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Hello good people

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persephone

persephone

Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
Hi everyone.
Im a 58 year old happily married of 25 years and a grandma of 10 little ones.
I am 5 years down the road of type 2. after the initial shock of diagnosis I got stuck into research and have managed reasonably ok. My HB1 has gradually gone down. My cholesterol has risen. weight was never much of a problem. All good until last year when cholesterol needed treatment. doc gave me steroids. I was concerned but fortunately ive been fine and levels have gone down to healthy level. April, my next review was a mixture. My HB1 was up. dont think ive done anything different but hey ho im going to fix it.
One quick question does anyone use a diabetes diary app on their iphone. im looking for a easy one to hopefully help me get control.
Take care everyone
 
Hi persephone, welcome to the forum 🙂 I'm not an iphone user, so can't advise on that, but I know we have quite a few members who do, so hopefully they will be along to help 🙂

Do you mean steroids or statins for your cholesterol? Are you on any medication for your diabetes?
 
Hi,
didnt notice i said steroids i mean statins. must read stuff first. 😳 im on humalog and humulin insulin. because my reading was 28 when i was first diagnosed the diabetes nurse said i might as well go straight to insulin cos i would probably end up on it in the long term.
does your name give you away of where you are from? Im from the land of the Pink Panther. 🙂
 
persephone said:
Hi,
didnt notice i said steroids i mean statins. must read stuff first. 😳 im on humalog and humulin insulin. because my reading was 28 when i was first diagnosed the diabetes nurse said i might as well go straight to insulin cos i would probably end up on it in the long term.
does your name give you away of where you are from? Im from the land of the Pink Panther. 🙂
Click to expand...
Interesting - how did your diagnosis come about? Sometimes people can be misdiagnosed as Type 2 purely due to age, where in reality they are Type 1 - has it ever been considered a possibility? In any event, so long as you are on appropriate medication that is helping you manage your diabetes well that's the most important thing 🙂

Yes, I am a Northerner, although until very recently I had lived down South for 22 years 😱 🙂 Now back in God's own county, Yorkshire 🙂
 
Hi Hobie.
Diagnosis happened very quickly. I work as a housekeeper and was working silly hours for many weeks so when I felt terrible I didnt think something was wrong just the effects of long working hours. I started to be very thirsty and that rang bells. I visited docs on a monday. got blood took on tuesday morning.. the hospital phoned me at 7.30 tuesday night telling me i must see my doc the following morning. I saw gp on wednesday morning, was sent to local diabetes hospital clinic and left there with insulin and lots of information. Talk about whirlwind... trying to get to grips with the sudden influx of info was terrifying. They didnt know if i was 1 or 2 so they just treated the results. I needed a blood test which took about 2 months to find out which one i was. No weight loss.. not overweight... I didnt fit into any category. eventually result said type 2.
Welcome home to yorkshire. My daughter lives in a beautiful village near york. she emigrated from our ikkle house near durham
 
persephone said:
diabetes nurse said i might as well go straight to insulin cos i would probably end up on it in the long term.
Click to expand...
welcome Persephone....

There is so much wrong with this statement.... It is not a foregone conclusion that we will all end up on insulin by any means😡
 
Hi Martin.
I suppose as this happened so quickly I just had to take her advise. My head was in a knot. I think with hindsight you are right. Martin ask how you maintain your health as it looks like you have stopped your metformin and glyburide
 
Welcome to the Forum Persephone. Yorkshire is a lovely county - my hubby hails from there although we live in the Midlands area now where I am from. His friend lives in the north east not that far from Whitby, a place I really love.
 
Hi Maz2
Yorkshire lads are unique. My dad was a Yorkshire lad. I love whitby. My hubby and i are bikers.. Whitby is biker heaven. The ride over the moors is fantastic
 
persephone said:
Martin ask how you maintain your health as it looks like you have stopped your metformin and glyburide
Click to expand...
Diet & exercise.... Was initially diagnosed with a FBG of 14 & blindly took the scrip for metformin, 3 months later (despite a much lower A1c) given a scrip for Glyburide (without any warnings that it would cause Hypo's)

So the first 9 months of being diagnosed T2 was a real roller coaster while I modified my diet & experimented with foods, working out what I could eat & not, becoming frustrated as I was trying to eat the ADA way & this nice wholegrain diet was not working; I started to modify my diet toward a Mediterranean Diet & got results, first my BG levels were dropping nicely, second I was getting constant Hypo's (some severe).

