well as the insulin consumption and what I was eating and the whole sort of wrap-up. That's perfect. That's exactly what I would advise

[00:05:00] Melissa Hartwig: anyone listening to do if you wanted to take on something like the Whole30. We actually have a series of articles written by Dr. Luke Redinger, a medical doctor based in Wisconsin, called Talk to your doc, which A, talks about the importance of working with your doctor when you are a type 1 diabetic, and B, how to talk to your doctor about the program if maybe you don't have the same really close relationship that you do with your doc, or you think your doctor may not be as receptive to these dramatic changes. So maybe we can put the link for that series in your show notes.

[00:05:31] Rob Howe: That'd be perfect. Excellent. Glad to do that. And I think that's really the purpose of today is to say, hey, there's this great resource out there for diabetics who are trying to either make a change in their diet or their relationship with food, or just to try to consume less insulin and get better numbers. I know, obviously, diabetics are always looking for a cure. And although we don't have, you know, something that's widely accepted as a cure, I think this is a great sort of interim point where you can lower the amount of insulin that you rely on and really just feel much better after, you know, you're consuming as much food as you want, as long as it's the right stuff. And, you know, really feeling like a productive, I loved it because the less I rely on insulin, the more I feel normal. And so it was really, really cool to be able to do that. So before we kind of get into the specifics of my experience, what are some questions? I know you mentioned that you've had some success stories from type 1s as well as type 2s, but what questions do diabetics usually come to you with?

[00:06:37] Melissa Hartwig: Well, I think the most important question is, can I do this as a type 1 diabetic? And of course, the answer is you can. And again, we encourage you to work very closely with your doctor before and during the change. But our program is really ideal for helping you manage your blood sugar. The goal of the Whole30 in terms of your metabolism and hormones is to take you out of this sugar burner dependent on sugar for energy mode that most people are stuck in, teach your body how to use fat for fuel, and reduce the need for either your body or for you as a diabetic to send so much insulin into your system all the time to help manage blood sugar levels that are bouncing up and down, that are slightly out of control. So what we aim to do by changing the food that you put on your plate is regulate blood sugar better, teach you how to access your fat stores and the fat from your diet as fuel, and you will need less insulin going forward to help you manage those blood sugar levels. So you're not getting these raging highs. You're not getting these super low lows. It impacts your energy, your mood, your activity in the gym, and your recovery. Obviously, it has a huge impact on your health. And I think you hit on a really important point is that from a psychological perspective, it just helps you feel more normal. I'm imagining you're not worrying quite as much about where you are in your blood sugar management and having to excuse yourself to sit at the dinner table and inject insulin more frequently. I would imagine that that was a really big non-scale victory for you. Well, it's huge because one of the things you hit

[00:08:17] Rob Howe: on as well, and this is something that I'll go throughout this interview, is there's so many parallels between just doing Whole30 and being a diabetic in general. And one of those is as a diabetic, uh, if you're looking at, um, a hundred, say a hundred, uh, your, your blood sugar is as a hundred is your like baseline. You're trying to keep yourself, uh, spiking, keep your big spikes and sort of lower the curve on those so that you don't have those big spikes up or down throughout the day. And that's sort of the goal of, uh, I, I wear an insulin pump. So rather than, uh, on some pens or other solutions where you have a big meal, you give yourself a bolus insulin and it brings you back down. Uh, and then sometimes you kind of swing up or down depending on your activity level or how much, how many carbs that you ate. Uh, and the cool thing about Whole30 is that by cutting out all those simple carbohydrates and those sugars, uh, and those really big spike type foods is that you already limit your blood sugar curve dramatically. So that's where the big piece of it for me came out because it's not as much as that I had better control with my insulin. I had better control without my insulin just because all this food that I was putting into me was slowly raising my blood sugar because of the type of complex food that it is. so um and i and halfway through i started i got this analogy it's almost like uh when you have a car and the car always runs better on premium fuel it doesn't matter what car you have if you're putting the top uh fuel in it it's going to run and perform better and that's sort of the way that i felt um initially on Whole30 was wow i'm putting this really high quality ingredients and really high quality food in my body and it's responding really positively the way that i want

