VERY politically incorrect

I feel a failure - had to go on tablets two weeks ago.

HYPOTHETICALLY then, do cancer sufferers NEED their drugs if its terminal? Or HIV victims, they dont NEED their drugs, as like T2's surely they simply arrest the condition from getting worse? Hey, never mind this £175bn black hole that the labour govt have put us in, just stop doleing out meds to everyone, survival of the fittest, and we dont need an NHS, saving a fortune.... :roll:

Janieb said:

I feel a failure - had to go on tablets two weeks ago.

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Janieb, (hugs)

You are far from a failure. You are managing your condition to the best of your abilty. By taking the medication you will get better control. There is no failure in that. People who foster this image should hang their heads in shame. There is probably a high percentage of members who do or have taken medication to control type 2 diabetes on this forum. I wouldn't consider any of them to be failures. They would be failures in my book if they were prescribed it after consultation as to why it was being prescribed and chose to ignore it's benefits and carried on without it and put themselves at risk because diet and exercise alone was not working.

Take care,
Catherine.

Hi Hana,
agree with Dan that this question is well worthy of debate, and frankly I've been surprised and disappointed with some of the replies.
A a type-1, of course I'll never be free of insulin injections. I choose to eat far less carbs than I used to, as it allows me to miss injections and excercise without fear of hypos. The best part is discovering that I don't need to eat carbs to keep hunger at bay. It makes me feel more in control, and motivates me to walk everywhere and excercise more which can't be bad.
I used to follow the standard advice, and believed that I needed bread, potato, pasta, etc with every meal, and of course that involved a short-acting injection to cover it. My dietition could not get her head around the fact that I chose to have a home-made soup for lunch, and kept insisting I needed an injection and some carbohydrates for my lunch. Last year she wrote that I was non-compliant in my notes!.
The results of following the high-carb route were weight gain, for me at any rate. There's nothing more soul destroying when following a weight loss diet, than having hypos and having to eat when you don't want to, and you're not even hungry.
I feel it's only common sense that diabetics should follow a lower-carb diet, and for some that may help them reduce the amount of medication they take, where's the problem in that? A type-2 relative of mine, not on medication, is given advice to eat starchy carby food, eg; cereal and fruit for breakfast, seems crazy to me.
If diagnosed with any type of diabetes, do we stick to the same diet and compensate with large amounts of meds or accept that we have to make changes to our diet and lifestyle?
Hana, I don't think what you said was controversial. You didn't say that every type-2 can manage without meds, nor did you suggest it' anyone's fault if they do require meds. I get frustrated hearing about the probs people are having on particular insulins, and the lack of support they recieve from their docs, I can only guess that you feel the same sense of frustration about this issue, which is why you posed the question. I think it's healthy to question things, not to take different views and ideas as a personal criticism.
Jus

This study from this months Diabetes care suggests that putting people onto metformin from the start may be beneficial.
It folllowed almost 1800 people with type 2 who had been put on metformin and had initially lowered their HbA1c to below 7% with it.

It found that 42% experienced 'secondary failure' that its that their HbA1cs rose above 7.5% within 2-5 years after being put on metformin . So almost half 'progressed' within five years.
However they also found that those who were put on Metformin early on (when HbA1c was under 7% and/or within 3 months of diagnosis) had a very much slower rate of progression.
They conclude

initiating it (metformin) soon after diabetes diagnosis and while A1C is low might preserve β-cell function, prolong the effectiveness of metformin, reduce lifetime glycemic burden, and prevent diabetes complications.

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http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/33/3/501.abstract