Category: Personal Story

By: Ray Taylor. Not a Doctor.

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You know exactly how it goes. You sit in the waiting room. You get your seven minutes. The doctor glances at your chart, writes a new prescription or bumps your dose, says “watch your diet,” and you are back in your car before you got to ask a single real question.

It happens every time. You leave with a slip of paper and zero conversation.

I want to be clear about one thing before we go any further. This is not me against doctors. A good doctor is one of the best things you can have in your corner. But I learned the hard way that if you walk into that room without a plan, the visit runs on autopilot. And autopilot always ends the same way. A prescription, and no conversation about whether anything else could change your numbers.

So I started bringing a few questions with me. Three of them, to be exact. They changed what those appointments were even for. In this post I am going to give you all three, word for word, plus why they work. No charge, no catch. Consider it my genuine advice to you.

First, the truth about my numbers

I am not a doctor. I am just a guy who got sick and tired of being sick and tired.

In July of 2022 my A1C was 11.7. I was on metformin, glipizide, and insulin, all three at the same time, and I was still getting worse. My blood sugar hit 450 in a hospital bed. As of March 2026, my A1C is 5.5. That is in the normal range. I take zero diabetes medication. The whole climb took about three and a half years.

I am not telling you that to brag. I am telling you because the appointments where I just nodded and took the prescription were not the ones that moved me. The ones that moved me were the ones where I walked in with a plan and actually talked to the person across the desk. That is the difference I want you to have. (I broke down the whole climb in how I got from an 11.7 A1C to 5.5 and normal range if you want the long version.)

Why your appointment runs on autopilot

Here is what nobody explains to you. A standard diabetes follow-up is built around your numbers, not your strategy.

The doctor looks at your A1C, looks at your meds, and adjusts the dial. That is the whole appointment. If your number is up, the dose goes up. If your number is down, you keep doing what you are doing. Nobody in that room is going to bring up food, fasting, or movement unless you do. There is not time, and frankly it is not what the seven-minute visit is designed for.

That is not a conspiracy. It is just how the system is set up. But it means the burden is on you. If you want the conversation to be about more than the prescription pad, you have to be the one who opens that door.

The book says it plain. Be an active partner in your health. Understand why you are taking your meds, and explore every avenue for improvement with your doctor. Partner is the key word there. Not patient. Not passenger. Partner.

The three questions I bring with me

These are not trick questions. You are not trying to corner your doctor or prove anybody wrong. You are trying to turn a seven-minute dose adjustment into an actual conversation about your health. Here they are, word for word.

Question one: “How can lifestyle changes help me address the root cause?”

This is the one that flips the whole appointment.

Most diabetes care is aimed at managing your blood sugar. Important, but it is downstream. The actual root cause of Type 2 is insulin resistance, and meds, as useful as they are, do not fix that. They manage the symptom. This question moves the conversation upstream, to the thing underneath the number, and it tells your doctor you are serious about working on the cause, not just chasing the readout. Food is the lever that moves it most, which is why the first thing I changed was what was on my plate. (Here is the food list I built it around.)

Question two: “What’s the goal beyond just managing numbers?”

Ask this and watch the appointment change shape.

For a lot of people, the unspoken goal is to keep the A1C from climbing. That is it. Holding steady. But holding steady is not the same as getting healthier, and you deserve to know what your doctor actually thinks is possible for you. Better energy. A lower dose someday. Weight coming off. Real improvement, not just a number that does not get worse. Make them name the target. You cannot hit a goal nobody ever set.

Question three: “Could these changes potentially reduce my need for medication over time?”

This is the one most people are scared to ask. Ask it anyway.

Notice the words. Potentially. Over time. You are not announcing that you are quitting your meds. Let me say that loud, because it matters. Do not ever stop a medication on your own. That is dangerous, and it is not what this question is about. What you are doing is opening the door to a real plan where lifestyle changes and your medication work alongside each other, under your doctor’s supervision, with the door cracked toward needing less down the road. That is a conversation worth having out loud, and most people never start it.

