Have I got a name?

Your name is Lmacca.
Your circumstances are causing you distress and changing your thinking into making irratic decisions due to not giving yourself more TIME.
Its happening too fast and making you feel out of control.

Am I right?

Welcome @Lmacca_ . Some type1s will be along shortly but im pleased you've joined us.

Lmacca_ said:

Im new on here, not sure how it works or if I'm posting in the right place?
I lost my hypo awareness 8 months ago and living a self imposed hell. I don't go out, lost my jobs, my driving licence. I've been to the doctors who's given me 'ptsd' tablets but I haven't started taking them yet, to scared they'll make me something I'm not . My question is........I don't eat, if I don't eat I don't need to take insulin and that lows my chance of going hypo. Absolute madness I know but that's what my head is telling me and I've listened for so long it feels normal to go a few days without so much as a cuppa and a biscuit. I looked up diabelima but I'm not that! Is there a name for what I'm doing to myself so I can talk to my doctor about it? Does anybody else do this?

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Lmacca - It is becoming more recognised that not all diabetics with disordered eating have diabulimia. Some have anorexia, bulimia, or I guess even binge eating, but also happen to be suffering from diabetes. I'd urge you to try not to worry too much about what title your disordered eating should have. It doesn't matter what it's called, but it sounds like you owould like to make some distance between yourself and the condition. That can only be a good thing.

I suffered from an eating disorder many moons ago, before I became diabetic, so I wasn't juggling those balls, but I can very much empathise with the mental turmoil you are expressing.

I'll tag @asortafairytale whom I believe has much more experience with this sort of thing. Being a Bank Holiday, it's hard to know who's around at the moment, but stick around. I'm sure there are people with relevant experiences to share with you.

Good luck with it iall.

I am fairly sure that your belief that you don't need insulin if you don't eat is in error, as you are type one.
Can you bring yourself to use just a little insulin, and have something to eat, (I think that is the right order to do it) then monitor yourself to see how you respond to it?
I'm a type two and don't need medication to get normal numbers, I live by my meter and knowing how many carbs I am eating.
I do worry when I see type ones posting about taking the same amount of insulin at set times as it seems to take now regard of the foods they have eaten, might be going to eat, or their starting point in BG levels.
Another concern I have is that when I fasted I saw the highest BG levels I had for months - (thank you for that my silly liver) - so you could be not thinking straight due to something similar. Now my BG levels are low I have lost the ability to write fantasy fiction, which is something else I will have to give up - my writing is so boring now. My conversations are a lot more lucid though.
Control implies that you are going straight and level, under your own power, not plummeting straight down due to the inexorable influence of gravity.

Lmacca_ said:

Your 100% right!! The not eating is me having control over my body. I've treated it so well over the 32 years of being diabetic that I'm discussed that it can treat me so bad as to take away my hypo feelings. I've fallen out with myself so bad!

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I have read some can get it back.
I don't feel 4s with hypo symptoms but mine is due to Bisoprolol tablets.
I definitely feel 2s. 3s are hit and miss.

One thing you can back me up on is our diabetes journey is constantly going through different stages. Some better than others.

Relationships with food can get strained whilst begrudging its affects on our body.
I'm currently trying to ignore naughty carbs, again. After my son's 4th birthday party the carbs (especially ice cream) they have been talking me into carb suppers. I think I've won the battle, for now.
I've been losing weight recently which is very very unsual for me but at 20st, I need to.
I too in the past had a worse relationship with all food. Hence I'm so mindful now of how I can turn if not careful. I become obsessive and see 20sts in the mirror even though 10st ends up looking back.
Take your advice of your medical team. Try and just explain your relationship with food. They should know what it means.
I know my team does.
If your in doubt about their understanding, let them tell you its medical term.
I think with better understanding these days you will be in safe hands.
Please keep me updated.

Have you tried running your sugars a bit higher for a month or so to see if the hypo awareness returns? Not high, high sort of 7-8 for a while? Obviously you would need to eat/inject to aim for that which may not be what you want to hear right now.

