There are many ways to a healthy plate and a healthy body. And there are many scientifically sound diet and lifestyle strategies to help you prevent type 2 diabetes, as well as medical strategies such as taking the medication metformin. However, it seems that quite a number of people continue to look for that one best diet. Some will flit from diet plan to diet plan in search for the one that sheds pounds, whittles the waist, boosts energy, and drives blood glucose and cholesterol levels down. Then sooner or later, something in the plan becomes unsustainable—it’s boring, expensive, or overly restrictive—and the search for the best diet continues.
Success in meeting health goals doesn’t start with identifying the best diet or a top-10 foods list. Rather it comes from identifying your best diet and your best healthful lifestyle habits. If I gave you advice that simply didn’t fit with your life or food preferences, it wouldn’t help you meet your goals no matter how strong the evidence for my advice. Fortunately, there’s more than one smart way to reach your goal! Similarly, many people ask for written meal plans, but my experience tells me that they rarely help the way people expect them to. That’s because most people need more flexibility than prewritten meal plans offer. Instead of meal plans, you’ll find meal-planning tools and strategies and a few example menus in the chapters that follow.
This book will help empower you to find your best healthful way, which may be very different from your friend’s preferred way to achieve a similar outcome. For example, many people manage diabetes or prediabetes with a vegan or vegetarian diet. Others do quite well with the greater variety that comes with an omnivore’s diet. Some people meet their exercise goals and achieve cardiovascular fitness by hitting the gym several days per week. Others enjoy the solitude of jogging in their neighborhoods and strength training at home. While others join tennis, bowling, or soccer leagues to boost their fitness.
Throughout this book, you will learn about general guidelines and recommendations for good health and diabetes prevention that are grounded in science. You have the flexibility to pick a path that suits you. Simply speaking, after examining where you are in your habits today and comparing them to where you want to be eventually, you’ll select small steps that lead you in that direction. And then you’ll take on more and more small steps. The informational sections, exercises, worksheets, and goal-setting strategies in this book will guide you in much the same ways that I coach and counsel my clients. For accountability and expert feedback, you may want to work with a registered dietitian nutritionist (RD or RDN) who has a background in prediabetes, diabetes, and heart health.