Three questions. That is the whole list. Bring them on your phone, bring them on a sticky note, it does not matter. Just bring them.

Do not walk in empty-handed

Here is the other half of it. The questions land a lot harder when you bring proof.

The book puts it like this. Walking into your doctor’s office armed with actual data, your blood sugar logs, a food journal, your weight trend, makes for a much more productive conversation. You are not just saying “I think I feel better.” You have proof. That is how you partner with your doctor instead of just reporting to them.

You do not need a fancy system. A notebook and the same basic fingerstick meter I prick my finger with, the cheap kind that comes with the strips and lancets in the box, will do it. I brought real numbers, written down, so the conversation had something solid to stand on. When you put dated readings on the desk, the appointment stops being a guess and starts being a discussion. Your doctor is part of your team, like the book says, and a teammate works better with real information than with a shrug.

If you want to see the actual gear and pantry staples I lean on day to day, without digging for any of it, I keep the whole list in one place: my remission toolkit. It is just the stuff I reach for, nothing fancy.

I write about exactly how I got from an 11.7 A1C and three medications to a 5.5 and none in my book, Type 2 Ain’t My Type. The part that makes these three questions actually powerful is understanding the root cause they point at. Insulin resistance, and how food directly drives it. That is Toolkit number one in the book, and once you get it, you will know exactly what you are asking your doctor for and why. The questions are the door. The root-cause understanding is what lets you walk through it.

A word on the doctor relationship

I will give you my honest stance, the same one that is in the book.

My personal belief is that food is medicine, and before we talk about drugs, we should look at diet, movement, and state of mind first. But I am not a doctor, and I am not telling you to argue with yours. I am telling you to partner with one. The right doctor will welcome a patient who shows up informed, with data, asking good questions. That is a dream patient, not a difficult one.

If you bring these three questions and your numbers, and your doctor genuinely engages, you have got a keeper. Hold onto that person. That is what good partnership looks like, and it is worth more than any single prescription.

This is not medical advice. Always talk to your doctor before you change your diet, your movement, or your medication. And never stop a medication on your own.

You have more power in that room than you think

You do not need a medical degree to be a partner in your own care. You just need to stop walking in empty-handed.

Consistent persistence overcomes resistance. Every. Single. Time. The most powerful kind of persistence I know is the boring, repeatable habit of showing up prepared. Three questions on your phone. A few weeks of real numbers in your hand. Do that every appointment and watch how fast those seven minutes turn into an actual conversation. Mine did, and the conversation is a big part of how I got from an 11.7 A1C and three drugs to a 5.5 and zero.

You may not land all the way at remission the way I did. But you can absolutely get better. Lower numbers, more energy, maybe less medication down the road, all of it with your doctor in your corner instead of just handing you a slip of paper. It starts with the next appointment on your calendar.

Want the full breakdown of the root cause these questions point at, plus exactly what I track and bring with me? It is all in Type 2 Ain’t My Type on Amazon.

When is your next appointment? Tell me in the comments one thing you have always wanted to ask your doctor but never got the chance to. I read them.

P.S. New here? My free guides are a good first step. They walk you through the very beginning, one move at a time. Start here.

By: Ray Taylor

You just got your A1C number back, it was higher than you wanted, and now you have one question on a loop: how long until I can get this thing down? I have been exactly where you are sitting right now. So let me give you the straight answer nobody gave me.

The honest version has two parts. You can see real movement on your next test in about three months, because that is how A1C works. But getting all the way down to a normal range was a longer game for me. It took about three and a half years of staying consistent. Both of those things are true, and you need both to set your expectations right.

This is not medical advice.

I am not a doctor. I am just a guy who got sick and tired of being sick and tired and changed what I was doing. Talk to your own physician before you change your diet, your fasting, or your medication.

The short answer: about 90 days to see it move

Here is the part that surprised me when I finally understood it. A1C is not a snapshot of today. It measures your average blood sugar over the last two to three months, roughly the last 60 to 90 days. So your A1C number is always looking backward at the last three months, not at this morning.