Lmacca_ said:

Your 100% right!! The not eating is me having control over my body. I've treated it so well over the 32 years of being diabetic that I'm discussed that it can treat me so bad as to take away my hypo feelings. I've fallen out with myself so bad!

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LMacca - I know you are primarily here to explore and discuss your relationships between eating (or not) and your diabetes, however I thought I'd just mention this site offers a Hypo programme, which I understand may touch upon a lack of or losing hypo awareness. There is a link to it in my signature, below my posts, but I'll post the link here too:

http://hypoglycemia.uk/#/

There have been several threads about lack of hypo awareness in the past. You could do a forum search and see if any of those might be helpful to you.

Can you speak to a DSN? You may find your basal insulin needs have changed and adjusting them could see the return of awareness.

The more hypos you experience the worse they feel as you burn through your glycogen stores in response to the adrenaline release. The only way to replace glycogen is by eating some carbs.

You need some carb intake daily to avoid nutritional ketosis too and in the absence of insulin its very dangerous.

Big hugs to you. Its an utterly exhausting place to be. My hypo awareness came back after going on the pump 8 years ago. It might be worth exploring that as an option too.

Hi @Lmacca_ Great advice from everyone ( as usual ).
Not sure my take on diabetes would be helpful at the present time........BUT I think the avatar is great and you probably need to have a real good look at it.
You are diabetic, a bloody good one to still be here after 32 yrs.
Go back to the beginning and regain the control you once had.
At the moment your diabetes as found a weak spot and is exploiting it. You need to eat and you need insulin. Don't fight this problem, accept it's happening but you @Lmacca_ is the boss and you will take control.
Good luck and keep posting.

The other thing to explore would be a CGM as then you would have some reassurance that you would get an alarm to warn you before you went low.

Are you just under your GP or are you under a hospital diabetic clinic? The hospital clinic might have a psychologist with an understanding of diabetes they can refer you to.

My life was completely changed by this video, advocating a low carbohydrate diet. Tiny carbohydrate=tiny insulin requirements. My wife used to have to bring me out of hypos at least once a week. Often with the help of paramedics. I switched to low carb beginning of 2014, and have not lost consciousness a single time since then. Watch the video, and after that if you want to know a huge, huge amount more, check out Dr Richard Bernstein's book 'Complete Diabetes Solution.' It's hard to read because Dr Bernstein is completely frank (He's a type 1 diabetic now in his 80s), and the solutions are by no means an easy answer, but I may well have died from a hypo by now without the advice I read there.

Thanks @Charles Robin - I'm now better armed to field the neverending questions/lack of comprehension from some family members. That was excellent viewing!

Snapsy said:

Thanks @Charles Robin - I'm now better armed to field the neverending questions/lack of comprehension from some family members. That was excellent viewing!

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No problem, it was passed to me on a thread on this site, I like to repay that debt whenever I can

Sounds like a horrible situation and one I can completely understand although luckily I don't have the same problem at the moment. Have you considered a freestyle libre? They're expensive (£50 a fortnight) but mine completely changed my life. If you don't claim PIP at the moment you definitely should - I work as a money adviser and although not everyone with T1D qualifies you definitely should. If you did get it the money could pay for the libre for you. The good thing about the libre is you can see you're heading low at a glance - I used to keep my blood sugars above 10 all the time because any lower than that I'd be scared I'd soon be hypo. Now I don't worry about that because if I'm at 5 but the arrow is straight across or going up then I know I don't need to eat.

I know you probably know all this, but not eating is the worst thing you can do in your situation. For a start then you'll get ketones, which make you feel rubbish, not hungry and more worried about hypos etc. On top of that, if you do have a hypo it'll be more dangerous because your liver won't have any glucose in it to release (I learned this the hard way!). If you eat a decent amount of carbs then if you are hypo you'll come out of it even if you are asleep etc.

I think the other thing you could do is look into an assistance dog. They can let you know when you're hypo and even wake you up during the night if you're hypo. Also would probably help you with going out etc.

Hope something there helps you - we're all different and what works for one doesn't always work for another, so just a couple of ideas!

Thinking of you xoxo