Diabetic Neuropathy

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Phil, the long term complications of diabtes are caused by running toxically high blood sugar levels. However, you give no information about your numbers or your diet or what treatment/medication you are using to manage your diabetes.

Some information about these things may help us to help you, we can make suggestions on what you can do to reduce your blood sugar numbers, which may help to manage your problem.

I'm sure someone with more relevant experience than me in dealing with the long term effects of neuropathy will be along presently.

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

philipburdekin said:

Hi
I have it both in my hands and feet, the doctor told me I have Raynauds disease, is this possible with having Nuropathy ?
Yes. Raynauds is a totally seperate condition.

Do you get both together? You can do. It is not always that way. Because you have one doesn't automatically get you the other.

How do you deal with it? Here is a link to a website with very good information about what YOU can do to treat your DN.
http://diabetes.webmd.com/features/peri ... d-diabetes

Does it go away? It is emminently reversible, especially if you take control of your BG levels.

Does it get any worse? It will do if you don't take control of your BG levels. The main cause of Diabetic Neuropathy is high Bg levels.

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Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Hi Philip,

Having read your additional info about your diet I can see that you eat a lot of carbohydrates. This is the usual cause of high blood sugar levels. With a bit of help and advice from here we could help you get your blood sugar levels down through your diet which may help alleviate your neuropathy symptoms a bit.

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

What Sue said. Although when I went back and re-read your first post, I thought I'd missed all the info :shock: until I go to the next post :roll:

You have a very carby diet and that is what will be causing your high blood sugars, even though you give no info about your blood sugar numbers.

Find out about blood sugar and what you can do to bring it down. The advice diabetics are given to eat starchy carbohydrates is very, very damaging. I found that http://www.bloodsugar101.com was the best resource I found about blood sugar, while it is an American site, they are the same as us on the inside :wink: Take a look there and have a look in the diet forums here.

I imagine you have a meter if you are on insulin, you need to test to find out what your food does once you haave eaten it. This way you can eliminate the things that send you blood sugar up to those toxic levels.

Set yourself some targets. You need a diet you can stick to. Good luck. Come back and ask lots of questions.

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Hi Philip

We have been told all our lives that bread is good for you. Well for diabetics it is not. Full of carbs that pump up your blood sugar. You can take all the meds you want but the bread carbs will do what they do best. You mention pots (potatos). These are worse than chips for you blood sugar. Two great foods that most diabetics have to curtail.

It sounds like your diet is much like a none diabetics. But you are diabetic. Could be that you sort out your diet and in doing so, sort out your nuropathy and even perhaps be able to reduce your pills. Read up on what you can eat and enjoy and on what you can't, the stuff that damages you.

Take care

Stewart

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Cornflakes also contain quite a bit of sugar. Bread as stated is high in carbs but so long as you watch your portion sizes and consider switching breads from white if thats what you are on that will help. I find grannery is quite good and it has nowhere near the same effect as white or wholemeal(I was told to eat this when I was first diagnosed but I find its no better than white for blood sugar levels at least, I found that contrary to the whole GI thing that seeded breads were worse than white for BS surges). I dont advocate a low carb diet personally but you do need to watch your carbs as these do break down into sugars and are also possibly the worst culprir for putting on weight. As for potatoes I have tried them roasted, chipped, boiled, mashed and baked and found that they are no worse than spagetti and better than rice in terms of blood sugar levels. Best to test yourself and find out for yourself as everyone seems to be different. Could be worth checking out porridge for breakfast as I know that this doesnt have that bad an effect on my BS levels either and I know a lot of specialists recommend this as a great heathy breakfast. I see that you on a lot of medications including insulin and still seem to have rather high BS at times whilst I would never advocate living your whole life around just one figure as there is more to your life and health than your BS levels according to what I have been told in the past 16 is in the danger zone and I have been told if I ever get 3 readings in a row greater than 15 I have to go straight back to my doctors.

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Best thing, Philip, is to get a carb counter book and work out a diet for yourself based on reducing your carb intake slowly down from your high numbers to at least under 100gms of carb a day and lower if you can.
Work out what you eat now then start by modifying one meal at a time till you get blood sugar levels to drop down to more acceptable levels.
We are all different so there is no standard diet sheet unfortunately. The best thing is to test before a meal then two hours after. If the levels have dropped back to your pre meal level then you have got that meal right.
Keep a food diary for at least a week with the food you eat plus your meter readings before and after meals and then you will have a record of meals that you know do not 'spike' your blood sugar levels .