That cuts both ways. It means one bad day will not wreck your number, and it also means one great day will not fix it. Your A1C can only move as fast as that three-month window allows. So if you change what you are doing today, the soonest you will see a real, honest shift on a lab test is your next A1C draw, usually about three months out.

When I got my scary 11.7 result in July 2022, I had already started fasting, walking, and changing my food. The number was high because it was looking back at three months of the old me. I was looking forward. I knew the test was measuring the past, so I stayed patient and kept going.

The real answer: getting to normal range took me about three and a half years

So you can move the needle on the test in about three months. But lowering your A1C and keeping it in the normal range is a different, longer thing. I want to be straight with you, because nobody was straight with me.

When I started, my A1C was 11.7 percent. That was July 6, 2022. I was on three diabetes medications at once, metformin, glipizide, and insulin, and I was still getting worse. Here is exactly how the number came down, with the real dates:

• 11.7 percent in July 2022, the starting point
• 6.3 percent on January 29, 2024
• 6.0 percent on April 2, 2025
• 5.7 percent on September 23, 2025
• 5.5 percent on March 4, 2026

That last number, 5.5 percent, is in the normal range, and I am on zero diabetes medication today. That whole arc, from 11.7 to 5.5, took about three and a half years. Not three months. Not one big push. Three and a half years of consistent, daily choices.

I am telling you the long number on purpose. If you expect to be at a normal A1C in twelve weeks and you are not, you might quit. If you know going in that the test moves in three months but the real finish line is a longer road, you will stick with it. And sticking with it is the entire game.

How fast is too fast, and why it is not a straight line

People want a clean, straight line from high to normal. That is not how it went for me, and it is probably not how it will go for you.

My A1C did not drop the same amount every month. It came down in steps, with flat stretches in between. I even had a rough patch in 2024 where I slipped for a few months and put some weight back on, before I got back on track. That is real life. There will be ups and downs. Nothing happens overnight, and a plateau does not mean it stopped working. It means it is the long view doing its job.

As for too fast: if your blood sugar drops hard and quick, especially while you are on insulin or other diabetes medication, that can be dangerous. That is not a place to guess or go it alone. That is a place to be working with your doctor, watching your numbers, and adjusting medication only under their guidance. I stopped my own medication cold turkey, against medical advice, and I tell everyone plainly: that was not smart, and you should not copy that part. Bring your doctor in.

So what actually moved the number?

Three things, and I never ranked one above the others: food, fasting, and movement. Those are my three pillars. The number on the lab report is just the scoreboard. The work that moved it was changing what was on my plate, when I ate, and how much I moved every single day.

I am not going to dump the whole system into one blog post, because it is a whole system and it deserves more than that. I wrote the entire thing out, the exact food approach, how I fasted, how I moved, and the dated proof, in my book. How long it takes you is mostly about how consistent you are, and the exact moves I made to get from 11.7 to 5.5 are the full Food, Fasting, and Movement protocol I laid out there.

If you want to see the whole arc and how I actually got to normal range, I told that story start to finish here: How I Lowered My A1C From 11.7 to 5.5.

Start with the first 24 hours

You do not have to map out three and a half years tonight. You just have to start the first day right, so you are not guessing. I put the exact first move, the simple starting step written out plain, into a free guide called The 24-Hour Blood Sugar Reset. It is the on-ramp. Get that one day under your belt, then do it again.

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Frequently asked questions

Can you lower your A1C in 3 months?

You can see real movement in about three months, yes. A1C measures your average blood sugar over roughly the last 60 to 90 days, so your next lab draw, usually about three months out, is the soonest a real change shows up. Whether you reach a normal range in that window depends on where you started and how consistent you are. For me, going from 11.7 percent all the way down to 5.5 percent in the normal range took about three and a half years. This is what worked for me. Individual results vary, and this is not medical advice.

How fast is too fast to lower your A1C?

