Comment by manmal

I've been using the Lingo so I can't comment on that.

Also, it really important to note that I don't have diabetes or any metabolic disorders. I am mainly interested in learning more about the foods that I eat and their effects on me.

The Lingo is the same hardware as the Abbott Freestyle but the difference is in the app.

The way I've been using mine is to consistently log the foods that I eat (the app is really helpful for this) and then seeing what it does to my blood glucose level. My goal has been to minimize spikes in my blood glucose level.

Things I found interesting: 1. Instant oatmeal spikes my blood glucose level a lot. 2. A honeycrisp apple will also spike it but a granny smith apple is much much more modest. 3. Eating bread and rice will spike it. However, eating rice as part of a meal will cause a much smaller spike. 4. Gelato can cause a modest spike but much less than you would expect, smaller than instant oatmeal or a sweet apple. 5. Dark chocolate has little effect on blood glucose. 6. Running will cause a tiny rise (maybe my body is preparing me for the energy needs?) 7. I become borderline hypoglycemic when I'm sleeping.

A very notable effect from this is that minimizing these spikes has been very helpful with my dieting. My desire to snack has been much much easier to control and I've had much better success with my diet plans (I've lost 10 pounds in 3 months whereas my previous attempts only managed to lose 5 pounds before I just gave up).

Once you see what food does what to your blood glucose you sort of remember what foods or groups of good to avoid. I will also say that I'm now super wary of most processed foods. I don't want to be too cynical but I do wonder if the companies knew the connection between blood glucose level spikes and hunger signals.

Stelo is essentially a binned, feature-restricted version of the G7 that’s available OTC without a prescription. If you qualify for getting a G7, need readings more frequently than every 15 minutes, or have any need for high/low glucose alerts, then you shouldn’t consider Stelo at all, IMO —- it’s strictly an inferior version of the G7.

I can’t comment on the differences between the models.

As far as using it, you’ll fall into one of two camps

1. You put it on and go about your normal life. You might discover some unexpected foods that spike your blood sugar, etc.

2. You put it on, but you basically already know what’s going on. So you end up course correcting your diet to avoid seeing something bad. You should not buy a CGM :)

I was in the second group, although I learned that blood sugar can actually spike during _intense_ exercise, as your body releases glucose to fuel you.