update from newbie...

Hi Curleous, welcome to the forum, I do know what a shock it is when you first receive the diabetes diagnosis, I remember I went from total shock and disbelief to depression and anger and fear and back again and then into complete denial thinking that if I ingore it all it will go away. Ha, I have learnt a real lot since then.

I think one of the most important things that you should start with is to get yourself a tester, if your nurse/GP dont get you one of those then you can actually by them quite cheap from any chemist for around £10-15, then the bigger battle is to get those test strips on prescription if you GP has let you down already he/she might not be so wiling to let you have strips, they are expensive, but on the other hand if you control your diabetes well you will be saving the NHS some money because they will not have to treat any complications that you might develop because with good control you can avoid them. So do stand your ground and demand good service from your medics.

So, ask the nurse for a meter and strips or at least some strips if not the meter, you need this equipment to start testing before and after food, This way you will find out how your body reacts to the food you eat, for example you ask about porridge or weetabix, these are heavy on carbohyrdrates, and it is carbs that are the horrors that will raise your blood glucose (bg), but fear not, you may still be able to tolerate carbs, thats where the testing comes in, obviously if your weetabix is going to give you a high reading you will know that you either should try to cut down to just one weetabix instead of three (I am only giving you examples here), and the same with porridge.

Now to add to the confusion for a newbie, some people are okay with weetabix, others cant even look at one without geting a bg spike, same with porridge, I used to go sky high, but then I discovered that it was not the porridge but the milk that brought me so high, milk has lactose and is therefore high in sugar, again some can do it, others cant, we are human beings and not a fleet of mass produced cars with the same mechanics....now I can have my porridge made with soya milk, a bit of cream, I add chopped or ground nuts and sprinkle with cinnamon, and it doesnt raise my bg.


Best advice I can give you for now at least is get that tester and strips and get hold of the Collins Gem carb counter, this fits into your pocket and is useful when you are devising your own eating plan, something that suits you, your tastes and circumstances. And read food labels anything ending with 'ose' lactose, fructose, etc is sugary stuff, other high carb foods are bread, pasta. rice, cereals, starchy vegetables and fruit.

There are many other things that can have an effect on your bg, for example stress, upset, worry, infections, etc and of course at the moment you do have stress and upset. But I am telling you the more you learn about diabetes the more confident you will become, and you lose your fear too, trust me, also in the beginning you will make mistakes, I know I made plenty and it is all about trial and error, but you know its also quite interesting and if you really do have to have an illness then diabetes is miles better than any other illness because this is one illness that you can get good control over and it wont control you and you are actually kind of forced into leading a healthier lifestyle, so its actually not as bad as you think, huh?

I wont overload you with info, I have written too much already, but try and wade your way through the various threads in the forum, eg success stories and diet and recipes if you are stuck for ideas, you will find that we all have some different ways of dealing with our diabetes, pick yourself the bits out that you think might be good for you too, and if you find that you may have picked a couple of things that are not working for you then you can always change and do things different. All this will take a bit of time, you learn as you go along and you cant get it all right overnight, so don’t worry its all normal.

Everyone in this forum is so supportive and caring, so just ask as many questions as you want/need to.

All the best

Karen

hya andy,
just keep asking the questions,there is always someone here to help

Hi Curleous

Can I just add that with your high bs levels, ketones and rapid weight loss, there's a chance you could be a type 1. In which case Metformin won't help. When you see the nurse it may be worth innnocently asking how they tell a T1 from a T2 or whether they do any tests to find out (thus planting the idea in their heads) .

Meantime if you get abdominal pains, breathlessness, palpitations, vomiting, feel very sleepy or just start to feel generally very unwell, go to A&E or your doctor pronto.

can I second little Sues post : pointing out that though most adult onset diabetes is type 2, It is not just children and young people that get type 1 (I was in my fifities)

LittleSue and phoenix,
you've picked up on the same thought as mine. Weightloss and BGs in the 20s, with ketones= a high probability of T1
So many medics seem to go by age and not detailed symptoms. Didn't I read somewhere that the oldest T1 diagnosis was in a 90 year old?
My husband was in his late 20s

This seems to be a mirror of what happened to me, only with lower levels.

I was diganosed back in March.

i do think this site is amazing, but if you would take a bit of a suggestion from me, try it and see. I must have spent endless nights reading, and taking on board about diet, and went to an extreme whcih seemed to work, but then went back to the opposite pendulum to no detremental effect (high carb, to low carb, to just being sensible)

I also have found that if you try and food and it sends you high, it may be worth a few weeks later trying it again. I did htis with sushi. first time I went from mid 6's to mid 12's. Had it again on Sunday, and went from late 5's to mid 6'6.

Good luck.

Your BMI is now fine - if you are still getting high readings then you need to get some urgent action.

By high, I mean anything over 10.

Ideally, you should be much lower - but everything in stages

Take the advice of the T1s and push for confirmation that you are T2 and not T1