True Blood

I'm still feeling good and my blood sugar has been holding steady in the 90s and low 100s. My energy has increased and I've been sleeping pretty well.

I had another blood test this morning. It was a lot quicker than the last; it doesn't seem as if the nurse took as much blood this time around. I'm feeling a lot more optimistic about my upcoming doctor's visit, which is next Thursday. I think my numbers will be better; we'll see. I'm confident that my blood sugar will be okay, but am curious what my other stats -- cholesterol, lipids, etc. -- will be like. I've been paying so much attention to my blood sugar that I've sort of put these other issues on the backburner. But as of my last test, my cholesterol and triglycerides were high and I was suffering from non-alcoholic fatty liver syndrome. Not good. I'm hoping that as my health improves in general that these numbers will improve, as well.

I'm also wondering what my current weight is. I actually attempted to weigh myself, but we need a new scale; either that or ours doesn't go high enough for my weight, which is entirely possible in my case. But I hope I've lost a few pounds. I think I have; people keep on commenting about how I look thinner. Still, I won't get the entire story until I step on my doctor's scale.

I'll be very disappointed if I haven't lost weight or have even gained weight (which again is entirely possible given my history). I've been training for my upcoming walk and am definitely getting stronger, and I've been eating really well. I could stand to exercise more, but am fitting it in when I can and can feel the difference. One of my friends even noted that I walk a lot more steadily now and that he can see how much stronger I've become.

Meantime, I have another week to (hopefully) knock off a few more pounds. We'll see. I'm just praying that all of this work I've been doing to take care of myself will start paying off...

Subconscious Thinking

I've mentioned before how the insulin gives me weird dreams almost every night. Well, now things are getting a little meta for me because I've been dreaming about my insulin!

I've had a few dreams where I've taken my blood sugar or have felt a "low" while performing some task. But last night, I actually dreamed about giving myself the insulin shot. It would've been even more bizarre had my dream insulin given me a weird dream WITHIN my weird dream ... sort of like the Inception of diabetes management!

I guess my diabetes is on my mind a lot, as it should be. That's what is keeping me healthy, that I'm trying to be mindful and responsible. And I have been thinking about the insulin because I might be going off of it in a few weeks. I see my doctor in early October and if my numbers hold up, she'll start me on my way to being insulin-free.

Truthfully, I have mixed feelings about this. Obviously, it would be great if my body can function sans insulin shots and I can stay healthy by eating well and exercising. But I'm nervous that going off the insulin will cause a setback. I don't want to feel sick and run down again, or thirsty, or experince blurry vision. I like feeling energized and happy. I've been taking care of myself, but the insulin is my lifeline. It's what kept me from having to be hospitalized back in August.

I guess if my numbers don't stay in a good place, I can always go back on insulin. It wouldn't be the worst thing in the world, not if it helps me sustain my health. I guess I should discuss these fears with my doctor.

Meantime, I'll continue to exercise, eat well and watch myself ... and if that includes minding my health in my dreams, so be it.

A Scary Moment

Right now I'm on vacation, the first I've taken since I received my diabetes diagnosis. I'm doing the best I can to monitor my food, though it's been hard because we've been eating out for every meal, my schedule is different and I'm trying to balance my husband's needs.

My husband is one of those people who can get away with eating one meal a day. I cannot. So I often have to remind him that I NEED breakfast or lunch, or want to eat dinner before 8 p.m. However, we went to the Poconos Garlic Festival today, so our breakfast plans turned into a debate. I wanted to stop at a diner and have something substantial because I wasn't sure what kind of food would be available at the festival. He didn't understand why I wanted to eat before going to a food fest. I tried to explain how I need a balanced breakfast to keep my blood sugar even, and we finally compromised by stopping at a little general store along the way.

Unfortunately, it was slim pickings as this store was nothing like the delis back in NYC. They had cereal, but all of it was sugary -- no Total or Kashi or plain Cheerios. The only fruit they sold were bananas. I settled for ordering whole wheat toast, but the guy looked at me like I was nuts as he asked, "Is this ALL you're having?"

I ate my toast as we headed to the garlic fest and figured that they'd at least have SOMETHING I could eat -- some roasted veggies with garlic, some garlic chicken, maybe a salad with some garlic dressing. But when we arrived, I soon realized that they did not have one healthy item of food. There were garlic funnel cakes, garlic ice cream, garlic fries ... even the mushrooms and artichokes were fried. Everything sweet and salty and greasy and fried, fried, fried. Blech. I got some cheese curds because I could tell that I needed some protein and they wouldn't serve them to me unfried. I had a few and they were so gross -- I guess I'm just no longer used to the grease. I then had a garlic pickle, which wasn't bad, and a small piece of raw garlic dipped in dark chocolate (it's as bad as it sounds). My husband got the garlic funnel cake and a garlic chocolate chip cookie, so I had a small piece of each. The sweet was just too sweet for me ... I really have lost my taste for sugar.

