Feeling so ill all the time

[kristeen]

I haven't been on the forum for a while. I was diagnosed nearly two years ago now, and have had so many changes of medication. I started on metformin, which upset my stomach, then, on advice from here, got changed to metformin slow release which seemed to be fine. I was losing weight and feeling a bit better, when a blood test revealed that on top of everything else, (diabetes, high blood pressure, migraines), I had high cholesterol, in particular triglycerides. My GP has now got me on fenofibrate 160mg for the triglycerides, gliclazide 80 mg for the diabetes, ramipril and propanolol for high BP and amitryptline for the migraines. I am fine with the BP and migraine medication, but the gliclazide seems to be doing nothing for my blood sugars, and they are not coming down below 10 - and I am ridiculously thirsty all the time and craving orange juice. I even wake up at night thinking about orange juice. Mad. My GP said to test only when I feel ill, but that is all the time, so I am not sure what to do. I have a monitor which I bought myself, but my GP says I only need urine testing strips.
I feel really tired and achy all the time, as if I have been drained of energy. I am trying really hard with my diet, but am not losing any weight. I can't summon any energy to exercise, and I feel so dreadful.
Should I ask my GP if I could go back to metformin, or could it be the fenofibrate making me feel ill? If anyone has any experience of taking these meds, could you help me please?
I feel such a failure for being fat, and causing myself all these problems.

 

[Mileana]

Awww, sweetie, that is such a terrible place to be... I was a year ago, and it made me so tired and discouraged.

Can you tell us what your normal diet would be - now, and when you have the energy to try?

Maybe someone can come up with some advice...

The Orange Juice cravings ring a potassium bell with me - if you're on diuretics or otherwise have reason to suspect that your fluid/salt balance may be off, please ask to have it checked. It rings all sorts of bells with me about dehydration and too high sugars...

I am not familar with the meds generally, but if the diabetes med you are taking is not doing the trick, the option is that your insulin production may be low rather than your insulin resistance high - there are med that generally improves one aspect rather than the other, and if you aren't the right category for that, you may be better off on metformin or one of the others.

I may be LADA myself, so most of the meds have had little to no effect on me.

And yeah, being a big person does not help. But feeling so rubbish you can't stand on your feet to wake up your muscles and burn some energy is not helping you one bit, so you really have to get to the root of the problem somehow... Ask for a proper alround assessment, it will either reveal something or put your heart at rest a bit at least.

Your diet, though - what's it like?

 

[Sid Bonkers]

You may find the orange juice and thirst is a catch 22 situation, the orange juice will raise your blood glucose levels as is it full of sugar and raised blood glucose levels will make you thirsty. Orange juice is not tolerated well by most diabetics except in very small amounts if you are drinking it to quench your thirst it will just be keeping your levels high. Drink water for a week and see if you can see any difference.

Alternatively test your fasting bg levels and then drink some OJ then test your levels again 2 hours later I think you will probably see where the problem lies :thumbup: