Confused

[Stacey79]

Hi everyone. Bit of a long story but I was taken I to hospital with after suffering a mini stroke on 13th Nov. While in A&E they did a covid test which came back positive. I had no covid symptoms at all at this point. Skip forward 48 hours and I was in intensive care having been given a 40%chance. I cannot remember much from the next 6 days. When I turned a corner and was more aware of things I had a nurse come over to me and the following conversation took place:
NURSE: just going to give you your insulin Stacey
ME: but why I don't have diabetes
NURSE: it could be the steroid we've put you on so will proberbly go once you are off that but for now the Dr wants you on insulin as your BS is high.

As I recovered they came down and I was put on Metformin and the insulin was stopped. I kept asking for more info - what can I eat being the main question but kept being told a diabetic nurse would come see me.

After 4 weeks in hospital I was finally allowed home. Very week from not getting out of bed for 4 weeks and the after effects of covid. My discharge medication included the metformin but still hadn't had any information.

I called my GP the next day and asked and was told the community diabetic nurse would be I touch and to just eat a balanced diet but try to cut down on carbs. My mum is also type 2 so she's been really helpful but I am still confused as to whether I do actually have diabetes or if its the steroids I was on. I'm off them now. I don't have a tester thing as apparently you only get them if you have insulin so how do I keep track of my blood sugars????

I have tried eating as healthy as possible since coming home, meat and veg or salad with a few potatoes. Fruits. Fat free yogurts and the occasional biscuit or small sweet treat. I feel fine.

My mum did my blood sugar with her tester a few days ago I had eaten a low.fat.cheese salad sandwich on brown bread about 1.5 hours before and it was 11. Mum said that was high?

I am 42, have family with type 2(mum and sister) and obese so I have always known diabetes would proberbly be on the cards I'm just confused and shocked the way it's all happened. Any advice please?

 

[Squire Fulwood]

You can buy a tester but the downside is you have to buy the strips as well and they can be expensive. You get them supplied if you are on insulin or other glucose lowering medication. The reason for this is interesting. It's to avoid hypos according to info from my nurse, they have not considered using them to actually control your sugar levels unless things have changed since my chat with my DN.

I suggest you stop buying anything claiming to be low fat. The reason is that if you take fat out of a food then it tastes terrible. The manufacturer gets over this by adding sugar to make it palatable. Eating fat will not harm you in my opinion and according to many recent surveys. Bread is also a no no for most of us and so is anything made of flour. Your "low.fat.cheese salad sandwich on brown bread" probably wasn't a good idea.

 

[EllieM]

This is my favourite intro to low carb for new T2s

JoKalsbeek's blog | Diabetes Forum • The Global Diabetes Community

Unfortunately steroids are notorious at pushing up blood sugars, but honestly T2 is so strongly genetic that you probably aren't that tolerant to carbs even if you don't have full blown T2. IN any case, if you get a meter (@Rachox has info on UK ones) you'll be able to find out what foods your body can and can't tolerate.

Good luck, and welcome to the forums.

 

[catinahat]

Welcome @Stacey79
The last few weeks have been difficult for you, I hope you are feeling better.
I know you haven't received an official diagnosis yet but it does look like you are having trouble regulating your blood sugar. The advice you read here will probably be the complete opposite to everything you understand about nutrition and diet. When we digest carbohydrates they are converted to glucose and distributed around the body in the blood to be used as energy. Insulin is then produced to allow the cells to take up and use the glucose. With T2, although we don't have a problem producing enough insulin, the insulin becomes less effective at removing the glucose (insulin resistance). The other function of insulin is to take any glucose not used for energy and store it away as fat. So when we eat a low fat, high carb meal a good percentage of that meal gets stored as fat, not used to feed us.
High carb = high blood sugar, hunger, weight gain.
Base your meals around meat, vegetables and natural fat = lower blood sugar, no hunger, probable weight loss

 

[Rachox]

Hi @Stacey79 and welcome to the forum. I hope you have recovered completely from Covid now.

Here’s some info on UK meters, and to be clear I have no commercial connections with any of the companies mentioned.


