Hello

[Clarkydp]

Hi All

I had a stomach pain few months ago and the doctor arranged a blood test to check everything.

I received a call yesterday telling me I have diabetes and how do I feel about that.

pretty shocked was the response as a 32 year old male in good health. 5.11 weighing 12 stone.

I attended the practice in the evening and based on my results, the GPS appeared very concerned and arranged me to go to hospital at 10am this morning.

further tests suggested type 2 to the junior consultant but he wanted to run this by with the senior consultant as my body was still producing suitable ketone levels.

the senior consultant then stated due to my age and physic, he said this was likely type 1 and sent off the antibody test which will take a month to return. In the meantime, I will be started on insulin with my first dosage going in this afternoon.

ultimately I am pretty frightened and confused and completely overwhelmed on how the above will effect the rest of my life.

I even found myself walking round the food market so confused on what I can and cannot eat. Will it make me drop dead. Is my life going to be cut short. Every nurse or doctor gave me the look that this is the end of my world

I feel like I will become a burden to my loving partner

Reading online I suspect my case will be that of LADA so any advice would be very much appreciated

thank you for reading

 

[Kimblewoman]

Hi All

I had a stomach pain few months ago and the doctor arranged a blood test to check everything.

I received a call yesterday telling me I have diabetes and how do I feel about that.

pretty shocked was the response as a 32 year old male in good health. 5.11 weighing 12 stone.

I attended the practice in the evening and based on my results, the GPS appeared very concerned and arranged me to go to hospital at 10am this morning.

further tests suggested type 2 to the junior consultant but he wanted to run this by with the senior consultant as my body was still producing suitable ketone levels.

the senior consultant then stated due to my age and physic, he said this was likely type 1 and sent off the antibody test which will take a month to return. In the meantime, I will be started on insulin with my first dosage going in this afternoon.

ultimately I am pretty frightened and confused and completely overwhelmed on how the above will effect the rest of my life.

I even found myself walking round the food market so confused on what I can and cannot eat. Will it make me drop dead. Is my life going to be cut short. Every nurse or doctor gave me the look that this is the end of my world

I feel like I will become a burden to my loving partner

Reading online I suspect my case will be that of LADA so any advice would be very much appreciated

thank you for reading

Hi,and welcome to the forum. I imagine you are totally shocked but though I can not comment on type 1 as I have type 2 , I'm sure there will be lots off people on here who could advise, what I can say is I have been living with type 2 for 5 years now and whilst your emotions are high wondering why this has happened it can be very much a condition you can manage and you can lead a normal healthy life , it's from my own experience just getting your head round the diagnosis and like you said what you can and can't eat but in time your get all the information either from here or books , intenet , sorry I can't advise further, but everything will be ok

 

[trophywench]

There are plenty of us on here - shedloads of people aren't diagnosed Type 1 until they're adults, I was 10 years younger than you, married for 15 months and I'm still here, 71 in April. Whatever diabetes is, it's absolutely not a death sentence these days - once it's been diagnosed and being treated properly anyway!

I don't think you would be LADA - the majority of LADA people start off with Type 2 and the diabetes responds to Type 2 drugs - until that stops and becomes mega difficult, before being rediagnosed as LADA, and there's no reason you've given us why you'd look like Type 2 to anyone who knows A from a bull's foot, about diabetes, frankly.

The blood test you're awaiting the results of should confirm it anyway. Look up 'C-peptide' and 'GAD antibody' tests (which are usually both done) and read what the interwebnet says about them to understand what they tell both the experts and you and your partner.

The only foodstuff which affects our blood glucose A Lot, is carbohydrate so we need to match the amount of carb we're about to eat, with our dose of insulin pre-meal. This becomes much more straight forward to calculate as time goes on - but in any case, they start off with conservative doses which ae gradually increased as the beta cells in the islets of Langerhans within your pancreas, shuffle off their mortal coil and stop unhelpfully chucking out insulin in an utterly disorganised manner when they happen to fancy doing that instead of only when they're supposed to.

Which insulins have you been given to start with?

 

[Bruce Stephens]

pretty shocked was the response as a 32 year old male in good health. 5.11 weighing 12 stone.

I was a healthy 15 year old a few weeks before diagnosis. It's nothing to do with that. (Type 2 is more associated with unfitness, though even then there are normal weight otherwise apparently healthy people who end up T2.)

