Chapter 1: Discovery
In the crowded capital Ankara, Turkiye, here I was sitting on my couch and watching my soccer games, approaching 100kg (220lbs). I did not have wish or energy to exercise in the last several years. My journey with diabetes had spanned an impressive 28 years since the summer of 1995 once I first got diagnosed as a diabetic. However, destiny had an unexpected twist awaiting me.
Back in March of 2023, my son has received a weight loss related 12-page intermittent fasting diet program from his grad school friend, telling him this transformed his and his parents’ lives for good. My son, approaching his peak weight, wanted to try this intermittent fasting. He’s never heard of intermitted fasting and it seemed really tough when he read it at first, fasting long hours and no sugar no carbs and not even fruit! He tweaked it in the beginning to make it work for himself. 3-months into the tweaked intermittent fasting program, my son (47) had lost 18kgs (40lbs) and his lifestyle has been transformed. Towards the end of May 2023, he strongly suggested me to do the same! At first, I was skeptical if I could do it, after all I’m 35-years older than my son and I have been diabetic for 28 years, and the 14 years I was administering myself insulin shots twice a day – a staggering 68 doses per day in recent years.
Intrigued and inspired by my son’s success in following the intermittent fasting diet, I made a bold decision—to embrace the principles of intermittent fasting and give it a try. The discovery of this alternative path to wellness fueled my determination to rewrite the narrative of my health. Little did I know that this pivotal moment would set the stage for a remarkable journey of discovery, renewal, and transformation in the chapters that lay ahead.
Chapter 2: Culinary Adventures and Healthy Choices
Armed with newfound knowledge, I began my health journey at home in the beginning of June 2023. I started small, making gradual changes to my diet. I paid attention to the time window I ate from now on, I used to eat 2 or 3 times a day, having breakfast in the morning when I wake up and then lunch and sometimes light dinner. I started eating twice a day within 6-hour time intervals, from say 10am in the morning to 4pm in the afternoon. And more importantly I tried to remove all the processed foods from my life and replace them with more healthy alternatives such as fruits and vegetables.
With relatively mild effort, that month June 2023 alone I lost 6kg (13lbs) from 96kgs to 90kgs.
Chapter 3: Adding Exercise to My Routine
Mid July of 2023, I and my wife traveled to visit my son and grandkids staying with him for 4-months. Those 4-months, I followed a strict diet and exercise program under my son’s close supervision. No, my son is not a doctor, he has just watched about 100-hours of doctor videos about diabetes on YouTube at this point to help me out. As I continued my journey, I introduced another element to my routine – exercise. Every morning, before my son started working, he would take me to the park to take a walk. In the beginning I was having short of breadth in about 4-5minutes of walking. This was normal for someone had done barely 1000 or 2000 steps a day for the last, I don’t remember how many years! So we had to sit every 5-minutes to rest another 5 to 10minutes and try to get 4000 to 5000 steps a day by trying to walk at 2 to 3 times a day, morning, afternoon and evening. Starting with gentle exercises in the morning when I woke up, I gradually increased the intensity and by the end of July, showcasing that age was no barrier to physical fitness I was able to do 5000 steps. From there onwards, every week or every other week I was determined to break my own record in exercise! From 6000 steps in the beginning of August, I was up to 8500 steps in mid-September and had crossed 10,000 steps in the first week of November!
Chapter 4: I reversed diabetes!
Not having much luck with close doctor supervision in a foreign country with my son, all we had was internet and the guidance of certain doctor videos my son had watched. We were measuring my blood glucose levels at least 4 times a day and I was administering insulin if the glucose reading is too high. Gradually my diet and exercise was showing great signs of improvement on my blood glucose levels. Gradually reducing the time window I ate throughout the day, I started eating one meal a day in the beginning of August. This helped with my blood glucose levels even more as I reduced my insulin dose to 10 units per day. And on that day, August 5th, 2023, I administered my last (did not know it was supposed to be the last) insulin shot of 10 doses. My blood glucose levels were not jumping to alarming levels anymore and therefore I figured I really didn’t need all that insulin. On August 12th, I broke my fasting record of 27-hours, and ate at 4pm. That night, I felt my toes again after all these years!
In the next following days I figured my hypertension pills were doing me no good as my blood pressure dropped to 87/50 on August 13, 2023. I had to stop taking my blood pressure medication. I had already stopped all my diabetes medicine at this point, eating one meal a day, I was able to take 8000 steps a day and felt better about giving another 4kgs, now at 86kgs.
I continued to eat one meal a day strictly following the diet until beginning of September when I wanted to eat fruit badly and I started measuring my glucose response to select fruits. I have tried more than a dozen fruits and measured my glucose response. At first I realized how sensitive I am (or have become) to eating fructose. Then I figured I was able to eat pretty much all fruits, but with limited quantities as they had varying glycemic index.
Mid November I was back home, in Ankara Turkiye. I visited my doctor and had done my blood tests. My A1C ( or HbA1c) was 8.0 in May 2023, and now November 2023 my A1C was at 5.5! Meaning I was not diabetic by this measure!
MyDiabetesStory 