[00:10:06] Melissa Hartwig: it too. That's genius. And I think the important point to make is that whether you are, I'll say injecting, I know you have a pump and it's not like a needle, but whether you're kind of providing yourself with these really high levels of insulin to manage blood sugar, or your pancreas is producing really high levels of insulin to manage blood sugar, those are both pro-inflammatory, less healthy conditions, right? We don't want to be in this place of hyperinsulinemia. So if you're able to better manage blood sugar even without the insulin. If that amplitude of highs and lows has decreased and you're able to use less insulin throughout the day, that's a really big win in terms of health. So one question I do have for you and a question that a lot of type 1s have is, should I ease into this process rather than make this giant change all at once if I've been eating kind of a standard American diet as recommended for type 1 diabetics? Did you ease into it during your first Whole30 or did you just jump into it? And then what was the impact of either approach

[00:11:07] Rob Howe: for you? Well, it's a good question because I think, and even non-diabetics that I know in my just circle of friends that have tried or completed Whole30, I think immediately going and jumping right into it, depending on what your current diet is, you might be setting yourself up for failure a little bit, mostly because of the discipline, routine, and preparation aspects of it. Because, I mean, the things that make you good at Whole30 are the same things that make you good at being a diabetic, is thinking ahead, preparing, and being disciplined about, you know, when you're waking up to prepare your food, giving yourself enough time, making sure that you have enough, you know, groceries or, you know, Tupperwares on hand to pack your meals for work or whatever it may be. So my first Whole30, I did take about a week and eat a very, very close to Whole30 first week. I think I had a couple of things. I didn't have all of my groceries all outlined and had a couple like spices and things that had some soy in them so they wouldn't be Whole30 compliant. And so I kind of got through that first week because I wanted to know, my biggest question was about the lows. Because my my blood sugar, I'm not really a crasher. I'm sort of, you know, I'm sort of a riser. So when my my blood sugar goes up, I have to correct sometimes in the middle of the day, because I'm more predisposed to rising higher. And some some days that changes. But for the most part, that's like the general type of diabetic, I'd say I am. So I have to correct with insulin. And when you're eating really healthy, and you don't have those things that are sticking around in your stomach all day, sometimes an insulin hit will drop you dramatically low fairly quickly, and you'll need to correct. So I wanted to make sure that when I was working on my corrections that I was still being compliant. So I had to find and what I ended up finding was I could get by with generally keeping an apple around or maybe a Larabar. But sometimes if I was dramatically low, I would need something that was a little more sweet. So I went with a Trader Joe's 100% all natural non pasteurized orange juice so that it was about as close as you can get to something really compliant that will give you that 30 to 40 carb boost right away and correct that, you know, really low blood sugar. So I didn't jump right into it because I wanted to make sure that I was thinking it all the way through and making sure that I could set myself

[00:13:36] Melissa Hartwig: up for success. That's a really good point. Obviously, I say over and over, planning and preparation are key on the Whole30. And as a type 1 diabetic, I would imagine you're doing a lot more planning and thinking ahead when it comes to your meals because you've got so much to monitor. So I think that's an excellent point. And while I would normally encourage people to do the Whole30 just to kind of do a little bit of planning and then jump right into it full force, obviously for people with type 1 diabetes, especially if you're eating a diet that looks very different to Whole30, it might be better working with your doctor to kind of ease into it and start changing foods one at a time or two at a time or maybe one meal at a time so that you can avoid these really large boomerangs while you're trying to straighten things out. So I really like that approach. You mentioned that you thought about planning your meals differently. When we were talking earlier, you said that you no longer planned for ingredients, you planned for full meals. Tell me a little bit about what your planning looked like when you were doing your first full 30-year meal

