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any little suprises

Hi Herby and welcome to the forum,

Well, I guess it rather depends on exactly what you are expecting. If we don't know what your understanding is of type 1 and how it is treated then we don't know what will be a surprise to you (if that makes sense)!

As a starting point, do have any experience of type 1 diabetes, in family or friends for example? What has your GP or consultant told you about medication?
 
HI ,MY DAD AND BROTHER BOTH HAVE TYPE 1 THEY INJECT TWICE ADAY .I HAVE BACKGROUND ON A NIGHT AND THEN NOVA RAPID WITH FOOD.I'VE HAD A LOT OF HELP FROM MY FAMILY ALSO FROM THE DIABETES DEPT AT LEEDS GENERAL.I WAS JUST WONDERING IF THERE ARE ANY TIPS PEOPLE CAN TELL ME :D
 
Herby, Sounds like there's probably not a lot we can tell you!

Any of our Type 1 contributors able to give Herby some pointers/do's & don'ts?
 
Hi Herby and welcome.
As Dennis has said, it sounds like you know a great deal more than most people do. Surprises...well, there are lots, and of the top of my head...

Just when you think you have got this diabetes lark cracked,it all changes..be it the medical advice or your own body. This is very frustrating! You ahve the same food, insulin and exercise 2 days ina row..and you blood sugar can be completly different!

People often thik that you can not eat sugar...and can look at you quite critically if they see you tucking into a biscuit.

You can not give blood...maybe obvious to others, but it surprised me!

Some people think diabetes is teh plague, others think it is nothing more serious than a cold. Personally, I think it is neither. It is something we have to live with, and treat every day, but it should not take over our lives, or stop us doing anything.

There are a lot of diabetics about...Steve Redgrave, Halle Berry, Dominic Littlewood, garry Mabbutt, and all teh lovely people who post on here!!
 
Hi Herby

I am sure your family will be a big source of information and support. I was only diagnosed at the end of November so don't have a huge amount of experience with it myself either. I would just echo what Sugar said and suggest you don't stop doing things because you are diabetic. I have changed nothing in my life really but just fit my diabetes treatment around it if that makes sense.

Matt
 
Hi Herby welcome
I've been type 1 for 18 years and things are always changing as long as your prepared for every eventuality you're usually ok. I found my first actual Hypo quite scary I was 7, if you don't drive already be prepared for the Spanish inquisition every 3 years that drives me nuts I drive better than most of my friends yet I have to prove to someone I can drive every 3 years!
Type 1 since 1999 Lantus / Novarapid
 
Hi Herby

I was diagnosed on 10 March, very recently, so I hope what I have to say can help. My biggest little surprise has been the "honeymoon period". Your pancreas can decide that it's had a lovely holiday now that you've been injecting insulin for a bit, and to thank you, it can suddenly start producing its own insulin again. It won't last forever if it does hit you, minimum a few days and maximum around 1 year then it stops once and for all, but mine's been causing a minimum of two hypos per day for 8 days now and it's become gruelling. After talking to my team again today I'm now down to only 2 units of Novorapid at breakfast and suppertime and 4 at lunch with 6 units of Lantus at night; Saturday will be my first full day of that regime. The advice from them is that if it carries on over the weekend, I should stop using Novorapid completely but continue the Lantus because the continuation of insulin helps the honeymoon period to carry on for longer. So I might be able to only have one injection a day for a while! On the day of diagnosis I had a bedtime reading of 29.1 and since then my lowest hypo has been 2.0. Your first hypo will probably hit you like a truck as mine did, so don't worry it'll probably be very obvious... just make sure your glucose sweets or drinks are all around the house, in the bedroom, kitchen, coat pockets etc - within quick and easy reach. I discovered that trying to get a can open whilst my hands were very trembly and I was very confused and nearly passing out was too much like hard work so I switched to bottles, which I pre-opened in case I didn't have the strength to twist the plastic seal off them during a hypo. When I was first diagnosed I'd had very elevated blood sugars for a long time so my body had become used to high blood sugars; so, when my sugars got near normal levels, I became extremely tired and could have slept all day (sometimes nearly did). It took nearly three weeks for it to even start ebbing away; my dietician explained that my body was misinterpreting the new levels as a hypo or borderline hypo, and the tiredness was a hypo symptom. I have to say, she's right; now that I've spent some time in the lower end of the range the extreme tiredness had gradually got less and less; once or twice, it's been a symptom of a real hypo. I've also had two fake hypos in the night, where I've woken up sweating profusely and trembling but tested my sugars and they were fine; however, they'd halved in two hours, and again my body had misinterpreted that as a hypo. Other than that, the only real surprise is how much better, younger and healthier I look now that I'm finally absorbing some food, so I hope that happens to you as well.

Good luck Herby.
 
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