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

As everyone else has already written. you need to get BG under GOOD control ( around 5) to feel better if it's neuropathy. In fact tight control can often reverse early stage neuropathy.
I can suggest a simple diet pattern, which you can modify to your specific needs
eg
breakfast;
eggs cooked any way you likewith or without bacon
lunch;
salad, with TINY portion of pasta or rice or potatoes with cold meat, fish or cheese: Or all of them if you're hungry :lol:
dinner;
meat, fish, cheese or eggs with green leafy vegetables.
berries and cream for dessert
snacks;
macadamia nuts or almonds
tea and coffee adlib, without sugar.NO fizzy sugary drinks.
Look through the food threads for recipes. You can expand the basic pattern to include such things as ratatouille

That's assuming dinner as your main meal. Obviously, you can switch things around. You don't need to worry much about fats, so cream and butter are OK. You can fry your meat too if you like.

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

with TINY portion of pasta or rice or potato

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Hana......... :shock:

I just heard they are banning you from being a member of the low carb club ? :lol: :twisted:

Hana means tiny :!:
Three grains of rice, one pasta spiral and an eighth of a potato.

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

I had TWO little Vivaldi new potatoes(walnut sized :lol: ) with my lunch of pork medallon and cabbage, followed by pears with raspberries, home stewed with Splenda and served with Creme Fraiche. Bg now 5.3!! No medication since 0900 this morning ( 1 x 500 mg Metformin)
So tiny portions work for me
Hana

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Getting your BGs down will stop further nerve damage but won't on its own improve the damage that has already been done .

cugilas link http://diabetes.webmd.com/features/peripheral-neuropathy-and-diabetes?page=2
has the following

Vitamin B Complex May Help Nerve Pain

The B vitamins (B-1, B-12, B-6, and folic acid) are essential for nerve health. Most people get enough B vitamins just from eating a healthy diet, but controlled studies differ on whether taking a B vitamin supplement improves nerve pain.

Kinsella recommends taking daily B vitamins because they are "a generally inexpensive, safe measure that will help some people." He advises 25 milligrams of thiamine (B-1), 500 micrograms of B-12, 25 milligrams of B-6, and at least 1 milligram of folic acid.

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My neuropathy has virtually gone in 3 months taking Vitamin B supplements intially B1 and B12 ( diet unchanged and vitamins taken as benfotaimine and methylB12 as I seem not to be able to absorb them from food ? ) and then later adding a b multivitamin as they only got rid of it 90% , the multivitamin didn't improve the situation further , then I saw this link amongst others

http://www.ehow.com/about_5079246_natural-treatments-diabetic-neuropathy.html

Vitamin B6 can help diabetic neuropathic pain because of the link between diabetic nerve disease and pyridoxine deficiency. One study on B6 deficiency and diabetic neuropathy, conducted in the 1970s, found that Vitamin B6 supplementation offers significant protection against the development of diabetic nerve disease, since those with neuropathy frequently are deficient in B6. the last two weeks it has been even better as I have added B6

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But it would also seem that excess B6 can also causeneuropathy see

http://www.find-health-articles.com/rec_pub_18754531-elevated-b6-levels-peripheral-neuropathies.htm

I have been taking an additional daily B6 tablet ( sublingual coenzyme ) and my neuropathy has decreased further , pins and needles , "electric shocks " all gone or reduced so much that I don't even notice them ,


I also have Raynaud's disease BUT very mildly it only affects one finger on my right hand , interestingly since taking b vitaminsthe finger hasn't "turned off " although the sensation that it is going to is still there when I get cold !

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

25mg sublingual coenzyme B 6

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Another info source....

http://www.diabetes-support.org.uk/joom ... -treatment

Good Luck

Steve

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

That's very interesting , reducing BG is obviously extremely important to stop furthe AGEs and Oxidative stress , but as the article says " In addition, your doctor has pharmaceutical tools, such as small doses of tri-cyclic antidepressants like amitriptyline, or the more potent anti-seizure meds like Tegetrol (carbamazepine), Dilantin (phenytoin), and Neurontin (gabapentin). These will mask the symptoms, but do nothing to address the underlying pathology." My bold , also if you get your BG down you will limit further damage and probabaly won't need the antioxidants ,

To repair the existing damage however you nee B vitamins , if you already have a healthy diet and still have symptoms then either you are not absorbing enough or are flushing them out too quickly and I would think need to think of a boost with vitamin supplements

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Soundgen, I am taking "the cocktail" ALA/EPO/Vit C. I get sudden re-appearances of PN symptoms but only now and again. Would you recommend I take B Complex also?.

Steve.

Re: Diabetic Nuropathy

Soundgen, I am taking "the cocktail" ALA/EPO/Vit C. I get sudden re-appearances of PN symptoms but only now and again. Would you recommend I take B Complex also?.

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All can say is that taking B1 B12 and B6 has had an extraordinary effect on me in 3 months , if I were you I would try .