[00:14:40] Rob Howe: planning. Part of being a diabetic and what you just touched on is I've counted every carb in every meal or snack or anything else that I've eaten since 2005 when I was diagnosed. That's true for most diabetics. We're really good at multiplying by 15 because that's pretty much the one serving size of carbs. So when I'm prepping, when I was prepping and looking at, you know, what do I need to bring today for my diabetes supplies or, you know, if I need to change my pump or making sure that I have my test kit on me, as well as, okay, what do I need to make sure that I have for lunch and how much do I need to have compared to what my activity is like for that day? But the main reason, like you mentioned, and we talked about earlier, the way that I shopped change because I used to just make a grocery list and I would talk and I would look at you know my my groups I would look at you know making sure I had enough meat and maybe some potatoes or you know some sort of rice or something that I would eat and then I would just mix those around and into my meals throughout the week but after I you know started Whole30 I planned it around meals so I would just design my entire meal around you know what was first of all what was compliant? And second of all, what did I want to eat that day? So I kind of got, I'm a creature of habit. I'd honestly be okay with eating the same thing every meal every day at the same time. So I think that personality trait sort of helps me be successful. Um, you know, during some of those days where you're feeling like, uh, you know, you're having, having that day in Whole30 or like, wow, I really don't want to talk to anyone right now. I'm sort of, um, but I, so I started to, uh, I knew that I really liked eggs and like chicken sausage and spinach for breakfast. So I would like group that in my, uh, in my grocery list. And then I'd look at lunch and I'd say, okay, I want to have like either chicken or ground beef patties that I'd cook up. And I love Brussels sprouts, which I didn't even know until I started Whole30. Um, and then, and sort of some of my Trader Joe's mixes and then mix a bunch of coconut oil in there. And I'd have that for my lunch because I knew I could pack it and heat it up in the microwave at work and eat it very quickly. So, um, my schedule is pretty busy at the office and I never really know exactly what time I'll be able to eat, but I knew I could grab that quickly, be compliant and still get enough food. And then I'd make this, you know, relatively the same thing with the occasional substitution for dinner time. So I was planning on, okay, I have all of this here in my grocery list for my meals. And then once I got home, I knew, okay, well, this food needs to be prepped for the week so that I can take it to the office for lunch. And then when I get home, I know I have this here in the freezer or the refrigerator. So I think that was the key for me was just segmenting it out and knowing where it was in the production process.

[00:17:24] Melissa Hartwig: Yeah, I really like that approach. One of the pieces of feedback I got from other type 1 diabetics doing the Whole30 is that in the beginning, not only are they learning how these foods are impacting their blood sugar regulation, but they're also learning how to plan and prepare and cook all of these new foods too. So the learning curve can be pretty steep in the beginning. And they also said they liked the idea of kind of eating the same things or the same meals at the same time for the first week or two so that A, your planning and preparation is a little easier and B, you can figure out which meals impact blood sugar in which ways. And then it's very easy to make a substitution. I usually eat sweet potatoes at dinner. I know how many grams of carbohydrate that is. I'd like to eat some fried plantains tonight, you know, pan fried and coconut oil? How many plantains can I eat and be about the same level? And those things should impact blood sugar relatively the same way. Um, obviously not identically. Would you agree with

[00:18:22] Rob Howe: that? That's a hundred percent true. And I think, you know, there's obviously a little bit of, uh, I like the term reasonable confidence, um, because your body's different every day, your level of activity is different, uh, and you can schedule it out to a point and within reasonable confidence, I know what my blood sugar is going to be at a given time, especially on Whole30 when you're eating a very strict Whole30, eating about the same time every day, and if you're planning about the same, relatively the same meal, you can guess what your blood sugar is based on the way you feel and based on what time of day it is, which is super valuable for a diabetic. That just sort of takes out that extra layer of, oh, I don't know what my blood sugar is right now. And by the end of the Whole30, you're like, oh yeah, I know what I am. I probably don't even have to test. Oh, look at my great blood sugars. Here we are. Let me go ahead and just eat. And I think, um, you know, depending on what you're eating, you'll know sort of what your blood sugar is at that given time of day. Um, and as you're starting to look in, and I was tracking my testing really diligently the first two weeks of my first Whole30, just cause I wanted to know. And I was looking at this, the, at my sugar levels and they, my averages were coming down, but my insulin consumption was dramatically cut down. And so I was like, wow, I'm getting lower and closer to the right margin blood sugars using almost 60% less insulin. So the prediction piece, like, oh, I know what my blood sugar is at this time and this time and this time, and I know how this meal is going to impact my blood sugar, it was almost like shocking. I honestly couldn't even, I never would have predicted that it would have been so drastic.

