შობა-ახალი წელი და დიაბეტი

განახლებულია: 23/12/2025

New Year's Day is a special time for everyone.

This holiday is created by a family atmosphere, beautiful decorations, gifts, and of course, delicious and varied food, which can be a challenge for a person with diabetes.

How to meet these days without spoiling our mood and not to damage our health seriously?

At last all we deserve to give ourselves right for just a day to eat food we love so much. Especially when we behaved well all the year and our blood glucose level was within its target range. The main thing is a quantity!

How to maintain moderation and deal with temptation, here are some suggestions to help you with this goal:

Avoid long lasting hunger

A strong feeling of hunger is always followed by eating a large amount of food.

Therefore, before the New Year's table is set and all family members sit down, enjoy a protein or non-starchy vegetable dish beforehand.

Such food is slowly processed by the body and gives a feeling of fullness.

Drink a cup of water before eating

Filling your stomach with water will help you feel full sooner, reduce your appetite, and therefore reduce the risk of overeating.

Make your eating plan beforehand

კარგი იქნება, თუ ოჯახური საახალწლო მენიუდან წინასწარ დაგეგმავთ, თუ როდის რომელ კერძს დააგემოვნებთ.

Also, make sure that most of your diet consists of non-starchy vegetables. Here's a quick guide:

vegetables containing starch are: potato, corn, peas, pumpkin.
vegetables without starch are: cucumber, tomato, bulgarian pepper, carrot, beet, cabbage, broccoli, anion, radish, lettuce, eggplant, mushroom, asparagus.

Eat as slow as it's possible

This will help you avoid missing out on a filling meal and overeating.

Of course, you can also enjoy a small amount of your favorite cake from time to time, and we can coincide this exceptional day with the New Year.

Don't forget that small portions are key!

For this purpose you can eat very slowly and also you can add sweets after main dish as a dessert. It will really help to keep small amounts.

Hide the food

It is advisable not to keep food in plain sight at all times.

This will help you avoid snacking between meals. Looking at food always makes you want to eat it.

Replace eating with walking

If you're really hungry, but you've already had quite a lot and it's not even time for your next meal yet, try taking a walk in the fresh air instead.

20 minutes is enough to produce the hormones of satisfaction: endorphins and serotonin.

Control your blood glucose level more often

To stay on top of things, don't be too hasty and stop in time.

Don't forget physical activity!

you must even increase your usual physical activity level. It will help your body to handle with extra glucose and calories. Have a walk outside after dinner.

and finally,

Don't blame yourself

If you were unable to do so and missed the plan by one day, that's just a normal human factor. A few exceptions are allowed.

Remember that the next day gives you a chance to fix everything.

Diabetes and alcohol

Alcohol is an undivided part of the christmas holiday.

The daily acceptable dose of alcohol which doesn't change blood glucose level is: 100 ml of wine and 330 ml of beer.

Using more than this amount of alcohol can cause hyperglycemia at the first stage and then hypoglycemia, which is dangerous for the body.

The risk of hypoglycemia is particularly high for those being on insulin therapy.

How can we decrease this risk:

don't take alcohol on empty stomach and before eating! Only drink along with eating.
after drinking alcohol you must have a snack before going to sleep, to avoid hypoglycemia at night.
avoid drinking alcohol with add on sugar or soda. The best choice can be red wine with no sugar.
control your blood glucose more frequently.
in case of hypoglycemia use a cup of orange juice or a little peace of chocolate or other food containing simple carbohydrates.
study beforehand how your body reacts on alcohol in order to be ready for possible problems after drinking. The frequent control of blood glucose 2 days before and after drinking can help with it.

Happy new year!