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Do you control Diabetes or does it control you??

J

Jay88

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3
Hello,

I'm new to this forum, but having read some posts I thought I could add some imput. :)

I'm not a Diabetic but my mother was, until December last year she was one of the UKs oldest surviving Diabetics. Having had type 1 Diabetes for over 66 years!! She was given a medal from the Diabetic Ass for reaching 50 years which was great. I've obviously lived with it all my life, mum died very suddenly last year from a heart attack! Which as you know is a high risk for all Diabetics.

About 8 years ago, after mum had been on the Dapha course, she was put on a pump!! This changed her life, made it so much easier for her. She's always been able to regulate her bloods etc. I think that may be due to back in the 1940's when they didn't really understand the condition, they where very hot on testing every 5 minutes!! Mum tested everytime wrote she are so she knew exactly how many units to tell the pump.

Reading some of the current posts I can't help but feel that Diabetics really isn't taken seriously!! From the So called Health experts to young people not having a clue!! Not that this is their fault, they've been let down big time!!!

Diabetics can have a completey normal life, but you must be tought to control it NOT to be controlled!! This condition is effecting so many peeps across the world now that more should be done. In the US it's reached epidemic portion!! But still so many bury their head in the sand!! well maybe once they loose a few toes, go blind or maybe have a heart attack they'll sit up & take notice!!

What's your view on the current state of educating our new Diabetics??
 
Sorry about your mum Jay. Yes education is the key and knowledge is power in fighting the epidemic that is diabetes, I try as far as I can not to let it control me but being type 1 it is something that is never far from your thoughts (injecting, testing etc). I enjoy life and diabetes apart I am well and in good health, I often think if I wasn't diabetic would I be following a healthy diet and lifestyle and would my health be much worse than it is now, diabetes is a burden at times but it shouldn't stop you leading a full and active life.
 
Good for you & well done:)

I think in some ways speaking for my mum, she was diagnosed very early at the age of 6. So really she didn't know life without it!!

I feel that if you suddenly develop it at say in your 20's it would be a huge shock & lifestyle change. Which long term is difficult to deal with.

Thank you for your kind words regarding mum
 
Jay88 said:
Good for you & well done:)

I think in some ways speaking for my mum, she was diagnosed very early at the age of 6. So really she didn't know life without it!!

I feel that if you suddenly develop it at say in your 20's it would be a huge shock & lifestyle change. Which long term is difficult to deal with.

Thank you for your kind words regarding mum
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I really feel for young children who get diabetes, as you say it's a huge shock at any time but it must be extremely hard for a young child to deal with diabetes with the daily ritual of injections, testing and watching food, it must also come as a huge shock to the parents and will be emotionally and physically draining.

Again I'm sorry to hear about you mum and thanks for posting!
 
Thanks for sharing your story.

I've been on insulin 6 months and I am trying to get to grips but my Diabetes is so sneaky at times and just when I've sussed it goes a bit crazy...so I feel sometimes it controls me because if I get a mid morning spike I don't feel good for the rest of the day.

I have a varied lifestyle, I keep fit and like to socialise. The biggest thing was injecting in front of people, i just don't make a big deal and talking whilst doing it helps people feel less awkward. I try not to get angry when someone says "oh no i hate needles" I also get panicky if I have a diet coke at a pub and find myself constantly asking is it diet coke?

My sister is a fitness instructor and knows exactly how to deal with me when I have a hypo during class. Just two days ago I was low, she saw me eat a Jelly baby and I resumed exercise! She told me to sit out two tracks which I wasn't happy about and when I retested she asked me for the reading and let me back in. She knows hypos can mean I'm not always in the right frame of my mind. My work colleagues are also getting more in tune with me too they can tell sometimes when am high or just ask me up or down? Sometimes they make a big fuss if they bring in biscuits and stop to ask me and i keep telling them there will b times i will take one or two but other times i'll just say no thanks! I think they feel guilty for bringing in biscuits because they think i may feel sad that i cant eat them. My boss has been fantastic and gives me plenty time off for appointments and he knows if I have a bad morning I'm likely to work to hit my target. Last year I missed two targets but he argued my case and got me a great bonus because despite being so ill I worked harder than the well people!!