I even found myself walking round the food market so confused on what I can and cannot eat. Will it make me drop dead. Is my life going to be cut short. Every nurse or doctor gave me the look that this is the end of my world

To coin a phrase, an end is also a beginning. Managing the condition is a continuous effort (though obviously it becomes easier with practice). If your dream was to be an astronaut then maybe that's not realistic, but most things are (with some planning) doable.

I don't know whether there's any accepted average shortening of lifetimes; I suspect such things depend a lot on quality of management of the condition (which is improving all the time) so if there are estimates I'd tend to ignore them and assume you'll live about the same length as you would have done, staying about as healthy as you would have done otherwise. (That's my assumption, anyway, even though I was diagnosed a while ago so have lived through less effective technologies.)

There's arguably a benefit in having such a chronic condition in that we have more contact with healthcare professionals than is typical, so there's a better chance of picking up other conditions earlier.

As to the what you can eat question, we can eat anything, but we're responsible for managing glucose levels, so in practice it's less work to eat less carbohydrates, usually. But (unlike some people with T2) we can (and most of us do) eat very sweet things now and again without worrying too much (because we can use insulin to handle it).

The top (pinned) question of this forum has links to a variety of information sources that I'm sure you'll find helpful (though also overwhelming). Feel free to ask specific questions.

 

[Clarkydp]

There are plenty of us on here - shedloads of people aren't diagnosed Type 1 until they're adults, I was 10 years younger than you, married for 15 months and I'm still here, 71 in April. Whatever diabetes is, it's absolutely not a death sentence these days - once it's been diagnosed and being treated properly anyway!

I don't think you would be LADA - the majority of LADA people start off with Type 2 and the diabetes responds to Type 2 drugs - until that stops and becomes mega difficult, before being rediagnosed as LADA, and there's no reason you've given us why you'd look like Type 2 to anyone who knows A from a bull's foot, about diabetes, frankly.

The blood test you're awaiting the results of should confirm it anyway. Look up 'C-peptide' and 'GAD antibody' tests (which are usually both done) and read what the interwebnet says about them to understand what they tell both the experts and you and your partner.

The only foodstuff which affects our blood glucose A Lot, is carbohydrate so we need to match the amount of carb we're about to eat, with our dose of insulin pre-meal. This becomes much more straight forward to calculate as time goes on - but in any case, they start off with conservative doses which ae gradually increased as the beta cells in the islets of Langerhans within your pancreas, shuffle off their mortal coil and stop unhelpfully chucking out insulin in an utterly disorganised manner when they happen to fancy doing that instead of only when they're supposed to.

Which insulins have you been given to start with?

Thank you for your comments which are reassuring to hear.

I had looked up the tests you refer and understand if it returns the antibodies then I will be diagnosed type 1. The doctor was adamant this would be the case based on my appearance and health.

today was a low 24 hour dosage of insulin that the nurse did for me. Tomorrow I return for more of the same dosage and to do myself.
I then have a meeting Monday to receive my insulin to administer at home and to discuss diet plans whilst awaiting the antibody results

 

[Clarkydp]

I was a healthy 15 year old a few weeks before diagnosis. It's nothing to do with that. (Type 2 is more associated with unfitness, though even then there are normal weight otherwise apparently healthy people who end up T2.)


To coin a phrase, an end is also a beginning. Managing the condition is a continuous effort (though obviously it becomes easier with practice). If your dream was to be an astronaut then maybe that's not realistic, but most things are (with some planning) doable.

I don't know whether there's any accepted average shortening of lifetimes; I suspect such things depend a lot on quality of management of the condition (which is improving all the time) so if there are estimates I'd tend to ignore them and assume you'll live about the same length as you would have done, staying about as healthy as you would have done otherwise. (That's my assumption, anyway, even though I was diagnosed a while ago so have lived through less effective technologies.)

There's arguably a benefit in having such a chronic condition in that we have more contact with healthcare professionals than is typical, so there's a better chance of picking up other conditions earlier.

As to the what you can eat question, we can eat anything, but we're responsible for managing glucose levels, so in practice it's less work to eat less carbohydrates, usually. But (unlike some people with T2) we can (and most of us do) eat very sweet things now and again without worrying too much (because we can use insulin to handle it).

The top (pinned) question of this forum has links to a variety of information sources that I'm sure you'll find helpful (though also overwhelming). Feel free to ask specific questions.

