Is remission from T2 diabetes possible

[JamesMS]

I can only describe my own experiences and feel the answer to your question must be, at least from me, yes.
Eighteen years ago age 50 my BGL was 35 when I measured it using my mother's meter. My GP did not immediately suggest medication. After 2 weeks of thrice daily runs for an hour and changes to my diet I passed 2 glucose tolerance tests and my baseline BGL was 4.5.
My vision cleared becoming 20/10 again and my energy levels improved. I continued with increased exercise and better diet and my BGL remained stable for over 10 years.
About 16 months ago a blood test showed HbA1C of 113 and my baseline BGL was 8.0. I started taking Dapagliflozin and later Metformin, but even with improvements to my diet and increased exercise my BGL remained too high.
At the beginning of 2026 I got a Libre 2 plus sensor and modified my diet and exercise again. My HbA1C was 42 in January and 39 in May, so I stopped medication because my BGL was sometimes too low.
During June my CGM range has been 98% below 6.8, with 1% over 6.8. I have become able to relax my diet somewhat, since my body seems to respond much more to insulin release now.
For me, I know remission means changing lifestyle and maintaining it. Otherwise diabetes seems likely to return. So I have stopped eating huge quantities of milk chocolate and crisps every week. My sight has again sharpened and I have a lot of energy. I lost over 3 stone over the past year and my blood pressure now falls to about 114/70 with pulse 50 at rest. Some would feel I exercise too much, but 10 or more hours per week feels right.

 

[niblue]

Remission is possible, but once you get there be beware of the risk of complacency. That's what caught me out.

I was diagnosed in Match 2023 with a hb1ac of 106. 3 months later I had that down to 53 (going low carb and focusing on losing weight as well), another 3 months and it was 43 and then my next test was also in the 40's. That is went back to annual tests and my next hb1ac was 80. I did a bit better for the year after that but only got it down to 68 (that was in April this year). So that's me back on 3-monthly checks again, although I'm hoping (after starting to put the work in again!) that my next one in about a month will be back to acceptable levels.

If and when I do get it back down I'm not going to do what I did last time - which was to stop testing my blood sugar and also to stop weighing myself. This time I think I'm going to stick to testing and weighing myself on at least a weekly basis, as a checkpoint. I'm still toying with the idea of going with a CGM long term (as I quite liked the Dexcom I had on trial) but in reality it's not necessary if I do stick to low-carb and also to a limited testing regime.

 

[JamesMS]

I hope you are able to bring your HbA1C down again. Because I accomplished a big reduction in average BGL 18 years ago I decided to work towards the same goal once more. Because the Libre2+ gives readings every minute, I use it during exercise to monitor drops in glucose and similarly rises after meals. Several months ago I used to get big spikes in glucose after meals, but I have tried various changes to my diet and have eliminated all CGM spikes over 7.2. Exercise after meals helps, although this may cause additional rises but make the return to baseline faster. I tried fasting for 60+ hours on 4 occasions, which helped me lose weight, but on the 3rd occasion my glucose dropped and I became hypoglycemic, so I had a meal. Over the past 2 or 3 weeks my glucose has gone lower and the CGM reports are consistent with this. Because I have some retinal edema that can respond positively to lower glucose, lower blood pressure and lower cholesterol I have been lowering all three. What tells me this is working is the increased clarity in my central vision and the shrinking of affected areas in my field of vision. I probably will continue using the CGM, since I don't want complications similar to my mother and maternal grandmother. My father and sister both developed diabetes around age 60. CGMs can reveal trends that only excessive fingersticking could reveal. For example, I can see the effect of initial insulin release after a meal, then the rise due to continued glucose absorption, followed by a bigger fall when more insulin is released and another fall later. Exercise changes this, but the insulin releases are still evident. Similarly, I can see my glucose levels drop after 11pm and fall steadily during sleep, from CGM readings of 5 or below to 4 or below, then a rise to 4.4 when I wake in the morning. I don't think I could have accomplished this without the CGM.