[00:20:00] Melissa Hartwig: That's amazing. I do want to jump into what results you saw, but the first thing I want to ask is you've mentioned a couple times activity. Were you exercising during the Whole30? And if so, what kind of activity were you doing? Obviously, high-intensity activity like CrossFit uses a different, will impact you differently than a long, slow distance like hiking. And if you were exercising, how did exercise plus the Whole30 work in terms of helping you

[00:20:29] Rob Howe: manage blood sugar? It's a good question. And I think it really knowing your body and knowing how you react to the exercise already, especially if you're if you're somewhat active, and you know, sort of have a workout routine that you go through. I was a college and professional basketball player. So I know my body pretty well. And I'm pretty active. So my first hole 30, I didn't really vary from my existing routine, I play in like a recreational basketball league, and I worked out two or three times a week doing sort of circuit training, circuit weight training, high intensity, relatively low and like short periods of time, like within like an hour, an hour and a half. So I knew that I would go in and my blood sugar spikes when I start to work out. I take my pump off and it's a little bit more stressful, a little bit more intense, and then it tapers off after I get done exercising. So I knew that about myself going in and I found that it really didn't change that much. And as my body started getting used to metabolizing fat versus carbs, I think the first week and a half, I didn't have I didn't feel like I had as much energy, I kind of felt like a little bit depleted. But then really weeks two through four, I felt awesome. And, and I felt better energy throughout the day better energy throughout my workouts, it was more sustainable, and less of a spike. And I just felt more comfortable sort of getting

[00:21:55] Melissa Hartwig: into those things. That's really good to hear. I would say that if you are active as a type 1 diabetic and you do know how your body responds to exercise, your approach is perfect. Pay attention to your body. Figure out what you need. If you feel like during the first two weeks of the Whole30, it's very common to feel kind of lethargic and not have the same energy, obviously kind of pull your workouts down. Maybe take a half intensity week or take some time off. If you are not exercising, I would say don't throw the Whole30 on top of like, I'm joining a CrossFit gym in the same week. That is just going to be way too many variables for you to attempt to manage all at once. So if you're not active and you start the Whole30 and you decide you want to throw in some long, slow distance stuff, you want to go for easy walks or an easy bike ride or a hike, those would probably be far more manageable activities to throw on with a Whole30 for the first time than something that is, you know, high intensity, like a P90X or a CrossFit class.

[00:22:55] Rob Howe: And you bring up a good point. And this is sort of new for me as a discovery I made really in the last 30 days. And I just finished up my third Whole30 yesterday. I got an Apple watch between the times that I have done a couple of my Whole30s. And this Whole30, I didn't adjust the way my activity level at all. I just wanted to do the Whole30. It's been a really busy time with work and with the podcast and everything. So I really didn't change anything about the rest of my life other than the food piece. And every day my Apple Watch tracks my activity and I would hit my activity goal, like my calorie burn goal on my Apple Watch, maybe once a week. And that would be where I was walking somewhere or I walked up and down the stairs in my office a few times or I went somewhere else and had to be on my feet for a while. Um, but when I started the Whole30, I immediately, I hit my move goal and my calorie goal every day for 15 days straight without changing my, uh, activity, which was crazy. You just burn so much more calories. So, um, I definitely agree that if I wouldn't jump in, not just with the Whole30, uh, and adding an exercise program on top of that, that would be a whole lot.

[00:24:09] Melissa Hartwig: Yeah, it would be. I want to hear about your results, but before we do, the last question I have for you, and this is the most important question I think that I get from type 1 diabetics, is how do you manage low blood sugar? And I think there are probably two categories to discuss. And you touched on this, but I do want to kind of go into a little more detail. How do you manage just generally, like, oh, my blood sugar is a little low, I'm not feeling good. And then how would you manage if you had any instances of this, like a true kind of hypoglycemic, I need to correct this now situation while on the Whole30?

[00:24:41] Rob Howe: Well, I think, again, and just kind of comes down to a very similar answer to everything with diabetics is always test, test, test, test, test. I think on a Whole30, you have to be ready to test sometimes twice as much as you normally would just so that you know what your body is doing at a different part of the day. So I would test if I was feeling a little bit low and I'm very sensitive to it. So I would feel it even if it was like 70 or maybe 65 on my glucometer readings. and if it's that low, I would probably just do maybe a couple apples or a Larabar, kind of like I said. But occasionally I found throughout my Whole30 that I would plummet, my blood sugars would drop in the middle of the night while I was asleep. So I would wake up and I would feel a little bit low, so I would test, and a couple times it was very low, like below 40, which is very low. But still 11 years, no hospitalizations, no loss of consciousness, I'm good. but uh hey that's something it's like my body's like we need to correct this right away so um that's where i went to uh to my orange juice and again just uh 100 all natural organic non-pasteurized from the fridge and then measure it out eight ounces at a time uh and then test test test test test until you get it back regulated because something too um because you haven't been consuming that much sugar uh you know basically just immediate sugar content for you know however long you've been in the Whole30, your blood sugar is going to spike quick because your body's not used to absorbing it. So always, you know, in the past you might have overdone it with some of that or needed more, but I think this time really, as long as you're measuring that out and really testing, you're going to be okay. So I would say the answer to all the low blood sugar questions is make sure that you have your treatment options on hand and make sure you just test religiously.

