Sounds good maybe until you know I ignored the diabetes for 18 yrs, sure I took my insulin but that was all. Never, ever tested, didn't care what I ate. I'm a reformed character who feels rather stupid/ guilty and is aiming for redemption. Or trying to stave off any damage those 18 yrs have done! X
You and me babe... although, I did test - and usually very frequently, my biggest problem was not stopping to look at what I was doing and so I went through at least 18 years of Himalayan mountain BGs. There's no reason to feel stupid or guilty - by all mean, kick yourself a few times, but understand that the symptoms that lead to diagnosis still exist and play havoc once you're on medication.
The highs and lows send emotions in all directions and induce carb/sugar cravings, etc. Your behaviour was not inevitable if the right approach had been given throughout your diabetic life. Many of us were sold a half-truth with the DAFNE / "You can eat just like anyone else, just carb count, etc., etc." Many of us are now seeing the devastating consequences of an approach that could work properly IF all the information, technology, medication and mentoring was in place to support the 'freedom' it offered.
I went onto a pump in 2005 without any diabetes education and found that my Himalayan mountain BGs never went away. When I went on a carb-counting course last June and learnt that carrots and parsnips had carbs - and even more depending on how you cooked them, well it blew me away and made me sit up and realise that I was given the tech and the basic knowledge of how to use it, but that I didn't get given or directed to good sources of information about type 1 diabetes as a whole.
The world has changed and we know so much more than we ever did knowabout diabetes, but just as we think we're getting it nailed, we discover something else that upsets the proverbial apple cart (take, for example, the recent study that discovered that possibly the majority of type 1's still produce some insulin even 30+ years after diagnosis and insulin)!
So, yeah, give yourself a kick, then take a deep breath and say to yourself: "Now I know what I know, what am I doing from this moment to do things better." You can't change the past, but you can affect your future.
Good luck and very best wishes.
C.