HOME HEALTH have the Gluco Navii, which is a fairly new model and seems to be getting good reviews, links to the strips and the meter:

https://homehealth-uk.com/all-produ...ose-meter-test-strips-choose-mmol-l-or-mg-dl/

There are also discount codes for when you come to buy more strips - "navii5" and "navii10" will give you 20% off purchases of 5 packs of strips and 25% off 10 packs of strips respectively.


Then they sell the older SD Code Free, details to be found here!

https://homehealth-uk.com/all-products/codefree-blood-glucose-monitoring-system-mmoll-or-mgdl/

Discount codes for the Code Free strips

5 packs 264086

10 packs 975833



SPIRIT HEALTHCARE have a meter called the Tee2 + found here:

https://shop.spirit-health.co.uk/co...e2-blood-glucose-meter?variant=19264017268793

with the strips found here:


https://shop.spirit-health.co.uk/co...py-of-tee2-test-strips?variant=19264017367097

Some members have got a free Tee2+ by phoning up to order, with a large order of strips they often throw the meter in for free:

Phone number 0800 8815423


With more expensive strips is their Caresens Dual, this one has the advantage of glucose and ketone testing in one machine, it’s to be found here:

https://shop.spirit-health.co.uk/collections/caresens-dual



If there is a choice of units of measurement then ‘mmol/L’ are the standard units in the UK, ‘mg/dl’ in the US, other countries may vary.


Don’t forget to check the box if you have pre diabetes or diabetes so you can buy VAT free. (for all meters and strips)

 

[andromache]

Hi everyone. Bit of a long story but I was taken I to hospital with after suffering a mini stroke on 13th Nov. While in A&E they did a covid test which came back positive. I had no covid symptoms at all at this point. Skip forward 48 hours and I was in intensive care having been given a 40%chance. I cannot remember much from the next 6 days. When I turned a corner and was more aware of things I had a nurse come over to me and the following conversation took place:
NURSE: just going to give you your insulin Stacey
ME: but why I don't have diabetes
NURSE: it could be the steroid we've put you on so will proberbly go once you are off that but for now the Dr wants you on insulin as your BS is high.

As I recovered they came down and I was put on Metformin and the insulin was stopped. I kept asking for more info - what can I eat being the main question but kept being told a diabetic nurse would come see me.

After 4 weeks in hospital I was finally allowed home. Very week from not getting out of bed for 4 weeks and the after effects of covid. My discharge medication included the metformin but still hadn't had any information.

I called my GP the next day and asked and was told the community diabetic nurse would be I touch and to just eat a balanced diet but try to cut down on carbs. My mum is also type 2 so she's been really helpful but I am still confused as to whether I do actually have diabetes or if its the steroids I was on. I'm off them now. I don't have a tester thing as apparently you only get them if you have insulin so how do I keep track of my blood sugars????

I have tried eating as healthy as possible since coming home, meat and veg or salad with a few potatoes. Fruits. Fat free yogurts and the occasional biscuit or small sweet treat. I feel fine.

My mum did my blood sugar with her tester a few days ago I had eaten a low.fat.cheese salad sandwich on brown bread about 1.5 hours before and it was 11. Mum said that was high?

I am 42, have family with type 2(mum and sister) and obese so I have always known diabetes would proberbly be on the cards I'm just confused and shocked the way it's all happened. Any advice please?

Steroids are shockers for blood sugar - I have high doses for MS from time to time - but they’re better than being dead from Covid, so thank heavens for them. I’m happy that you made it through safely and wish you a good return to full strength. If I were you I would cut out sugar and refined starch and nourish yourself back to good health with plenty of whole food meat, fish, full fat dairy, eggs and above-ground green vegetables. Good nutrition is key to good recovery, and your poor system has a lot of healing to do.

 

[Daibell]

Hi. Many meter manufacturers will provide a free meter if you phone them but you need to buy more strips which is where they make their money. As others have said, don't buy anything that's 'low-fat' as fat is not a problem for us and in fact isn't the main cause of cholesterol whereas carbs are. It does sound like you may get a T2 diagnosis but once the weight comes down and hopefully the steroids are stopped you may come into a good range.