During type 1 diabetes, your body fails to produce insulin. This is a problem for your body because your body needs insulin to take the sugar or glucose from the consumed foods and turn it into energy for your body. Hence, type-1 diabetes means you need to take insulin every day to live.

Along with the prescribed insulin intake, you can also opt for certain dietary and lifestyle changes to manage diabetes. If you adhere to it, it actually works and helps you to improve your overall health condition. This article is an effort to make you understand about certain dietary and lifestyle changes to manage diabetes if you are a patient of type-1 diabetes.

Exercise Regularly
Regular exercise is helpful for everybody towards maintaining a healthier life. In the patients of type-1 diabetes, it can help lose weight and increase insulin sensitivity. Increased insulin sensitivity means that your cells are better able to use the available sugar in your bloodstream. Regular exercise further helps your muscles to use blood sugar for energy and muscle contraction. If you are a patient of type-1 diabetes, some of the good forms of exercise you can include in your daily routine are weight lifting, brisk walking, running, biking, dancing, hiking and swimming.

Control Your Carb Intake
As a process, our body breaks carbs down into sugars. Post this, insulin moves the sugars into our cells. When we have problems with insulin function, this process fails and blood glucose levels rise. According to studies, controlling carb intake by counting carbs or using a food exchange system helps in type-1 diabetes with blood sugar control.

Increase Your Fiber Intake
Regular consumption of plenty of fiber can help in controlling blood sugar. Soluble dietary fiber is the most effective. This is because fiber slows sugar absorption and carb digestion. Thus, it promotes a more gradual rise in blood sugar levels.

Drink More Water to Stay Hydrated
Always ensure to drink lots and lots of water. This helps you to keep your blood sugar levels within healthy limits. Apart from preventing dehydration, it also helps your kidneys to flush out the excess blood sugar through urine. Drinking water helps in re-hydration of the blood, lowers blood sugar levels and reduces diabetes risk.

Implement Portion Control
This strategy helps in the regulation of calorie intake and this leads to weight loss. The weight control process promotes healthy blood sugar levels. Along with controlling the symptoms of type-1 diabetes, it also helps in the prevention of type-2 diabetes. You can follow the below tips to control portions:

• Measure and weigh portions
• Use smaller plates
• Avoid all-you-can-eat restaurants
• Keep a food journal
• Eat slowly

Control Stress Levels
As per studies, stress can affect your blood sugar levels. Work towards controlling stress levels with the help of exercise and relaxation methods such as yoga. This helps in controlling the symptoms of your type-1 diabetes.

These are some of the dietary and lifestyle changes that you can adhere to so that you can manage diabetes. However, you should always check with your doctor before making lifestyle or dietary changes.