NEUROPATHY REVERSING?

[Grazer]

Hi, a friend of mine was diagnosed type 2 a few months back. He has a tingling in his toes, but no blackening or outwards signs of neuropathy. He now has very well managed BGs, but on diagnosis he was high with an HbA1c of 11.2 so it could be he had early neuropathy at that stage. The question is, now he's down to very good levels, if it WAS early neuropathy, is it likely to fix itself?
Anyone have experience/knowledge of this?

 

[lovinglife]

I had tingling in my feet befor diagnosis - I too had a HbA1c in the 11's a month after diagnosis - I no longer have any tingling and all my yearly tests are good - so yes I think slight damage can be reversed.

On the DESMOND course the leader said if the damage is slight and only on the very ends of the nerves they can repair themselves - if the damage goes deeper though she said probably not

I think like me your friend has been lucky

 

[Grazer]

Thanks for that lovinglife, I'll pass it on.

 

[Carbdodger]

Grazer
yes it can be reversed. At diagnosis I had quite bad everywhere but unlike your friend a normal HB1aC at 5.6.
Changing to a low carb diet "cured" me. Nothing else worked.
Cd

 

[IanD]

Yes it can be totally reversed, before any permanent damage has occurred.

11 years ago I went to the Dr with a tingling sensation - diagnosed as diabetic neuropathy.

7-8 years on, with the DUK/NHS high starchy carb diet it progressed to crippling leg pains, also signs of diabetic retinopathy & chronic tiredness.

I joined this forum, learned about low carb & have no diabetic symptoms.

 

[borofergie]

My diagnosis symptom was numb toes, I hadn't been able to feel them for a couple of months before I finally went to the Doctor. My HbA1c was 10.2%, and I low carbed this down to 5.2% at my 3 month check up.

My toes recovered their feelinng quickly. However, I still do sometimes get numb toes (especially after running). I'm hoping that my good BG control will encourage some more nerve repair.

 

[Grazer]

Thanks all, useful info

 

[Fallenstar]

hi Grazer
I had terrible problems with my feet and lower legs, I used to get a feeling like someone was pouring hot water down my lower leg under my skin...and my feet :shock: They drove me mad, I got pains like the most intense itching ,burning chill blains, under my skin on the soles of my feet. I wore tracks in my bedroom carpet where I would rub my feet raw to try and get to the pain.
I was told there was not much I could do to reverse it and it was Neuropathy due to my Diabetes, at the time I was eating a lot of starchy carbs was fairly active but not doing regular cardio.

I started running ,did low carb, lost weight , got very fit and the Neuropathy is now a thing of the past. I have full feeling in my feet, never get any pain or odd sensations in them and they check out fine..so even though I was told it could not be reversed and once you have got it,well that's it I don't buy into that, as I believe as others have said above you can, with a healthy lifestyle, turn it around..Tell your pal, all is not lost at sea :wink:

 

[peter7]

deleted

who knows

 

[HDKey]

Been diagnosed DT2 for about 14 months and successfully controlling BG by diet. I thought it was my imagination that the soles of my feet don't feel as wooden-like and I am finding using the lances when testing a little painful now whereas before it wasn't. Concluding that the neuropothy can be reveresed but how much remains to be seen.

 

[ians1]

My wife has nerve damage to her feet and also stage 3A renal failure as a result of a) Being taken off Avandia (because it cost too much) and b) No effective medication until Byetta and its derivatives became available. This meant that her sugar levels were "off the meter" at 33+ for about 2 years. Intolerance of other diabetic medications meant that it went basically untreated for this long and the resultant nerve damage is irreversible. She has a low carb diet and her blood glucose is an average of 6.0 now and has been for over a year now. The damage to her kidneys will not repair itself and her feet are too sensitive to touch,even being treated by a professional podiatrist is agony for her. She cannot walk without crutches now and then for only a few yards before needing her wheelchair. So for some the outlook is not too good, but I guess it depends on how bad you were to start with.

I think the main problem is that many people do not know they have high blood glucose for many years and that is when all the damage is done, sometimes permanently.

Still, with GP practices writing to people to tell them to "buy your own test strips" and "the medication you are using is too expensive" you can bet that in the future the bill to treat those with various forms of diabetic neuropathy will surely increase 10 fold or more!

NHS will stand for "NO Health Service" in the future.

:lol: :lol:

 

[AliB]

What I have learned over the last 4 years is it's not just about too much carb, but it's also about too little real nutrition. Much of the carb and other highly processed stuff out there is pretty 'dead' as far as nutrition is concerned and actually robs the body of more than it gives.

Sugar for instance has nothing in it of value to the body (calories yes, nutrition no - the body cannot exist on calories alone) and the body has to drain it's own limited resources in order to process it. We are live human beings and we need strong nutritious food to support us. What we put in our mouth is the tools the body uses to maintain, rebuild and rejuvenate itself. It may taste 'nice', but is it valuable, is it supportive? Some of it is downright toxic. http://en.rian.ru/infographics/20111106/168384287.html

If we are eating the **** stuff all the time, we end up in nutrition deficit and that's when damage starts to occur. the body can't repair itself if it doesn't have the 'tools' to do it with. I feel that going low-carb has a two-fold effect. Not only are you not eating the 'dead' foods, but you have replaced them with more nutritious food as a natural part of the process.

I also take some limited supplements to further boost my nutrition levels - my food may give me enough for my daily needs, but not necessarily enough to make up the shortfall.

