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Bish bash, newbie here, hello to you all

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WildWolfman

WildWolfman

New Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
My story, I have always considered that I take care of my body, lifestyle and eat foods in a balanced way,I am a ex smoke and ex drinker, but since I was 60 years old, I was diagnosed with mild COPD, hypertension and my blood sugar levels have always bordered the threshold level I was told is 42, After a recent blood test my sugar level is now 150 and I am diagnosed with diabetes type 2, also my sodium level as decreased and my kidney function is reduced due to damage or infection (waiting for further test results).
This week I have started medications, Candesartan 2mg tabs, 1 per day to help raise my sodium level, Metformin 500mg tabs 1 in morning with breakfast first week and 1/2 Gllclazide 80mg with main meal, 2nd week increase Metformin 2 daily + 1/2 Gllclazide, 3rd week Metformin 2 tabs twice per day + 1/2 Gllclazide.
Also I was issued with a Spirit TEE2 blood glucose monitoring meter, with sharps and test strips and shown how to use it.
it's early days yet, readings are high at the moment.
All this is very worrying and daunting, but I am determined to be able to control this, with help from my doctors and with the help of diabetes uk members.
Please keep safe
Regards
WildWolfman
 
Hi @WildWolfman, and welcome to the forum.

Assuming that the 150 was from a HbA1c test, then that is well into the red range and there is some real incentive to get to grips with it.

Read around the forum and see how others have gone about getting that sort of level back to near normality and come back with any questions you have. There is a lot of experience round here, so tap into it.
 
Ok, @WildWolfman, we have a few members who have been over 100 on diagnosis but at 150, you are in and amongst a highly select group.

Most have tackled a high HbA1c by focussing on what they eat. It is one way of getting to grips with things which is totally under your control. So can I suggest you get a food diary under way and begin to monitor your blood glucose? Get a feel for what it is when you wake in the morning which will give you a general measure of where things are - I'm guessing that will be in the teens or more at the moment and you will be looking for a steady reduction in that. Then measure before a meal and two hours after. There you are looking for the effect of foods and in particular those things that give a big rise. Those are the things you need to cut down on or avoid. Write everything down, it is the best way to see the patterns. Also, things you might think unimportant (morning coffee with a couple of biscuits or a slice of cake) could well show up as being particularly troublesome, so record everything.

Another basic point. Could you do with losing a pound or two? If so, then losing it will help - some say it is key to getting things back on track. If you do not need to lose weight, then all the more reason to get monitoring to guard against the slight chance that there is something more than straightforward T2 going on. Don't want to worry you with that remark, it's just that personally I like to cover all bases.

As we keep on saying, diabetes is a serious condition but it is manageable and once tamed it goes into the background. Easy to be daunted at the beginning but once you get the principles sorted and work out a plan to suit you, things will get into perspective.
 
@Docb thanks for the sound advice,
I have started a blood meter test result record, target 4 to 8 mmol/L.
Early days yet on medication, my blood readings are erratic 17 to 29 mmol/L but the good news is they are heading down.
Also I have recently set up a food diary and cut down my portion sizes and watching my carb Intake.
During Feb and May months my weight went up from 12 to 14 stone highest ever!, I have since got this down again to 11st 8lb, but hope to lose another stone.
I am aged 69, height 5ft 6"
Total agree with what you suggest and I need to do more pre/post blood test, to help identify the foods that are the best of worst for me?
Thank you.
 
Candesartan is a blood pressure drug. However - all the ARBs do reduce your sodium level - because my sodium level is naturally low and I took Losartan for my BG, when my sodium got far too low, I had to change my BP medication! It is a side effect of the ~sartans.

Thing is when your blood glucose is out of whack like yours - it affects all sorts of other bodily functions - all without anything noticeable to the person whose body it is.

Have you been advised to keep a close eye on your BP too? It may be OK being on a very low dose but you don't want to land up with very low BP by accident.
 
Hi @WildWolfman, thanks for the thanks!

Personally I don't think you need to go over the top with meal testing. If you test everytime you imbibe something you will frighten your GP with the number of strips you use and get very sore fingers from all the bodging.

I would do a bit of carb estimation with what you are eating and see which meals have the highest carbs. You will soon get used to reading labels, checking weights and looking up nutritional stuff on t'internet. Could be breakfast if you are fond of cereals and toast or could be evening meal if you like spuds or pasta or sticky toffee pudding. Then focus for a few days on one meal and look for patterns, trying to spot those things which give a big rise (for me it was anything with flour in it and some fruits), cutting back on them and see if this results in a smaller rise. I think it works well if you can cut out snacks and the like which are often high carb - at least until you have a base pattern sorted.

Although a few years older than you, my weight when I started was about where you are now and has gone down to where you want to get to. That happened by going the low carb route, almost automatically. Could work the same for you.
 
Thanks for the info so far.
I have quite a few appointments at my doctors over the coming weeks, to get me back on the right path, in the short term I will go along with my doctors advice.
it's good to know I am not alone!
 
trophywench said:
Candesartan is a blood pressure drug. However - all the ARBs do reduce your sodium level - because my sodium level is naturally low and I took Losartan for my BG, when my sodium got far too low, I had to change my BP medication! It is a side effect of the ~sartans.

Thing is when your blood glucose is out of whack like yours - it affects all sorts of other bodily functions - all without anything noticeable to the person whose body it is.

Have you been advised to keep a close eye on your BP too? It may be OK being on a very low dose but you don't want to land up with very low BP by accident.
Click to expand...

Hi,@trophywench, yes my raised blood pressure is also being monitored closely, bp meter is to be worn for 12 hrs starting Mon 26/11/20 results will be known following day, I have also for the last 5 years been taking daily 10mg Amlodipine tablet for this.
Additional I take one 20mg tab Atorvastatin, one 20mg tab Omeprazole and I use a Trelegy Ellipta inhaler once per day to control my mild COPD.
Rega
 
Hi Wildwolfman. I found that I wanted/needed to test every meal at first. But that should only be for 3 meals per day.
Many people don't realise that snacking is very bad for Type 2 diabetics (if there are any carbs in the snacks. This is because every snack with carbs is going to pump more glucose into your blood stream and then your pancreas will produce more insulin to compensate. But Insulin is the 'fat storage' hormone so it will both shunt any excess glucose into your fat cells and prevent you using the stored energy in those fat cells to fuel your body (which is what they are designed for).
So don't starve yourself - cut the carbs but not the calories (traditional fats and proteins) so that you can last until the next meal without having to snack.

My success has come from eating real unprocessed foods, traditional fats like in eggs, cheese, fatty fish, fatty cuts of meat, avocados, olives, nuts (except for Cashews and Pistachios). The test, test, test so I can avoid ever eating anything that would spike my BG by more than 2.0 mmol/L

P.S. I'm also using a Spirit Tee2 - the test strips are relatively affordable which was just as well since I got through so many tubs of them at first.
 
Hi,
Some good news, my blood pressure meter readings yesterday are normal.
After a total of 48 readings were taken over a 12 hour period my weighted average is 125/69.
I will continue taking 1x 10mg Amlodipine tablet daily to help.

My next HbA1c blood glucose tests are scheduled for Nov 4th 2020.

Regards.
 
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