Fit with Diabetes Challenge
Editor’s Note: Christel is a blogger, personal trainer, diabetes advocate, fitness bikini champion and fitness personality. She has been living with type 1 diabetes since 1997.
Beyond Type 1 met up with Christel Oerum from Diabetes Strong for a chat about fitness and her latest project; a free six-week Fit With Diabetes Challenge which is kicking off September 4, 2016 (don’t worry if you join a little later; you can quickly get up to speed. Oh, and did we mention, it’s free?). Christel has type 1, but she also has professional training experience that pertains to safely and effectively working out with type 1 diabetes, no matter what your level of fitness is. Here’s what she had to say about the program that can change the way those with type 1 think and feel about working out and the physical and mental health that can follow.
So tell us, why you decided to do the Fit With Diabetes challenge?
I created Diabetes Strong as a website dedicated to diabetes and fitness because I was missing a place online for guidance on how to safely and effectively exercise with diabetes.
Every week, I receive a lot of really good questions from my readers and the people I train about how to manage blood sugars when working out, what to eat for good nutrition and blood sugar control, as well as more emotional questions on how to get motivated or how to manage the fears of hypoglycemia.
In the Fit With Diabetes Challenge, I want to take people through all the different aspects of exercising with diabetes in an easy to follow step-by-step fashion and give them the tools they need to be successful.
What can people expect from the challenge?
This challenge is all about setting up the people living with diabetes for success when working out, which means controlling crazy blood sugar fluctuation. There will be posts written by me and other diabetes and fitness experts (Dr. Sheri Colberg, Daniele Hargenrader, Cliff Scherb to mention a few) that will give everybody in the challenge the tools to finding their workout formula. The formula I’m talking about is that right level of insulin and carbs that will make your workout efficient and keep your blood sugars from going through the roof or tanking completely.
We’ll also be getting our sweat on, so I’ve made a series of workout videos and we’ll be doing 2-3 each week throughout the challenge. Since the challenge is for people of all ages and fitness levels, the workouts are just suggestions and people will be able to do their own workouts instead if they like. The important part is learning how your body and blood sugar reacts to exercise and learning the tools to exercise successfully.
Lastly, there will be a lot of more general diabetes management and health advice, like how to manage Dawn Phenomenon or calculate your daily calorie need, because learning those things can have a huge effect on whether or not you are able to exercise and achieve results as well.
At a very high level, the topics the challenge will cover are:
Week 1 – How to set realistic diabetes and exercise goals and find your motivation
Week 2 – How to manage your blood sugar for cardio workouts
Week 3 – Nutrition, meal planning and different approaches to carb counting
Week 4 – Resistance training and how it impacts you blood sugar
Week 5 – Finding you insulin and carb sensitivities
Week 6 – Putting it all together and making it a lifestyle
This is of course just a very high-level overview and each week will cover several different subjects.
Each day, I will suggest something you do to learn more about the day’s subject or improve your diabetes management (the daily challenge). At the end of each week, we will also have a raffle where challenge participants can win prizes from some great diabetes and fitness brands. The prizes are pretty fabulous and include some great Beyond Type 1 swag (some even signed by Nick Jonas!)
How do you think the challenge can help people living with diabetes?
My motto is “there is nothing you can’t do with diabetes” and one of my goals is to support people living with diabetes in living healthy, active lives. There is no reason why people living with diabetes shouldn’t be active—in fact, we are one of the groups that can benefit the most from exercise.
What I’ve found is that when you get active and stay active, the diabetes actually becomes easier to manage. When you exercise, your insulin sensitivity improves, meaning you need less insulin and, in my experience, you’ll see less blood sugar fluctuations.
Where can people who sign up find support and ask questions?
After you sign up on Diabetes Strong, you will receive a welcome email with a link to private Facebook group for challenge participants. This is a great place to meet other people with diabetes and ask questions. My husband and I are in the group multiple times each day to answer questions and moderate the discussions.
I’ve yet again been amazed of the overwhelming support and camaraderie there is among people living with diabetes. Seeing people reach out and support each other to the degree I see in our group is heartwarming and makes what I do all worth it.
I look forward to seeing you in the Fit With Diabetes Challenge!!!
Read Start Working Out with T1D by Christel Oerum.