Fast is not always safe. If your blood sugar drops hard and quick while you are on insulin or other diabetes medication, that can be dangerous. The pace matters less than doing it under your doctor's eye, especially if you are adjusting or stopping medication. I dropped mine by stopping my own medication cold turkey against medical advice, and I am clear with everyone: that part was not smart. Work with your doctor on the medication side.

Can you lower your A1C without medication?

I did, but I want to be careful here. I started on three diabetes medications at once, metformin, glipizide, and insulin, and today I take zero, with an A1C of 5.5 percent in the normal range. That was my personal result over about three and a half years using food, fasting, and movement. It does not mean you should stop your medication, and I am not a doctor. Never change or stop a medication on your own. Talk to your physician about whether lifestyle changes could reduce what you need over time, under their supervision. This is not medical advice.

Why does A1C take so long to change?

Because it is a long-view test, not a snapshot. A1C reflects your average blood sugar over the last two to three months, so it moves at the speed of that three-month window. One good day does not fix it, and one bad day does not ruin it. That is actually good news: it rewards consistency over perfection.

This is not medical advice.

The information here is based on my personal experience with Type 2 diabetes. Individual results vary. Always consult your physician before changing your diet, fasting schedule, or medications.

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By: Ray Taylor. Not a Doctor.

The phone call I remember is the one I almost did not answer. It was July 8, 2022. A nurse from my doctor’s office was on the line. My blood had been drawn two days earlier, on July 6. She read me the number. My A1C was 11.7 percent.

I did not fully understand what that number meant yet. I just knew from her voice that it was bad. I was already on three medications for Type 2 diabetes. Metformin, Glipizide, and insulin. All at once. And the number was still 11.7.

I’m just a guy who got sick and tired of being sick and tired. That call is the day sick and tired finally turned into something else. I decided I had to do something different.

Today my A1C is 5.5 percent. That is a completely normal number. I take zero diabetes medications. This is the honest story of how the number came down, including how long it really took.

This is not medical advice. I am not a doctor. Talk to your own physician before you change your diet or your medications.

Disclosure: I’m an Amazon Associate. If you buy my book through a link on this page, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

What an 11.7 actually meant for me

Let me put 11.7 in plain terms. A normal A1C is under 5.7 percent. Diabetes starts at 6.5. I was at 11.7 and climbing, on three drugs that were supposed to be holding it down.

A couple of months before that call, in May 2022, I had landed in the emergency room. My blood sugar there was 450. A normal fasting reading is under 100. I was more than four times that.

Here is what was happening inside me, in plain words. My body had stopped responding to its own insulin. Insulin is the key that lets sugar move out of your blood and into your cells. Mine had stopped turning the lock. On top of that, my liver kept releasing more sugar into my blood even when I did not need it. So the sugar piled up with nowhere to go. That is the engine behind a number like 11.7.

The drugs were pushing against that engine. They were not winning.

What I changed first

I want to be honest about one thing: the order matters more than people think, and getting it wrong is where most people stall out.

The first thing I changed was when I ate, not just what. I pulled my eating into a shorter daily window and stopped grazing from morning to midnight. I am not going to pretend I eased in gently. I jumped in. But how far you take that window, and how fast, is exactly the kind of thing you should not guess at on your own, especially if you are on medication. (I am not a doctor. Fasting while you are on diabetes medication, especially insulin, can be dangerous. Talk to your doctor first.)

At the same time, I cut the obvious culprits. Bread. Sugar. Pasta. Rice. I did not need a science degree to know those were spiking me. I cut them and pulled my portions back. That was day one. Simple and blunt. The deeper food work, the label reading and the swaps that came later, was an upgrade, not the starting line.

The third piece was movement. Not punishment. Walking. On one of my early days I walked about eighteen thousand steps and my afternoon blood sugar read 196. Still high, but a long way down from north of 300 that same morning. Walking pulls sugar out of your blood and into your muscles, and it does that without needing insulin to do the job. I could watch it work.