Also my hubby is trying, sometimes he still bins the wrapping off the food and I have to retrieve to suss out the carbs. The other day I asked what he had made for dinner....pizza AND a fancy cheese and pepper bread thing! He sometimes forgets or just isn't sure about food I think or maybe wants to bd normal and let me choose if i want it or not. Or maybe he just can't keep up with how much I'm likely to have.
I just had some pizza with salad and let him eat the bread thing. I also told him he must never feel bad for buying or eating chocs/sweets etc.

I bought a Diabetic bracelet because a friend insisted (her cousin is T1 and wears one if out alone). I refused to wear it initially but recently I have started to wear it especially as I had a couple of hypos walking from work to the bus stop.

It's my illness so I have to adapt and control it but I'm learning that with the best will in the world I still need support from others especially in these early days.
 
It certainly sounds that you've got a great network round you, which when your first diagnosed is very important. With type 1 it's not hard of it to control you for the first year or so. My mum was only 6 years old, so the change of life had a bigger impact on my Grandparents. Who had to look after my mum, making sure she ate the correct food at the right time, doing blood tests etc.

I really believe that once you come to terms with your diabetics, you will find that you'll relax more when your in the pub or at the gym. You'll get to know how your feeling. When mum started feeling a little out of it, if she couldn't do a quick blood test, she'd take a couple of glucose tablets & all would be fine again. She always carried her glucose tablets in her handbags!!
 
Jay88 said:
You'll get to know how your feeling. When mum started feeling a little out of it, if she couldn't do a quick blood test, she'd take a couple of glucose tablets & all would be fine again. She always carried her glucose tablets in her handbags!!
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That's the advice I was given by my DSN when first diagnosed, if ever in doubt you are hypo or not then treat regardless (this was before bg meters) but is still relevant today if meter isn't handy.
 
Hi, your Mum sounds like she was a very strong woman, surviving 66 years of type 1 diabetes! Sorry for your loss.
Re: education of diabetics, I completely agree, it is not taken seriously enough in my opinion. As somebody who is very much controlled by her diabetes, I feel completely let down in the way I was taught to "control" it. I was diagnosed at 11 years, when I was told I could eat whatever I wanted, and just adjust the dose of insulin accordingly. They were just introducing the DAFNE approach, however I was never trained to carb-count. This means I was essentially told I could eat what I want as long as I gave the right insulin, but I wasn't taught how to work out what the right insulin was. I've seen dietitians since and I find that the very limited time and support you get seeing a dietitian every few months meant nothing I was told really stuck - I know people who have had diabetes for longer than me who can just look at a plate and make a very good estimate as to how many carbs are in it. I wouldn't even be able to guess the weight of the food to the nearest 500g! I believe it is completely irresponsible to tell people they can continue to eat sugary treats unless you are teaching them how dangerous it is if you haven't learned to carb count and adjust your insulin FIRST. Furthermore, I don't know what anyone else thinks about this, but I find that sugar is like an addiction to me, a problem I didn't have before the diabetes, and there seems to be a very clear link between insulin and sugar cravings- the more insulin I take, the more sugar I want. The more sugar I then eat, the more insulin I need, and so the vicious cycle continues. I would have been much better off if I'd just been told I wasn't allowed to eat sugar anymore because it would have an adverse effect on my health.
I also believe therapy should be recommended to anybody who isn't managing very well. I'm considered a very self-aware person by most, but after 11 years of terrible control, missing injections, underdosing, and not doing blood tests, but I have only just realised (when I decided to see a therapist to try and work out why I was struggling so much) that subconsciously I have been choosing to neglect my health for years, because I haven't been able to accept my diagnosis. I believe this is a problem that many diabetics with poor control may be struggling with, whether they're aware of it or not. I also feel let down by the fact that therapy is really helping me, but it was ME who had to suggest it, and it was a hard fight trying to get it, and I think a good doctor should have recognised that a mentally capable person who is unable to manage their diabetes, clearly needs some help on a psychological level!

Would love to hear other peoples' thoughts on this matter.

Sarah
 
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