Best and Worst Drinks If You Have Diabetes

After your doctor diagnoses you with diabetes, you’ll have to gravely watch what you eat and drink. It would also be helpful if you could tell right away if a certain food or drink is chock-full of carbs, and whether or not something will make you feel ill.

The American Diabetes Association stands firm in drinking zero-calorie drinks for diabetics, or at least low-calorie drinks. The reason is to stop blood sugar spikes.

Choosing drinks will help you avoid feeling unwell, managing your symptoms, and maintain your weight.

The Best Drinks For Diabetics

Always go for zero-calorie or low-calorie drinks. If you’re having trouble sleeping, they say that lettuce soaked in hot water will help you sleep.

Go for reduced-fat dairy. General knowledge tells us that dairy drinks aren’t low-sugar beverages.

Your options are water, tea, coffee, and vegetable juice.

Water

Water won’t raise your blood sugar levels. Drinking enough will eliminate excess glucose in your system. The medical recommendation has always been about 8 to 13 cups a day.

If plain water isn’t appealing enough for you, add drops of lemon and orange, or herbs like mint, add crushed raspberries.

Tea

Tea is said to reduce blood pressure and lower harmful cholesterol. Research tells us that drinking 6 cups of tea a day will lower your risk of type 2 diabetes.

Whether it’s green or black tea, you have to avoid tea with lots of sugar. You can concoct your own version of iced tea.

Earl Grey and jasmine green tea are kinds of teas with caffeine in them.

Coffee

Recent research tells us that coffee lowers risk of type 2 diabetes. People who drank 4 cups a day were found to have lower chances of getting diabetes.

If your body isn’t used to caffeine yet, you can start with decaf and gradually increase caffeine levels. It’s always best to have your coffee unsweetened. Adding milk, sugar, or cream isn’t good for diabetics as it increases calorie count and spikes your blood sugar.

Vegetable Juice

A celery or cucumber drink is refreshing when the water is a little cool. You can also add natural fruits like blended mango, banana, even grapes, pineapples, and oranges to your chilled water.

Drinks To Avoid

Avoid soda, energy drinks, and artificial fruit juices.

These raise blood sugar by a lot. Soda has about 40 grams of carbs in them and about 150 calories. This drink is linked to weight gain and tooth decay.

Energy drinks also have excess caffeine and carbs. It’s also linked to insulin resistance. Caffeine overdoses lead to nervousness, increased blood pressure, and insomnia. Sweetened fruit juices also have an incredible amount of sugar in them, so if you’re going to drink one, dilute it with water, or add natural fruits with the diluted drink.

Diet soda and alcohol drinks also have a negative effect on people with or without diabetes. They influence gut bacteria, and messes with your brain condition. Check in with your healthcare provider if you feel like you are depending too much on these drinks. But the occasional alcoholic drink doesn’t hurt too for getting back to a more relaxed state. However if you’re drinking to fall asleep, you can opt for over-the-counter sleeping pills. Just tell the pharmacist if they have sleeping pills.

Summary

Choose water as much as you can. If you feel you are running low on energy, your next best bet is coffee. People with diabetes also drink Starbucks iced coffee with sugar free cinnamon dolce and fat-free milk.