[morrisma]

Stuboy,
I have had this happen a couple of times in chinese or thai food places where communication is difficult at best. Never thought to use the meter to check. Great idea. Unsweetened tea or water with lemon for me now. Too annoying dealing with the spikes and frustration.
Good thread.
Mike

[Eddy]

Originally Posted by Funnygrl

I drank a full 48 ounce regular coke once by accident. I went to HI on my meter. I was upset. I bolused and felt better in 2 hours though.

(That would raise 185-pound me by 400 to 500 mg/dL.)

I now _really_ wonder about my pre-DX downing of Mountain Dew 2-liters... no basal, no bolus...

[Eddy]

The converse (ordering regular, bolusing, finding diet) is an equally-scary thought.

Neither hyperosmolarity nor a wicked hypo appeals to me..

[movieman111540]

I was in the restaurant business for over 30 years. Most (not all) servers are young and think the reason most people order diet drinks is because of weight. It is management/owner who should train their employees about health problems and as to why customers order certain items. Mistakes are made but most of the time it is because the employee is in a "hurry".
The drink syrup at one time came in a metal tank and the hose connection for diet and regular drinks could not be interchanged they simply did not fit. Most syrup comes in a box today and I am not sure how the connections work. (Been retired for a few years)
My point is it is usually management's fault for improper training not the server.
Complain to the manager not the employee if you want action.
Another problem I have is caffeine. I have a heart problem and must watch the caffeine and I can not tell by taste.

[Stuboy]

That's what really bugs me about this sort of thing... im not ordering Diet because im watching my weight. Many people have commented along the lines of "diet?" (im slim) in confusion, i just answer back "im diabetic"

People dont think about it... but if you mention diabetes you can almost hear their brain click!

It was the manager we complained to, i didn't moan to the waitress she was actually pretty good. we could see they were all in a hurry because we were sat next to the open kitchen and could see the rows of orders. So yes, i think you are right, it was part servers in a hurry part manager.

[Glucoweb]

Originally Posted by Stuboy

But here is a good tip... the Accu-Chek Compact Plus does read sugar in drinks!! We tested it again when we got home with diet lemonade, diet coke and full fat 7up. the diet drinks read ERR and the 7up read 17.8mmol/L, the full fat coke read "HI". So if you have this meter, and you're in doubt of your drink being diet... you can use your meter to find out.

I tried this with my Flash last night, but it did not seem to work... bummer. Anyway, I tried looking up more information about the Compact meter having this capability, but was unable to find any. I downloaded the user manual and could not find it in there either. Where did you hear about this at? I want to see if there are other meters out there with this ability. Thanks.

[Stuboy]

I heard about some meter being able to read sugars in drinks on this forum actually.

I tried it with my life scan meters but didnt' work, and it occured to me in the resturant that i hadn't tried with my compact plus... so i tried it and it read "HI".

I've tried it a few times sinse that night and i've had a reading of 2.3 from Robinsons no added sugar Orange & Pineapple cordil. we also had 17.9 from 7up. and any diet or zero sugar drinks i've tested have errored.

[Scrabblechick]

I don't think I've ever not been able to tell the difference in the taste between diet and regular. Diet always has "that taste" to me. Having said that, servers should always try to make sure orders are correct. If the Diet Coke line is out, the thing to do is to come back to the table and say, "Sir, I'm sorry, but we're out of Diet Coke. Can I get you something else?"

I normally order water anyway, but do get Diet Coke occasionally. I always take a sip first, to check.

The meter idea is a good one.

[Tashia]

I probably would have been a bit frustrated myself. Some may think it's not a big deal but to me it would have been. You were probably starving to begin with and usually restaurants put out rolls for you to snack on.... well most of us skip those. Your waiting an hour for food, drinking what you think is diet coke only to find that BG is sky high... I would have been livid. What are you to do now.. just eat your protein? I would much rather eat my carbs and sugar than drink them... especially if I'm going out for a dinner. And I agree also that it's very hard to distinguish regular and diet fountain drinks from one another.

I've had something similar to this happen to me in a restaurant, but it was completely my fault. I noticed that on the menu they served diet cherry coke. So I opted for it, well little did I know that they made there own version... and that they added cherry syrup to the diet coke. I drank about half and thought it was a tad sweet so I had my husband try it, he agreed that it was very sweet. So I asked the waitress if it were diet and she informed me that it was diet with cherry syrup in it. Yikes... I told her I'd just have plain diet coke. Like I said... if I'm going to have carbs and sugar I'd take much more enjoyment out of eating them.

[UpNorth]

It sure is annoying to get regular coke when ordering diet. I usually drink coke zero if drinking soda. It has happened a couple of times that i've been served regular cola, but i usually notice after a couple of sips because i find regular cola being sickening sweet I quit drinking regular cola even before i was diagnosed with diabetes...

[RobiJo]

My hubby and I go out to eat a lot. I always order diet coke/pepsi. ALWAYS. All of my family and friends know what to order me if I'm not there yet. Very rarely I'll not get what I ordered, but only about 1-2% of the time. And even then the glasses were just switched with someone else at our table. They figure it out right away too and we just switch.

I can pretty easily tell the difference between regular/diet especially in colas. I despise Coca-Cola and Pepsi. The taste makes me cringe. However, if I'm not sure I have had no problems asking (and getting) the server to bring me a fresh glass. I just make sure I ask nicely.

[cheryl]

I guess I am a big odd ball diabetic, I was drinking regular soda from the 2002-2007 seriously....I drank it while prego's with Jacob, a1c in the low 6's high 5's no lows...actually a foutain drink from a resteraunt is so watered down that when I started to count carbs....It was totally hard to figure the carbs in soda at resteraunts...I usually went with 40 carbs....so I guess for me if I really did end up drinking a regular coke it is in and out very fast....actually I dunno....

But I am sure it would be so annoying and all that if you already bolused correctly but I guess popping another 3 units or so wouldn't hurt....coke if you understood it is quite easy to figure out....mostly if I ever got a regular coke instead of diet, I so would...make sure my meal then was high fat LOL...it's slow that bad boy down....

oh how i miss coke especially a vanilla coke from sonic yummy...used to bolus 6 units for that and a wrap....and was on target or got low....not massive but it depended...oh boy...lol

But resteraunts should be careful it does suck and we should rant about it.....i am glad I have sensitivty to aspertame, cause I ask for a glass of ice bring a can of diet coke with splenda with me....and there....LOL

Cheryl

[jacobsam622]

I worked as waiter while in college and part time for five years after I became a programmer. There is an easy way to avoid the fuss, coke and diet coke do not look anything a like. If you put coke and diet coke next to each other you will be able to tell the difference. When you wait on a table of 12 people and one or two order diet and the rest order regular you learn to tell the difference.

Diet coke is a deep black.
coke is black with a slightly brown tint.
Get a regular coke and a diet coke and set them side by side, the darker one is the D-coke

[Tattoo azz]

I just try and avoid all cokes cos the taste is so foul! If i do go out to a restaurant thesedays i just have water its easier to bolus for

[Alice]

That's interesting about the color! I do agree, Cheryl, that the soda drinks are watered down...I have a friend who used to play golf and would treat his "lows" with a coke on ice from the golf club dispenser...he always had trouble raising his glucose with those cokes. I recommended he skip the ice and drink the fountain drink "straight up"...

When I use Cokes to treat lows at home...I never put on ice...why bother. I also have trained myself to drink a "warm" coke which is normally horrible...but when you are low and working in an office...reaching into your desk drawer for that emergency can is a blessing! I trained myself to think "it's purely medicinal...not for taste...", and so on.