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Pokermid

Pokermid

Newbie
Messages
3
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Hi, my name is Peter. I'm 60 years old, married with 2 grown up children and was diagnosed with Type 2 in 2006. I've been meaning to join this forum and get more involved for quite awhile now as my condition has got worse over the last year or so. and I need to understand Diabetes a lot more than I ever thought I would! I've let myself go on all fronts and now I'm suffering because of my intransigence. My blood sugars are all over the place (ranging from 15,7 to 2.8 .....in one day) and my body is so racked with pain that I don't know which way to turn for help. Its my own fault for letting it get to this point and I've no excuses to offer. I'm just hoping someone will have some advice that may help me. I was also diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease 20 years ago at the age of 40 and my condition has slowly diminished over those years. It has really hit hard lately and at times I get my meds wrong. I take in the region of 25 pills for my PD along with Sukkarta and Humalog for my Diabetes.

The symptoms that I have at the moment are as follows:
Severe muscle seizure (it feels like my sinews are pulling the muscles with steel wires...and getting ever tighter) in my legs and face, severe muscle pain, a chemical smell on my breath every time a seizure comes on, dry mouth and lips and getting very thirsty and peeing a lot, I can't seem to get anyone from my Neurology care team or the Diabetic care team to collate the information and make decisions. Its soooo frustrating!

Any advice will be much appreciated

Thanks

Peter
 
Last edited:
@Pokermid - Hello and Welcome to the Forum :). @daisy1 will be provide you with some basic information that all new members receive. Have a read around the Forum and ask as many questions as you like.
 
@Pokermid

Hello Peter and welcome to the forum :) To add to all the good advice you have already received, here is the basic information we give to new members and I hope you will find it useful. Ask more questions when you want and someone will be able to help.


BASIC INFORMATION FOR NEW MEMBERS

Diabetes is the general term to describe people who have blood that is sweeter than normal. A number of different types of diabetes exist.

A diagnosis of diabetes tends to be a big shock for most of us. It’s far from the end of the world though and on this forum you'll find well over 220,000 people who are demonstrating this.

On the forum we have found that with the number of new people being diagnosed with diabetes each day, sometimes the NHS is not being able to give all the advice it would perhaps like to deliver - particularly with regards to people with type 2 diabetes.

The role of carbohydrate

Carbohydrates are a factor in diabetes because they ultimately break down into sugar (glucose) within our blood. We then need enough insulin to either convert the blood sugar into energy for our body, or to store the blood sugar as body fat.

If the amount of carbohydrate we take in is more than our body’s own (or injected) insulin can cope with, then our blood sugar will rise.

The bad news

Research indicates that raised blood sugar levels over a period of years can lead to organ damage, commonly referred to as diabetic complications.

The good news

People on the forum here have shown that there is plenty of opportunity to keep blood sugar levels from going too high. It’s a daily task but it’s within our reach and it’s well worth the effort.

Controlling your carbs

The info below is primarily aimed at people with type 2 diabetes, however, it may also be of benefit for other types of diabetes as well.

There are two approaches to controlling your carbs:

  • Reduce your carbohydrate intake
  • Choose ‘better’ carbohydrates
Reduce your carbohydrates

A large number of people on this forum have chosen to reduce the amount of carbohydrates they eat as they have found this to be an effective way of improving (lowering) their blood sugar levels.

The carbohydrates which tend to have the most pronounced effect on blood sugar levels tend to be starchy carbohydrates such as rice, pasta, bread, potatoes and similar root vegetables, flour based products (pastry, cakes, biscuits, battered food etc) and certain fruits.

Choosing better carbohydrates

The low glycaemic index diet is often favoured by healthcare professionals but some people with diabetes find that low GI does not help their blood sugar enough and may wish to cut out these foods altogether.

Read more on carbohydrates and diabetes.

Over 145,000 people have taken part in the Low Carb Program - a free 10 week structured education course that is helping people lose weight and reduce medication dependency by explaining the science behind carbs, insulin and GI.

Eating what works for you

Different people respond differently to different types of food. What works for one person may not work so well for another. The best way to see which foods are working for you is to test your blood sugar with a glucose meter.

To be able to see what effect a particular type of food or meal has on your blood sugar is to do a test before the meal and then test after the meal. A test 2 hours after the meal gives a good idea of how your body has reacted to the meal.

