Symptoms before Diabetes

Some years ago I spent some time on a diabetic ward in hospital I was the only non diabetic there, I do remember a gentleman who told me he had been experiencing symptoms for some while and actually went to A and E had his blood tested and was told he was not diabetic and sent home a week later he was brought into hospital in a coma.

When he had recovered sufficiently to ask what had happened that is how he could be non diabet one day and in a coma the next week he was told that he had been a latent diabetic so when tested nothing shew up.

So from that if true it would seem the answer to your question is yes but maybe not so common.

I may be corrected by others more knowledgeable than I though.

@lyoung54, have you actually got your test results from over the years? Many people have looked back at their records online and found they were not told when their blood sugar first started to rise.

It also depends on how your were tested, not all tests pick up type 2 in the same people.

Neuropathy does affect about 5% of normal and upto 20% of people with prediabietes so yes symptoms do come before a type 2 diagnosis.

The only symptom that might have been associated with type II before my diagnosis was my tremendous thirst. My GP at the time merely asked if I passed water frequently, which I did. That was OK in his eyes and didn't require further testing.

My eventual diagnosis happened because of a medical I had for an insurance, so almost by accident.

My father, now 90, and type II for probably 30 years, discovered that some his blood test results from work related medicals in the early 70s indicated that further tests should have been done at that time.

In my case, I had a number of the symptoms, especially running out of energy, itching, slow wound healing. I never had the thirst and frequent urination though, which was probably why I never considered diabetes.

Alison Campbell said:

@lyoung54, have you actually got your test results from over the years? Many people have looked back at their records online and found they were not told when their blood sugar first started to rise.

It also depends on how your were tested, not all tests pick up type 2 in the same people.

Neuropathy does affect about 5% of normal and upto 20% of people with prediabietes so yes symptoms do come before a type 2 diagnosis.

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I was not told by the doctor that I had high BG,when Tested only when I happened to return to the Klinik.after 8 months
He said "by the way you are a Diabetic " i had no symptoms,I was in my early 50 no clue about a low carb diet..I have learned more from this
Forum then from any other source.i am thankful for you all.

If you are in the UK? All GP's had to have online coded records and allow patient access by 2016, some haven't though. You need to ask for a form from your surgery for full access and take ID. You can often tell from the surgery website but it is not always promoted.

I had symptoms I can remember as far back as being 5 or 6yrs old. Thrush, mainly on a night. In fact 2-3am in the morning at its worst. Why? Because my liver dumped due to fasting on top of maybe high bgs.
I'd struggled with undiagnosed diabetes til I was 32yrs old. A change of dr picked it up.
I had thirst, tiredness and carb cravings galore for decades!!!!

I went to the gp for a test due to blurred vision, getting up to wee every night and incredibly itchy legs that I used to itch till they bled. My fasting bg came back as 6.1 just into pre diabetic range. My gp rang me with the results he was so surprised as I was slim and ran.
I normalised my bg by low carbing and all those symptoms went, as well as frozen shoulder and restless legs at night which I didn't realise were due to high bg.

I think the most common symptom that comes before diagnosis is weight gain and finding it almost impossible to lose weight no matter what you do. No one ever seems to make this connection. Diabetics (type 2) are told they got diabetes because they are fat. More and more evidence is piling up to say the weight is a result of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome and is just another symptom.

I know that not all type 2 diabetics are overweight but not all have neuropathy or excess thirst either.