Hi all,
I was diagnosed as a diabetic a few years ago. I had all the usual suspects as symptoms, only I'd no idea what they meant at the time; I went from being a very fit/strong guy to a physical wreck in a short time, dropping 2 stones in the process. The condition was a result of taking prednisolone for a colitis flare up that would not settle. I'd taken enough steroids to drop a rhino and by the end of the summer my body (specifically my beta cells) gave up.
I was put on a large daily dose of 59 insulin units (10-12-17-20) & was treated as a Type 1 diabetic. Immediately read several books on the subject and realised the importance of managing blood sugar correctly, i.e. how the food we eat, exercise, sleep patterns, medication as well as a host of other factors effect BGL. With that in mind I condensed the material I read into a few pages and created a spreadsheet to help me monitor my BGL, keep records of when I'd opened day/night time insulin pens, keep notes on medical appointments, i.e. gather all useful information to help me spot patterns in my life style that either helped aid BGL control or caused my BGL to rise too high.
The sheet has 2 tabs, the first displays BGL, carbs consumed and insulin taken for morning, lunch, dinner and night times, as well as columns for exercise and medical information for each day. The second plots graphs based on the data recorded on tab one for easy viewing of the figures - the graphs can be printed off and taken to consultations to provide a useful summary of how you've been - my consultant asked for copies because he found they worked well with his notes.
Sheet breakdown:
1) All BGL column cells have a rule that will cause the cell auto change colour to orange if BGL is recorded above 8 and blue if below 4 - this allows highs and lows to be easily spotted within the sheet.
2) Underneath the morning, lunch, dinner and night BGL columns are 4 rows that calculate the average, standard deviation, max & min for each column. These calculations are used to plot the graphs on tab 2 which show daily BGL & insulin needed.
3) Tab 2 also calculates a rough Hba1C (mmol) and correctional factor - again driven by the data in tab 1.
I've zipped both the spreadsheet and the condensed notes into file.tar (use winzip to open - it's safe & free), maybe they can help people new to the condition or perhaps even those who've lived with it for a while.
Understanding the disease really helped me deal with it, I was lucky, after 7 months it went away because the steroids hadn't done permanent damage to my pancreas, but I'm not a tourist, for a long time I thought I was a diabetic and that was it, so I know how it feels and wanted to try to help other people in the same position.
The big things I learned were that a) exercise is massive, luckily I'd always played competitive football and loved exercising, it really kept the BGL in check as well as letting me eat more! b) do not take medical advice as fact - in my case I questioned the amount of steroids I was given several times and was told there was nothing to worry about - next thing I knew I had diabetes, and it turned out my problem was bacterial (now thankfully fixed) not inflammatory! This is not to say ignore doctors' advice, there are a lot of great people out there, just think for yourself too...
If anyone out there has a question feel free to ask and I'll try to help...
Good luck,
D.
I was diagnosed as a diabetic a few years ago. I had all the usual suspects as symptoms, only I'd no idea what they meant at the time; I went from being a very fit/strong guy to a physical wreck in a short time, dropping 2 stones in the process. The condition was a result of taking prednisolone for a colitis flare up that would not settle. I'd taken enough steroids to drop a rhino and by the end of the summer my body (specifically my beta cells) gave up.
I was put on a large daily dose of 59 insulin units (10-12-17-20) & was treated as a Type 1 diabetic. Immediately read several books on the subject and realised the importance of managing blood sugar correctly, i.e. how the food we eat, exercise, sleep patterns, medication as well as a host of other factors effect BGL. With that in mind I condensed the material I read into a few pages and created a spreadsheet to help me monitor my BGL, keep records of when I'd opened day/night time insulin pens, keep notes on medical appointments, i.e. gather all useful information to help me spot patterns in my life style that either helped aid BGL control or caused my BGL to rise too high.
The sheet has 2 tabs, the first displays BGL, carbs consumed and insulin taken for morning, lunch, dinner and night times, as well as columns for exercise and medical information for each day. The second plots graphs based on the data recorded on tab one for easy viewing of the figures - the graphs can be printed off and taken to consultations to provide a useful summary of how you've been - my consultant asked for copies because he found they worked well with his notes.
Sheet breakdown:
1) All BGL column cells have a rule that will cause the cell auto change colour to orange if BGL is recorded above 8 and blue if below 4 - this allows highs and lows to be easily spotted within the sheet.
2) Underneath the morning, lunch, dinner and night BGL columns are 4 rows that calculate the average, standard deviation, max & min for each column. These calculations are used to plot the graphs on tab 2 which show daily BGL & insulin needed.
3) Tab 2 also calculates a rough Hba1C (mmol) and correctional factor - again driven by the data in tab 1.
I've zipped both the spreadsheet and the condensed notes into file.tar (use winzip to open - it's safe & free), maybe they can help people new to the condition or perhaps even those who've lived with it for a while.
Understanding the disease really helped me deal with it, I was lucky, after 7 months it went away because the steroids hadn't done permanent damage to my pancreas, but I'm not a tourist, for a long time I thought I was a diabetic and that was it, so I know how it feels and wanted to try to help other people in the same position.
The big things I learned were that a) exercise is massive, luckily I'd always played competitive football and loved exercising, it really kept the BGL in check as well as letting me eat more! b) do not take medical advice as fact - in my case I questioned the amount of steroids I was given several times and was told there was nothing to worry about - next thing I knew I had diabetes, and it turned out my problem was bacterial (now thankfully fixed) not inflammatory! This is not to say ignore doctors' advice, there are a lot of great people out there, just think for yourself too...
If anyone out there has a question feel free to ask and I'll try to help...
Good luck,
D.