The blood sugar ranges recommended by NICE are as follows:

Blood glucose ranges for type 2 diabetes
  • Before meals: 4 to 7 mmol/l
  • 2 hours after meals: under 8.5 mmol/l
Blood glucose ranges for type 1 diabetes (adults)
  • Before meals: 4 to 7 mmol/l
  • 2 hours after meals: under 9 mmol/l
Blood glucose ranges for type 1 diabetes (children)
  • Before meals: 4 to 8 mmol/l
  • 2 hours after meals: under 10 mmol/l
However, those that are able to, may wish to keep blood sugar levels below the NICE after meal targets.

Access to blood glucose test strips

The NICE guidelines suggest that people newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes should be offered:

  • structured education to every person and/or their carer at and around the time of diagnosis, with annual reinforcement and review
  • self-monitoring of plasma glucose to a person newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes only as an integral part of his or her self-management education

Therefore both structured education and self-monitoring of blood glucose should be offered to people with type 2 diabetes. Read more on getting access to blood glucose testing supplies.

You may also be interested to read questions to ask at a diabetic clinic.

Note: This post has been edited from Sue/Ken's post to include up to date information.
 
Contralto said:
the dry mouth and thirsty WITH peeing a lot is something familiar to all diabetics. Generally means your medication is not doing the job for you, your diet is being ignored or some other reason your sugars are spiking. Without peeing a lot can be dehydration and/or electrolytes out of kilter.

Lotta people on this forum are on low carb high fat (specific kinds of fats are eaten ) diet. But there are people on a lot of varied diets for diabetes here.

The chemical smell is different. Depends on the kind of smell. Check this out

http://www.drgreene.com/unusual-breath-odors/

Some people taste and smell something strange at beginning of a migraine headache?

Muscles seizing up can be a lot of things including taking Statin drugs, other medications especially diuretics like thiazides

Here is stuff I have done to figure myself out while I got rid of some medications and puzzled out issues.

1. Go to Cleveland Clinic or Mayo Clinic or both online and use their symptom checkers. Do them one at a time and copyt paste the results. Then compare the results of all the sumptoms and see if the same disorders pop up.

http://www.mayoclinic.org/symptom-checker/select-symptom/itt-20009075

http://www.symcat.com/symptoms

2. Make a list of your medications and over the counter stuff you take in a chart. For each, go online and make a list of the side effects. Check out not only what the drug company claims are side effects, but what ordinary people say are side effects. Google the name of your drug and the word lawsuit and you will find stuff you normally don't find. Remember, however, life is too short to spend it in court but knowledge is power.

3. Go on careful eliminations of medications that might be the culprits of unlivable side effects. Let the docs who prescribed the meds know what you plan and why you want to eliminate them and try something different. For each drug that had an unacceptable side effect I had, I went off it for at least a month and documented both whether the bad symptom/s went away, but also whether I got worse in some way. Then I would try a low dose of something else, making sure it wasn't another member of the same type of drug. I also discovered that white or whatever uncolored versions of previously tinted drugs often produced fewer adverse symptoms. I also discovered that side effects were minimized by taking some drugs midmeal and time release (metformin) worked better with fewer side effects.

4. Keep one notebook and chart blood pressures, any irregular heartbeats or tachycardia (heart racing feeling), your waking blood sugars, before and after meals and notes of kind of pain.

5. If you can't exercise because of pain, try moving in hot water in a tub or shower a bit at a time. Aquatic therapy is good if you can get it.

6. Stretch every way and every time you can. Balance is a ***** when you don't have it and physical therapy is a helper to get it back. Force yourself to move. Remember you are alive.

7. Try to find out about occupational therapies you can do at home.

8. Mostly, stop beating up on yourself

Music heals. Listen to a lot of it, different kinds and sing along, tap to it, make a rhythmic accompaniment. Rhythm also heals. God bless Youtube and the democratization of sound

Not in order of importance
Click to expand...


Thanks for such a comprehensive reply Contralto. Its much appreciated and a lot of food for thought for me to digest. I like the sound of that symptom checker especially. I'll take all your advice on board and let you know how I get on. Thanks again!
 
Thank you too Daisy! I have a lot of stuff to help me get through this episode now and swotting up on line might help me dissipate this relentless pain. Thank you once again!

I'm still finding my way around the site, so please excuse my placings of these replies if they're not in the right place.
 
Hi and welcome,
If your having problems with remembering your pills then ask your GP if you can have all your tablets dispensed in Dosette boxes or trays (they have several names). I have all mine that way and memory problems so its a lot easier their dispensed by day of week and time of day so you know instantly if you've messed up and missed any.
Works for me.
 
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