[00:26:32] Melissa Hartwig: That's wonderful. That's a really great answer. And I think that's going to be really helpful for our community. Okay. Now I want to get to the money, which is what were your results on the Whole30? And I know you've done three so far. Is that correct? You just finished your third yesterday. So tell me about the results from your first Whole30, this first experiment.

[00:26:50] Rob Howe: So the first experiment, um, was probably the most dramatic. Um, I had, uh, you know, I thought I was eating relatively healthy. Um, because I just, I mean, really my, uh, I was, I'm relative. I was relatively young. I just turned 26 and I was like, you know what? Like, Like I'm still young enough where I have a high metabolism and I'm consuming some relatively high quality stuff, but I didn't really know what I didn't know. And so I was eating a lot of grain and dairy and like cheese and way more sugar than I ever even realized. So really within the first five or six days, my insulin consumption changed dramatically. I was getting a lot of lows, so I had to adjust my basal insulin. So I reduced that really like 20% at a time. and by the third week I was my basal insulin had been reduced by 60 percent and for non-diabetic listeners basal insulin is the drip insulin that you get all day long so that's the stuff that you sort of just keeps you within the range throughout the day so that was the first big thing that I noticed is like in order for me to stay I had to lower my insulin in order for me to stay high enough all day to be in the safe range so I wanted to keep my blood sugar between about 100 and 140 was my target range. And so I reduced my basal. But then the biggest thing throughout the Whole30, this started initially, I still, I was still using bolus insulin and really about a one, a one to 15, one unit to every 15 carbs that I was eating. My carb reduction was very, or my carb consumption was very low. But as I started going through, I didn't need any bolus insulin. So by At the end of the Whole30, I virtually take no bolus insulin throughout the day. So I reduced my insulin consumption from about 55 units a day to 60, depending on what I was eating, to around about 20. Wow. So, you know, almost a 60%, 70% reduction of the insulin that I was taking throughout the day. And my levels were even better. So I went down from about a 7.0 hemoglobin A1c, which is your like three-month average. I went down to a six and a half, which is really, really good. Amazing. For me personally, but also, you know, just for diabetics in general.

[00:29:05] Melissa Hartwig: It is. And when was your first Whole30?

[00:29:07] Rob Howe: So that was October 2014 was my first one.

[00:29:11] Melissa Hartwig: Okay. So that's about a year and a half-ish, call it. A little bit a year and a half ago, yeah. And then you just finished your third one yesterday. day. So tell me, have you maintained the habits that you learned during your first Whole30 and have they been relatively easy to maintain? And then what were the results of your third Whole30?

[00:29:30] Rob Howe: So I think in terms of the habits, I almost eat no bread, no dairy, no grains all the time. That's pretty much out of my diet. It makes me feel bad to eat like a burger, even when I'm not on a Whole30, to eat a bun or like a sandwich. And I used to love these sandwich places, but now I just get them without the bread and I feel way better. Um, because, and, and that's pretty much the, that's the biggest difference. Like when I'm going, talking about reintroduction, I don't miss a lot of those things because I feel so good. And so, you know, occasionally I'll have, you know, somebody will want to go have like a cup of ice cream or something and I'll go do that. But for the most part, I meal plan the same way I would on a Whole30. I'm just not as strict. Maybe I'll go to a happy hour and have like a cider or something. But I think, you know, in terms of meals, it dramatically changed the way that I eat. That being said, after the holidays, you know, even though my family all does Whole30, so our Christmas was almost exclusively Whole30. But you know, you get busy and you start eating out a lot and you start consuming things that, you know, are relatively healthy, but you're not very strict. And so I wasn't sleeping very good. I had weird energy throughout the day. I gained a little bit of weight that I didn't want to didn't want to have. And so I was like, you know what, I need to do a Whole30 again and just reset. And so I did that. I got back from CES in Las Vegas, and I started my Whole30 in January, and I just finished and I lost I lost all the bad weight. I didn't weigh myself before or after but I know because like, I got a belt loop back on my belt. Nice. Which is great. I have awesome energy throughout the day, my blood sugar levels, My insulin reduction went back down and I feel really good. The interesting thing now is, you know, I'm like I had to change the way my body had changed a little bit. So some of my basal times throughout the day had changed. So I had found that I would swing low at night again, but in the mornings I would spike for some reason, no matter what I ate or how I planned. So I had to up my basal in the morning. And that's been an interesting adjustment as well. So now, you know, my body is responding differently to the Whole30. So that's cool. For diabetics, every day is different, and every time you do a Whole30 will probably be different. But that's just the challenge of living with type 1 diabetes. You kind of never know what surprises will come around.