Thank you for your reply.

I have confidence in myself that I can maintain the right diet and I feel my diet before today has always been pretty healthy with an aim to minimise sugar and carbs.

On the other hand, the management of the injections and tracking levels feels me with pure panic

 

[Bruce Stephens]

On the other hand, the management of the injections and tracking levels feels me with pure panic

Yeah. That's normal, I'm afraid. It gets easier with practice, and with technology. For the injections there's pumps (though I'm sure they have their own complexities and aren't that easy to get on prescription) and for tracking levels there's things like the FreeStyle Libre (much easier to get on prescription) which you just scan now and again (whenever you want a reading) and they produce graphs and things (and can show pretty directly patterns of highs and lows), including overnight.

But yes, it's something that we can't (yet) forget about, but it's getting progressively easier to handle.

 

[SaraKaya]

Hello, I was diagnosed with type 1diabetes September 2020 at 53!
It sounds very similar to your diagnosis and initial regime with insulin administered by health professionals to start with and then given a bag of goodies to sort out yourself! it feels like a huge mountain to start with.
I was so scared and can remember like you thinking I was never going to be able to eat anything again! I love food!
I am now getting to grips with injecting and I can now bolus for added carbs even dabbling with fish and chips!! It’s a bit of a wait to find out your results but when you do it is a bit of a relief if it is type 1 as you are in control! It’s not a license to eat anything but you can eat carbs and make allowances for it with your insulin and also exercise helps.
I have picked up so many tips and hints from the lovely people on here and I am now eating the best diet I have in ages and really enjoying food again.
it takes a bit of organisation to start with but get yourself into good routines early, record your Blood glucose levels and keep a food log! Change your needles every time and change your lancet regularly as well and move your injection sites around your tummy and upper thighs. These habits will help you as you move on. Your BG levels will come down gradually but don’t panic if it takes a while in fact a controlled drop is better than a sudden drop. I found my eyesight was quite blurry after diagnosis and I panicked thinking I was going blind but this is a common side effect when your blood sugars are very high for a while my lovely optician helped out with a temporary ready reader prescription to start with! ( I had bloods of 20 and my HAbc was 149!!) these numbers and letters will become part of your life moving forward!
ask questions and read through threads on here there are some really helpful pointers!
Good luck!

 

[SB2015]

Welcome to the forum @Clarkydp
Sorry to hear about your diagnosis.

I was diagnosed with T1 (or LADA) at the age of 53 (same as @SaraKaya ) It is a shock at any age.
It sounds like your Practice are on the ball. If slightly older and overweight so often this is misdiagnosed as T2 and mistreated. Later in life the destruction of the beat cells is slower than those diagnosed at a younger age, so we can manage to ‘keep going’ for quite a while before a crisis develops.

It takes a bit of getting used to but this is a manageable condition. The more recent technology developments makes life a lot easier than it was in the early days. Even simple things like a half unit pen can help as you often need quite small doses of insulin initially.

Whatever your concerns or worries just ask on here. I have learnt so much from others on here about day to day management. Nothing is considered silly. just ask.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Welcome to the forum @Clarkydp

But sorry you've had to join us

Diabetes can feel overwhelming and frightening to begin with, but the good news is that it's a condition that you can generally learn to live well with. With advances in treatment and monitoring technologies it's increasingly possible to have near-normal BG levels for quite a lot of the time and to keep potential complications of diabetes at bay, while living a full, active and healthy life. I'm 30 years into playing the game (dx at age 21), with not much to show for it, apart from some slightly calloused sides of fingers from over-enthusiastic BG monitoring. 🙂

Type 1 Diabetes in Children Adolescents and Young People by Ragnar Hanas is often recommended here, it's a thorough overview of diabetes management written in plain English. Alternatively you might like Think Like a Pancreas’ by Gary Scheiner - which is a practical guide to managing diabetes with insulin.

We had a thread recently where members offered their 5 top tips for better diabetes-ing, which you might also find encouraging.

5 Top Tips for Better Diabetesing

Just found myself absently wondering what I would say to myself if I could go back in time ‘Bill and Ted’ style and offer newly-diagnosed-me some hints and tips for better diabetes management, and a better relationship with my diabetes from future-me. What 5 hints and tips I might offer myself...

forum.diabetes.org.uk

Most of all keep asking questions here - nothing will be thought too obvious or 'silly' 🙂