As a diabetic, whether you have been recently diagnosed or not, understanding the foods diabetics should avoid is essential to your health. It is obvious that you need to limit the amount of sugar in your diet. It only makes sense that if your sugar levels are too high, ingesting more sugar through your diet is not a good idea. Many of the foods diabetics should avoid eating are not obvious if you do not thoroughly understand your condition. Within this article we are going to carefully outline the foods you want to avoid and why you want to avoid them. Nothing less than a complete understanding can help you live successfully with diabetes.

Tips for Foods Diabetics Should Avoid

Are you familiar with the glycemic index? This is a form of rating that has been created to determine how fast certain ingredients will transform into glucose. High ratings within the glycemic index are not good and this means that as a diabetic you should be avoiding these foods completely. Some of the highest rated foods include:

• White rice
• White flour
• White bread
• White bagels
• White potatoes
• Saltine crackers
• Most breakfast cereals
• White pasta
• Popcorn

As you can see there is a trend in this list, “white” seems to say high glycemic index. For every food option in this list there is an alternative for diabetics. Whole grains are always the best alternative. Instead of white rice you would choose brown rice, instead of white bread you choose whole grain bread, instead of white potatoes you would choose sweet potatoes. You may be surprised to hear sweet potatoes as a better option than white potatoes but they actually score lower on the glycemic index than the traditional white potatoes.

Suggested other foods diabetics should avoid:

When talking about best fruits for diabetes sweet fruits should be avoided as although fruit may seem like a no brainer, healthy choice, fruits are full of natural sugars. Watermelon and pineapple are the sweetest of fruits and this natural sugar can be too much for diabetics. Of course it is important to mention here that a few bits of watermelon for diabetes won’t hurt you but the more you eat the more you can be harming your blood sugar levels.

In terms of beverages, it is pretty self-explanatory that you need to avoid beverages with high amounts of sugar-glucose and fruit glucose but you also need to avoid alcohol as a diabetic. Alcohol can greatly raise your blood sugar levels but it can also impair your judgement in terms of how you deal with your diabetes and in some extreme cases this can be deadly.

We want to lastly mention artificial sweeteners. Many diabetics have switched from real sugar to artificial sweeteners, believing they are not raising their blood sugar this way. Although the jury is still out on this debate, it is important to use these artificial sweeteners carefully to ensure you are not raising your blood sugar.

When you are diagnosed with diabetes, you should immediately speak with a dietician so you know exactly what foods diabetics should avoid so you can make informed choices of better quality foods to eat.