[00:31:50] Melissa Hartwig: Yeah, that makes really good sense. I'm so glad to hear that you had such good results, both during your first Whole30 and then that you've been able to maintain those habits. It's certainly not a benefit or a blessing, but one thing that's unique to type 1 diabetics that many people who do the Whole30 don't have is that when you eat something that doesn't have a positive impact on your system, you immediately notice, you immediately feel it. Like when I eat bread, I don't really feel much of anything, and I don't think it's making me healthier, and I do know that if I eat it, say, three days in a row, I feel a major impact. But that, you know, one kind of two pieces of bread, not a big deal for me. I know it's having, I believe it's having a negative impact on me internally, but it's not quite so obvious. You eat, go out and have a burger and instead of doing it in a lettuce wrap, you're doing it in a bun and it's immediate. And so it's really, it's no longer a treat if it makes you feel like crap, right? So you are able, I think it's a lot easier for you to be able to weed some of those things out of your everyday choices because it just doesn't make you feel good. and you've got a very tangible response to these foods that aren't making you healthier.

[00:32:57] Rob Howe: Well, and it's interesting too because insulin is a depressant. So by consuming less of it, I automatically feel better because it's not bringing me – I mean it's designed to bring you down and to bring your blood sugar down. And yeah, I feel better when I have insulin in me because obviously you need it to survive. But the less I rely on it and the more higher quality food that I'm putting in myself, I just have more energy to do the other things rather than to fight against my body to process something that may not be great for me. And I think that's, you know, when you talk about, you know, an advantage for diabetics, that's huge. You know, right away what foods are good for you and what aren't because your body just responds so quickly. That makes total sense. Well, I think

[00:33:42] Melissa Hartwig: we really covered, boy, was there anything that we missed? I don't have anything. I think we hit all the questions I really wanted to ask you about your personal experience with the Whole30. Anything else you wanted to share?

[00:33:52] Rob Howe: I think anybody that's thinking about doing a Whole30 and you're type 1 diabetic, I'm always available to reach out and chat either on Instagram or Twitter or wherever because I think it really works and it's made a big difference for me as a type 1 diabetic. So if you get any questions that you see, just feel free to send them my way.

[00:34:14] Melissa Hartwig: That sounds great. And we'll put all of the ways to find out more about the Whole30 program in your show notes as well. whole30.com. We're at Whole30 on all social media fronts, and we'll definitely link to those Talk to Your Doc series of articles. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's the most

[00:34:30] Rob Howe: important thing is just communicate with your doctor, plan ahead, but also don't be intimidated. This is something that not only can type 1 diabetics do, but be very successful at.

[00:34:41] Melissa Hartwig: That's excellent. Thank you so much for speaking with me today or inviting me to interview you.

[00:34:46] Rob Howe: Oh, yeah. Thank you so much for coming on. I've been super excited for this all week. I've told everyone about it. So thank you so much for coming on.

[00:34:54] Melissa Hartwig: Yeah, thanks so much. Looking forward to hearing about how you're doing in the next couple months.

[00:34:58] Rob Howe: Thanks for listening to Diabetics Doing Things. Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly emails and behind the scenes content. And if you or someone you know has an amazing story to share, send an email to rob at diabeticsdoingthings.com. Diabetics Doing Things is also available on iTunes Subscribe to us in the Podcasts app to have weekly episodes automatically downloaded to your phone