In the end I found out I was heading toward a LCHF (How Carb High/Healthy Fat) Way of Eating & really just formalized it, realized that Hypo's should not be part of my life & it was the Glyburide that was causing my pancreas to secrete more insulin than my body needed... Ditched that....

The last step in the process was to address exercise... I took up Yoga, a couple of classes a week at beginner level was fun, but didn't really contribute to lowering BG but when I stepped it up & started going to intermediate classes as well; now I was doing 4-5 classes a week, that's when my BG really started to behave & become stable.. At that time I was running FBG typically between 5-6.
In the last month I have had to stay in a hotel 1 night a week for work & decided to hit the treadmill (not something I enjoy), I have noticed that my FBG is now typically in the 4's or low 5's (though I did have a 3.5 yesterday (no idea how that happened, on a retest 15-20 minutes later I was 3.9)).
 
you are a very focused person Martin. great its working for you. I need to try some of that. I have a very physical job, im a housekeeper in a student accommodation. so at 58 when i get home im very tired and only want to sit. I know that sounds defeatist i suppose I am at this time. I seem to be in a vicious circle. Need to eat enough to get me through my day but not enough to raise my levels. Its very easy to hypo if i dont take care while im at work .
Luckly i have a fab boss who understands what its all about. Her mother is type 2
How do you feel at 3.5? I would be in a mess. What did you do to get it to raise?
 
persephone said:
Its very easy to hypo if i dont take care while im at work .
Luckly i have a fab boss who understands what its all about. Her mother is type 2
How do you feel at 3.5? I would be in a mess. What did you do to get it to raise?
Click to expand...
Fist, going hypo is not something that a T2 not on hypo inducing meds would normally do, I think in this case it was because I'd got too little sleep on top of having a couple of pints (I rarely drink beer these days) I needed to leave at 0400 to get to the office for 0700.... The feeling (this time) was sweating, light headed... I knew instantly what it was & was surprised when my meter confirmed it (thought I would be near 4.0). I have been in conditions where I'd be having shakes & confusion, the lowest I ever recorded was 2.4, in those days I didn't know enough to realize how dangerous that level was....
As for getting it to raise, I joke that I took a Lisinopril & that tastes like it's pure sugar, but I retested about 15 minutes later & I was 3.9 BG on the way up & ready to drive to the office....
 
persephone said:
Hi Maz2
Yorkshire lads are unique. My dad was a Yorkshire lad. I love whitby. My hubby and i are bikers.. Whitby is biker heaven. The ride over the moors is fantastic
Click to expand...
That area is good for M/bikes ,Fish & Chips :D
 
Sounds like a very long day for you Martin.
HOBIE ...perfection M/Bikes and Fish and chips. You know Whitby well....and dracula 😱
 
Hi @persephone & welcome to the forum.🙂 I have never taken meds for my Type 2 & have managed to get it down to non diabetic levels just by diet & exercise. Although my total cholesterol levels are high, my ratios (HDL/LDL/Trigs) are spot on which means I've never been advised to take statins (though this took a while to prove this to the GP). Personally though, I would still like my LDL to be lower, though I haven't been tested for over a year so with any luck it has already come down. Oh, and just to complicate things, there is good & bad LDL too, but the NHS will not do LDL breakdown due to cost.
 
Hi, @persephone, from a fellow T2 on insulin too, last 6 years!

Lanny 🙂

I’ve been using an app on iPhone called mySgr. The free version can be upgraded to the full pro version if you keep using the app to note your readings for free so, no need to buy that! Taming the diabetes monster is quite fun as it makes little noises in reaction to your readings! Groans, giggles etc. for bad or good readings. They make me laugh & lift the gloom a bit when I get a bad/high reading! Apart from that little bit of fun, there is a very useful estimated, based on your readings, HbA1c reading & fortnightly reports sent by email to you & can also print out for doctors & nurses etc. You can track readings, weight, food, exercise, insulin & medication doses on the app. There are challenges you can do in regards to blood sugar & exercise targets.

Thanks to @Flower , for posting this app on a post, I’ve been using it since March 2018!
 
Hi Mark, i take my hat off to you for your sucess in taming the sugar monster. I dont think i have the drive to beat it this way..
Hi Lanni. thanks for the info on the app. ill go look for it. it seems just what im looking for. I thought it would be a better way than a paper diary cos im just the one to loose it or forget to take it with me. at least ive usually got my phone
HOBIE i know what you mean, met a few in my time
 
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