We walked around the fair for a couple of hours, looking at the shops and then enjoyed a juggling show. It was getting pretty warm out, so I had a diet Coke, even though I've tried to cut those out. I tested my sugar and it was decent, especially considering the fact that I had samples of some not-so-great items.

The heat was getting to me, though, and I began to get irritable. Jon kept asking if I wanted to try this or that and I snapped at him that I can't. I was annoyed with him for even asking and he was annoyed with me for not being too much fun at this fair.

Finally, we headed out around 2 p.m. and began the long drive from the Poconos to Tanglewood in the Berkshires, MA. I told Jon that I'm going to need to stop along the way to get some REAL food as I hadn't had a substantial meal all day.

We drove for a while and I began to feel lightheaded, but otherwise OK. Still, we saw a sign for an IHOP, so we pulled off. I knew they have omelets, so I figured they'd be a good bet for a decent late lunch. As I got out of the car, though, I felt as if I were going to faint. I hurried into the bathroom and tested my sugar -- and it was 60! I couldn't believe that it was so low and my now, my hands were shaking so badly, I could barely zip up my purse. I hurried back to the table and told the waitress, "I'm having a low diabetic episode, I need orange juice right away." To her credit, she returned with a glass about 10 seconds later.

Finally, I had an acceptable meal: an egg white veggie omelet with cheese, a salad and some melon, and I felt loads better. My sugar was back in the 100s after, so the OJ and good food did the trick. But it freaked me out that my bs dropped so low so easily. It also pissed me off that here I was, trying to avoid overdoing the unhealthy food and my body was punishing me for it! I think Jon felt badly because he promised that we'd stop for a real breakfast tomorrow and make sure that we have plenty of snacks.

I'm still learning how to control my sugar, so I suppose I will make a few mistakes along the way, either going too high or low. I'm just glad that I caught this when I did and that it didn't end up being as bad a situation as it could've been.

Fear Factor

For the most part I think I'm handling my diabetes diagnosis pretty well, but there are moments when I fear that the worst will happen to me: that I'll go blind, that I'll lose a leg, that I'll have a heart attack. At the moment, my blood sugar is under control, but I feel like I'm balancing a tower of stacked blocks: make one wrong move and everything will come tumbling down.

This is why I'm taking extra care to improve my health. I'm eating better, I'm losing weight, I'm exercising and I'm taking all of my meds and insulin on schedule. Still, I know that diabetes isn't completely under my control. Since I'm 37 and fairly young, I worry about what kind of life I will lead when I'm 50 -- or even if I'll make it to that age. To say that this is a life or death situation isn't an exaggeration; knowing that everything depends on my choices EVERY DAY is a bit daunting.

In a weird way, though, my diabetes could be what ultimately turns my life around. I've been battling my weight for about 18 years now and haven't been able to get down to a healthy size. Now I've had the fear of going blind knocked into me and it's suddenly made cookies look very unappealing!

I hope that I can continue to improve my health and my life. I've had a good month, but I was only diagnosed a few weeks ago. I have to keep this up for the next month and the one after that, and then for the next year, and then the rest of my life. There's no question that I'm getting physically stronger, but I need my mental strength to get me through this for the longhaul.

HubPages Post On Type II Diabetes

I've written a post about my experience with diabetes for HubPages:

Do I Have Diabetes?


Please check it out!

Taking Advantage Of A Bad Situation

While I'm certainly not happy to have diabetes, I figure that as long as I am dealing with, I can milk it for all it's worth.

The other day, my husband and I went out to eat at our favorite Tex-Mex restaurant. I ordered the veggie fajitas (skipping the tortillas), which comes with chips and dip. When I asked if I could get a garden salad instead, the waiter apologized and said that they can't make that substitute. I explained that I'm diabetic and that I was willing to pay extra for the salad ... and he ended up giving it to me for free. Thanks, Diabetes!

Also recently, I hailed an off-duty cab in the city when I was going back to my office after a doctor's appointment. The driver said he couldn't take me downtown, but when I made a big deal about how I was sick, he gave in and took me.

I normally don't believe in using a weakness to get ahead. I try not to cry in public because I don't want people feeling sorry for me, and when I was briefly in a wheelchair from my broken leg, I didn't want anyone to go out of his or her way. Still, it was nice to find that there is at least a little bit of a silver lining in having this disease.

Little Pricks

One of the questions I get asked the most is if it hurts to check my blood sugar or give myself insulin shots. No, it really doesn't, though after breaking my leg and having to have my bone popped back into place, my tolerance for pain has increased greatly.