As a result, over the last 4 years on low-carb, and especially the last 18 months on a 'healing' diet, lots of things have reversed. The 'diabetic' neuropathy, awful 'gouty' toes, that feeling of running hot - or icy cold - water down the legs, the restless legs that would keep me awake for hours, the IBS-D that I had for 12 years and the burning feet that I would have to stick out the bed every night, have all gone. The horrible brown 'age' spots have cleared from the backs of my hands and my skin is so soft - the wrinkles are dissipating and my hands look more like they did when I was in my 30s (I'm 54). The skin on my face is soft and clear. I no longer have BO. Oh - and I am no longer a walking fungus-factory either.

I still have a way to go in the healing process, but just to know I am going in the right direction is a great comfort.

It does make you wonder - are they really 'diabetic complications', or - as they can often be reversed by this process - are they actually complications of having too much toxic food and not enough proper nutrition. Is Diabetes, and the plethora of our other modern diseases just symptomatic of too much **** and not enough nutrition......?

 

[Fallenstar]

AliB, I could not agree more :thumbup: It's not the quantity of food we put in our mouth but the quality which makes all the difference to our OVERALL health. We have a nutritional epidemic in this Country, and much of the West,not through lack of food...but of too much rubbish choice :roll: Then again life's all about choices!

glad you have turned it around too, and are reaping all the fab benefits :thumbup:

 

[Ardbeg]

I too have neuropathy and had it months before I was actually diagnosed as T2.

I now take Benfotamaine tablets every day and I'm please to say the pains and tingling in my hands and feet has all but disappeared.

I do get it occassionally, but only after I've given into temptation and succumbed to excess sugary treats

 

[AliB]

The trouble with drugs is, as I have experienced, that they very often only just 'stop the body complaining' without really dealing with the actual issue. At best they maintain the 'equilibrium', at worse they create even more problems than they solve. Very few of them actually 'cure' anything.

When you come to realise that all drugs are toxic to a lesser or greater degree, it makes you sit up and take notice. Sooner or later those toxins are going to impact in some other way. They all come with side-effects of some kind which are just the body's way of saying, 'actually I'm a bit uncomfortable with this'. Most side-effects tend to be things like rashes, coughs, vomiting or diarrhoea, etc., all ways the body uses to try and get rid of stuff it doesn't want. It doesn't want these toxins, but every day we give it a nice new dose to contend with.

Sadly, we are hopeless at reading the signals.

If we had to suck or chew the drugs, we'd spit most of them out, but contained in a nice little plastic capsule, they bypass our taste buds and end up in the stomach. When I had to take Valsartan capsules for my blood pressure (another thing that has settled down and I no longer need medication for), I used to take them at night and occasionally they would cement themselves to the inside of my gullet, split open and the taste of the powder within would be like an explosion of poison in my throat. I am convinced they did my gullet and stomach a lot of damage.

Apart from having to take insulin, which I have no way of avoiding at present, I have managed to get to a state where I don't need to take any other medication, and I am very grateful for that. Over the years drugs in one form or another have done me and mine an awful lot of damage. Back then I knew no different. Now I am far more enlightened.

 

[Ardbeg]

The trouble with drugs is, as I have experienced, that they very often only just 'stop the body complaining' without really dealing with the actual issue. At best they maintain the 'equilibrium', at worse they create even more problems than they solve. Very few of them actually 'cure' anything.
.

Benfotamaine is NOT a drug; it is a vitamin B derrivative. I'm no expert, but just Google it and you can read all about it.

I'm not recommending them and I'm not selling them; just being helpful and responding to the OP request

 

[AliB]

Um. Wouldn't it be better to take B complex supplements and get the lot? For years I always understood that B vitamins should be taken together, as taken individually they could unbalance the body.

Personally within my supplements I take 50mg B Complex twice a day plus 'flushing' niacin (helps to flush out radiation) and that works well.

 

[andybiddulph]

:lol: I have reversed neuropathy and all the other diabetic complications without diabetes drugs and I still enjoy my sugary puddings. The trick was to attack the organism causing my diabetes (Clostidium novyi type A) with antibiotics then fortuitously I took erythomycin while having a rhinovirus which primed my immune system to respond to the organism. My feet had become hooves and there was muscle wasting in my lower legs. I now have full movement in my toes which have separated instead of being pressed together. What I believe happened was the C. novyi had tracked up my vagus nerve and had taken up residence in my motor cortex. The Alpha toxins bind irreversibly to L-Dopa (I have done the detailed molecular modelling) thus reducing dopamine production resulting in failure of motor neurone signalling. Yes, it is sub-clinical Parkinson's disease.

I call this a cure.

 

[robertconroy]

Yes, when I first went to the doctor it was for foot numbness. 4 doctors later they still didn't know what was causing it, even the Podiatrist couldn't figure it out. I went on the internet and had the answer in 5 seconds - diabetes. After getting my blood sugars under control, it decreased about 95%. I also have been taking alpha lipoic acid - the number one help for diabetic neuropathy - it actually stimulates new nerve growth. Alpha lipoic acid is the master antioxidant that your body drastically reduces output at age 40. All diabetics need to learn about antioxidants to prevent the complications of diabetes. The best book on this is: The Antioxidant Miracle by Lester Packer. Every diabetic (and their doctors) need to read this book. It will extend your life and improve the quality of your life, greatly.

 

[Ardbeg]

Thanks guys..........................I think :crazy: