In your best form : a series of broadcast talks for diabetics and their families (recently broadcast in the Home Service programme and published with the permission of the author and other broadcasters.).

Date:
1949
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: In your best form : a series of broadcast talks for diabetics and their families (recently broadcast in the Home Service programme and published with the permission of the author and other broadcasters.). Source: Wellcome Collection.

    19/24 page 17
    to something like normal. Now this can be done with the aid of a little self-discipline, and those who achieve it usually feel much better, more energetic, and so on. As regards your actual diet, you should take the advice of your doctor. Serious weight reduc- tion by dieting should always be done under medical supervision. People have ‘reduced themselves to ideal pro- portions, or should I say the fashionable proportions of the moment, and then been unable to stop. Someone wrote an “‘ Epitaph for a Foolish Lady ”’: ‘“ Here, in a grave, remote and quiet, Starved by a new reducing diet, Lies foolish little Mrs. Skinner Who smiled to see herself grow thinner, And kindly Death, when she had gone, Reduced her to a skeleton.’’ - But I don’t want to frighten you. I can assure you that for the one very rare case in which the patient loses too much weight, there are literally thousands who don’t lose enough. How is it done? An average man, lying completely at rest uses up calories at the rate of about 1600 in 24 hours. That is what we call his basal require- ments. It isn’t difficult to construct a diet of .1,200 calories. Right, then, reduce his calorie intake to 1,200, and he must lose weight, particularly if he’s -up, about and working—and therefore using more than 1,600 calories a day. It means cutting out potatoes, sugar, sweets, puddings, cakes, fried foods, thick soups, mayonaise and so on. Life would hardly be worth living, some of you will say. But, in fact, as long as you can get meat, fish, some cheese and plenty of green vegetables, some root vegetables, salads, tomatoes, and most fruits, you can do very nicely—and after a few days, after you have broken your habit of eating that is—you needn't feel unduly hungry. I know this because I reduced my own weight a stone or two in this way some time ago. When a person of average size, that is with basal requirements at rest of about 1,600 calories, doesn’t lose weight on a 1,200 calorie diet, I’m afraid there’s only one answer. He’s not keeping to the diet. The patient always thinks. of course that he’s the one exception—the person who really doesn’t lose weight under these circumstances. And he’s so persuasive you almost begin to believe 17 animal or mineral, as they say on another programme, can run without fuel or with too little fuel. So I say to these patients—when you can show me . a motor car running along without petrol or a railway engine running without coal, then I’ll believe that you are keeping strictly to your diet and not losing weight. Appetites do vary, of course, and I know its really difficult sometimes, but if you are fat, your weight can be reduced to normal by dieting. Large numbers of fat but mild diabetics. have done it, have felt immensely better, and, in that way, have got rid of or nearly got rid of, their diabetes. Finally, suppose you are of normal size and have a mild diabetes which does not require insulin. You can be given a diet in which the carbohydrate, or more accurately the sugar which is formed in the body from the diet, is reduced to an amount that you can make use of. This usually means cutting down the carbohydrate—bread, potatoes, puddings, cakes, and so on, and making up the calorie value of the diet with protein and fat—things like meat, fish and cheese. Again you needn’t feel hungry as long as you can get green vegetables, fruits and salads, and the diet needn’t be monotonous— you can easily vary it if you have once learnt how. I can’t tell you how in this talk. There are books to help, but the best thing is to go and talk it over with the dietitian in a diabetic clinic. 8. Marriage for diabetics and some final points Should diabetics marry ? Of course, the real question is should they marry and have children? Before we can answer this, we must ask one or two further questions. Is the risk of preg- nancy and having a baby greater for a diabetic woman than for a non-diabetic one? What are the chances that a diabetic mother will have a healthy live baby ? And if she does, will the baby later develop diabetes ?
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