Checking blood sugar is more annoying than painful. I have a One-Touch Ultra, which comes with a little needle that you pull back, and then it kind of ricochets into your finger. You then place the drop of blood on a test strip and it gives you a glucose reading. It hurts about as much as it does when you dig your nail into your finger (which isn't much), but sometimes I just can't get out enough blood. There are days when I get it on the first try, but then other times, I have to prick my fingers over and over again to get them to bleed enough -- even if I use a brand-new needle. I don't know why my fingers are so uncooperative, but they can suddenly turn against me when it comes to this task.

I try to make it "fun," though by turning the whole thing into a game. As the meter counts down from 5, I try to guess what my blood sugar number will be. I also find myself humming that song from Little Shop Of Horrors -- the one where Seymour has to prick his fingers to feed blood to Audrey II. Plus, it's kind of cool to watch the test strip suck up the drop of blood. I've nicknamed them "vampire strips."

As for the insulin shots, the only thing that's uncomfortable about them is that they're injected into my stomach. The location freaked me out at first, but I'm getting used to it, and they really do hurt at all. They make the needles so thin that they just slip right into your body. They do leave a tiny mark, but that's it. I'm wondering, though, if I can arrange the marks into a cool design -- sort of like George Seurat did with his pointillism.

Other than that, these tasks aren't so bad. They take up very little of my time and it's so, so important that I get them done every day. So I do what I can to deal with them and try to stay positive about the whole process.

The Dreaded Diagnosis

I expected to get bad news at my last doctor visit, but I was shocked when I was told just how bad my situation was: blood sugar over 400, high cholesterol, high triglycerides, fatty liver. Yikes. Yep, I had Type II diabetes and, the doctor warned, I was thisclose to having to be hospitalized. My heart -- which, at this point, I was amazed was still beating -- caught in my throat, and I felt as if I were coming apart at the seams. Still, I kept calm and somehow managed to keep it together as I was shown how to test my blood sugar and how to inject myself with insulin. However, as I later left the office, I broke down on a park bench. I knew that my life would never be the same, and that I was partially responsible.

Oh, I don't blame myself for getting the disease, but I do wish I'd taken better care of myself for the past few years. I don't smoke and I'm not a big drinker, but I have a checkered relationship with food. I was a skinny teen with a history of eating disorders, and then chubbed out in college. Fast forward to my adult years (I'm now 37) and I became morbidly obese. I'd diet, lose weight, binge, gain weight, diet, lose weight ... you get the picture. I'm a statistic in the dieting world, one of the 95 percent who manages to gain back the lost weight and then some.

I thought I'd finally broken the cycle a few years ago when I lost 100 pounds and completed a 20-mile walk. Unfortunately, the weight slowly came back on; then last year, I broke my leg and needed surgery. I could walk after three months and did PT, but my leg was still weak and sore for a long time afterward. I was inactive for nearly a year and ended up reaching my highest weight ever. I could barely walk -- not from the leg -- but from simply weighing so much. It was a nightmare.

I finally began to lose weight last spring when we visited Greece. I'd walk a block and have to sit down to rest, but I managed to walk all over Athens and even climbed up to the Parthenon. In the 10 days we were there, I lost about 10 pounds (fat people lose a lot of weight at first). I thought I was on my way to good health once again.

Then I got sick.

It started out with a really bad cold. I figured that I got it on the plane home, but this cold just wouldn't go away. Then came the thirst. I'm not talking the type of thirst you have after you've eaten something spicy; this was a full body thirst. I wanted icy, cold drinks and couldn't get enough of them -- the colder, the better. I seriously dreamed of jumping into a pool filled with strawberry smoothies. My body was hot and dry, and the only times I felt good were when I took a cold shower or took a dip in a cold pool.

Of course, drinking so much meant I had to use the facilities. All the time. Urgently. I had near accidents in the supermarket, on the bus and in Central Park. Of course, I was up all night because I had to go every hour, sometimes more. Because I wasn't sleeping, I was tired -- all the time.

I eventually ended up with another horrible cold, this one worse than the other. I lost my voice, my vision went blurry and I had no appetite. I knew that something was wrong and I was pretty certain that it was the big D. I'd made an appointment with an endocrinologist, but it was a few weeks away. I stupidly figured that I could wait. Besides, I was began to feel better. Knowing that I probably had diabetes, I tried to eat better foods and cut out sugars and some carbs. My husband and I even took a trip to the Poconos, where we enjoyed an active weekend swimming and boating.

Finally, I saw the doctor and she delivered the bad news. As bad as it was, though, it was a relief to get the diagnosis and know that help was on the way.

So far, things have improved greatly. My blood sugar is now down in the 100s (it even hit 96 the other night) and I have more energy. I'm sleeping better and no longer have that horrible thirst. I'm also training for a diabetes walk and have completely overhauled my diet.

This is the beginning of my journey, but I hope that as I go along, my health will get better. I hope that my story will inspire people to take care of themselves and get checked out if they suspect that something is wrong. As for me, I have to do whatever it takes to get well. I don't have a choice: it's do or die -- literally.