Food. Fasting. Movement. Three pillars. I never ranked one above the others. But the exact order I did it in, how I built my fasting window without wrecking myself, what I cut and when, and what to do when the number stalls out, that is the whole system. I laid it out step by step in my book, Type 2 Ain’t My Type. This post is the proof it is possible. The book is the plan.

The climb, by the numbers

Here is the part nobody likes to hear. It was slow. It was not a thirty day miracle. It was years of showing up.

These are my real lab numbers, with the dates.

• July 2022: A1C 11.7 percent. The starting line.
• January 29, 2024: 6.3 percent.
• April 2, 2025: 6.0 percent.
• September 23, 2025: 5.7 percent.
• March 4, 2026: 5.5 percent.

From 11.7 to 5.5 took me about three and a half years. I had good stretches and hard stretches. The line on the page is not perfectly straight. But the direction never changed for long, because I kept coming back to the same three pillars. Consistent persistence overcomes resistance. Every. Single. Time.

Along the way I lost more than 50 pounds. I did it by changing what was on my plate and when I ate it.

What normal and remission actually mean

At 5.5 percent I am not just lower. I am in the normal range, the same range as someone who never had this disease. And I am there on zero diabetes medication.

There is a real definition for this. The American Diabetes Association says remission is an A1C under 6.5 percent held for at least three months after stopping all diabetes medication. By that standard, I am in remission. I say remission because this is something I maintain, not something I get to forget about.

When my doctor saw the numbers keep coming down and the medications gone, there was no lecture. He told me he had never seen anyone do what I did, and to keep doing exactly what I was doing.

If you just got a number like mine

If you are reading this because you got an A1C that scared you, here is what I would tell you.

You do not have to do everything tonight. I did not. Pick one thing. Shorten your eating window a little. Or cut the most obvious culprit on your plate. Just one. Then do it again tomorrow. Stack the small wins and let the number chase you down over time.

The reason I wrote my whole story out is that nobody handed me a plan on day one. I had to build it. You do not have to build it from nothing.

I put the exact first 24 hours into a free guide called the 24 Hour Reset. It is the simple starting move, written out step by step, so you are not guessing on day one.

Get the free 24 Hour Reset →

Want the whole thing in order? That is exactly why I wrote the book. Type 2 Ain’t My Type lays out the full system the way I actually did it. The 12 week plan, week by week, plus the toolkits for the parts that trip people up. The food swaps. Reading labels. Beating the cravings. Eating out. Staying in remission once you get there. It is everything I wish someone had handed me at 11.7.

Frequently asked questions

How long does it take to lower your A1C?

For me it took about three and a half years to go from 11.7 percent to 5.5 percent. An A1C reflects roughly your last three months of blood sugar, so you can often see movement on a test in two to three months. Reaching a normal number took me years of staying consistent. Individual results vary.

Can you lower your A1C without medication?

I did, but I did not start that way. I was on three medications at once when I made my move: Metformin, Glipizide, and insulin. I will be honest, I walked away from all three at the lowest point I had ever been, out of pure desperation. That was my decision, not a plan I am handing you, and it can be dangerous, especially with insulin. Please do not copy that part. What actually moved my number over the next few years was food, fasting, and movement, not the way I came off the pills. My doctor watched the labs keep dropping and told me to keep doing what I was doing, and today I take zero diabetes medication. If you want to reduce or come off any medication, do it with your doctor, never on your own. This is not medical advice.

Is a 5.5 A1C normal?

Yes. An A1C under 5.7 percent is in the normal range. Mine is 5.5 percent. Type 2 diabetes is diagnosed at 6.5 percent and above.

Can a high A1C go into remission?

It can. The American Diabetes Association defines remission as an A1C under 6.5 percent held for at least three months after stopping all diabetes medication. I reached 5.5 percent on zero medication. I call it remission because I maintain it, not because it is gone for good. This is my personal result and individual results vary.

This is not medical advice. The information here is based on my personal experience with Type 2 diabetes. Individual results vary. Always consult your physician before changing your diet, fasting schedule, or medications.

By: Ray Taylor

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