The Days I Don’t Eat
I want to be honest about something that doesn’t get talked about enough in the T1D community.
On the days when my blood sugars have been bad — several difficult days in a row, erratic readings, corrections that don’t land, a sense that the condition is running the show and I’m just reacting — I get scared to eat.
Not just cautious. Scared. I’ll skip carbs entirely and stick to protein. Or sometimes I won’t eat anything at all, all day.
I know that’s not ideal. I know it. But in those moments, food feels like the one variable I can actually remove from the equation. If I don’t eat carbs, I can’t spike. If I can’t spike, I can avoid the particular loop of frustration and self-blame that a bad reading produces. The not-eating feels like control when everything else feels chaotic.
Of course it isn’t control. It’s avoidance. And it creates its own problems. But that’s the honest picture of where the relationship with food goes on the worst days.
Where It Comes From
T1D reconfigures your relationship with food at the most fundamental level.
Food is no longer just something you enjoy or need for energy. It’s a variable in a calculation that directly affects how you feel, how your blood sugar behaves, and — when the shame voice is active — how well or badly you’re managing.
That reconfiguration happens gradually and largely invisibly. Most T1Ds don’t wake up one day and decide to have a complicated relationship with food. It builds over years of having to account for every meal, of watching readings rise after eating, of the accumulated experience of food as something that creates management challenges rather than just pleasure.
The result, for many T1Ds, is a relationship with food that sits somewhere on a spectrum — from mild vigilance, to significant anxiety, to the kind of avoidance and restriction I described above.
And because T1D requires food awareness by medical necessity, it can be hard to know where appropriate management ends and unhealthy relationship begins.
The Loop It Creates
Here’s what I know about the skip-eating pattern from my own experience: it’s cyclical.
The bad blood sugar days arrive. I stop eating or restrict heavily. The blood sugars stabilise somewhat. The pattern eases. I eat more normally for a while. Then another run of difficult days arrives, and the same thing happens again.
This too shall pass — and it does, repeatedly. But the loop itself keeps returning, which tells me it’s not resolved. It’s managed around. And managing around something is not the same as addressing it.
What a Healthier Relationship Looks Like
I want to be honest that I’m still working on this, rather than presenting a version of it I’ve fully achieved.
What I know is that a healthier relationship with food as a T1D involves separating the eating from the judgement of the reading that follows. Eating something and spiking is not a moral failure. It’s a physiological event that needs a management response, not a self-critical one.
It means eating when you’re hungry rather than only when the numbers feel safe enough. It means allowing food to be pleasurable — genuinely, not just in theory — without the shadow of anticipated regret.
And it means recognising when the avoidance has shifted from a management tool to a coping mechanism. When not eating is about emotional self-protection rather than blood sugar management, that’s the signal to pay attention.
If This Resonates
If you recognise the skip-eating pattern — the days when food feels too risky to engage with, when restriction feels safer than the spike, when fear of readings is driving your food choices more than hunger or nutrition — please talk to someone about it.
Your diabetes team needs to know if your relationship with food has become significantly complicated. There is support available, and the intersection of T1D and disordered eating is something that deserves proper, specific attention.
You’re not alone in this. It’s more common than most people admit. And it can get better.
The Emotional Weight of Eating With Type 1 Diabetes
Your relationship with food changes the moment T1D enters your life. Eating stops being automatic. Every choice feels loaded. That pressure builds quietly and leaks into daily decisions, moods, and self-trust.
Food becomes emotional currency instead of fuel. That shift alone explains why so many people struggle, even when they “know what to do.”
When Diagnosis Rewrites the Rules of Food
Diagnosis doesn’t just bring insulin. It brings rules you never asked for. Foods get labels. Meals require planning. Spontaneity vanishes.
You didn’t lose willpower. You lost ease.
Anger, Grief, and Silent Food Rebellion
Anger shows up in strange ways. Sometimes it looks like indifference. Sometimes it looks like defiance.
Eating foods you “shouldn’t” can feel like pushing back against a condition that never asked permission to exist.
The Comfort-Eating Blur and Blood Sugar Insanity
Food works fast. It soothes nerves and numbs frustration. Then your blood sugars spike. Panic follows. Shame piles on.
To escape that feeling, you reach for more comfort. The loop tightens.
Shame After the Spike and the “Screw It” Response
One high number feels like proof of failure. That thought fuels the “might as well” mindset.
This isn’t weakness. It’s emotional fatigue.
Hyper-Control and the Fear of Every Bite
On the opposite end, control becomes armor. You restrict. You overthink. You fear deviation.
That tension turns eating into a test you feel doomed to fail.
Guilt as a Daily Ingredient
Guilt sneaks into meals without asking. It drains joy. It sharpens anxiety.
Food was never meant to feel like a moral trial.
Why Extremes Feel Safer Than Balance
Extremes offer certainty. Balance requires trust.
Trust feels risky when your body feels unpredictable.
Food as Data, Not a Moral Verdict
Food gives information. That’s it.
Blood sugar responses reflect timing, stress, hormones, and insulin needs — not personal worth.
Separating Self-Worth From Numbers
You are not your CGM line. Numbers fluctuate because bodies live.
Detaching identity from data restores emotional breathing room.
Learning to Pause Before You Punish
Before restriction or overindulgence, pause.
One breath creates space. Space creates choice.
Curiosity Over Criticism at Mealtimes
Curiosity keeps you grounded, but negative self talk fuels self loathing.
Ask what happened instead of why you failed.
Pleasure Still Belongs on the Plate
Enjoyment reduces obsession. Satisfaction prevents spirals.
Pleasure does not sabotage control — it stabilizes it.
The Myth of the “Perfect” Diabetic Diet
No perfect diet exists. Bodies respond differently.
Rigid rules collapse under real life.
Rebuilding Trust With Your Body
Trust grows through observation, not punishment.
Each neutral response repairs your relationship with food bit by bit.
Creating Flexible Food Boundaries
Boundaries guide. They don’t shame.
They allow structure without suffocation.
Navigating Sweets Without Spiraling
Planning removes urgency. Mindful eating removes fear.
Sweets don’t erase progress.
Social Eating Without Apology
Eat with people. Laugh. Bolus. Live.
Diabetes already demands enough attention.
Progress That Actually Feels Human
Progress looks uneven. That’s normal.
Consistency grows from compassion.
Support, Education, and Community Matter
Isolation magnifies struggle. Community reduces shame.
Resources like Beyond Type 1 normalize the messy middle.
When Mindset Work Changes Everything
Mindset work shifts patterns beneath behavior. It stabilizes emotions and reshapes your relationship with food without rigid rules or fear-based control.
A Calmer Way Forward With Food
You can eat without war. You can live without constant guilt.
A steady relationship with food leaves room for joy, imperfection, and peace.
Outside help:
How has T1D affected your relationship with food?
If you’re in the place…
If you’re in that place where you feel like you need to talk with someone that just – get’s it, I’m here.
Yours,
Pete
