New to Forum Dawn Swepstone

[SawleyDawn]

Thanks to the team for accepting me. Diagnosed with type 2 August last year. Managed to get my count down but can't seem to keep it there. Not on any medication. Looking for advice and finding out if I am doing something wrong, hoping to gain that from you guys with your own knowledge and experience.

 

[Inka]

Welcome @SawleyDawn 🙂 There are lots of friendly people here who can give advice.

Are you sticking to any particular diet? Do you test your own blood sugar at home?

 

[KARNAK]

Hello @SawleyDawn welcome to our wonderful forum.🙂 If you can answer @Inka`s questions we can start to help you.

 

[Ralph-YK]

Welcome to the forum Sawley, from a fellow T2.
Do you know your HbA1c results? Are you keeping a food diary, along with a record of your levels?

 

[SawleyDawn]

Welcome @SawleyDawn 🙂 There are lots of friendly people here who can give advice.

Are you sticking to any particular diet? Do you test your own blood sugar at home?

Hi there, thanks for the welcome. I do test my blood sugar at home about 10ish in a morning as read somewhere best to stick to the same time of day. When first diagnosed I went on low carbs sticking to between 30-40 a day which bought my reading down to 6. Now it has just crept back up again although I am keeping my carbs reasonably low. Do have an underactive thyroid so perhaps that does'nt help.

 

[SawleyDawn]

Welcome to the forum Sawley, from a fellow T2.
Do you know your HbA1c results? Are you keeping a food diary, along with a record of your levels?

Hi according to my blood monitor my reading this morning was 10.8. I am keeping a food diary counting my carbs and cals.

 

[SawleyDawn]

Hello @SawleyDawn welcome to our wonderful forum.🙂 If you can answer @Inka`s questions we can start to help you.

Thanks for the welcome

 

[ColinUK]

Hi Dawn, fellow T2 here.
It’s great that you’re testing but is there any possibility of testing more frequently? I can’t speak for everyone but a lot of folks test when they wake up in the morning, before eating a meal, 90 mins after starting the meal and then again before bed.
I know that seems like an awful lot of testing but it’s really enlightening to get a full understanding of what is happening to your BG levels throughout the day. I add that I don’t do that every day but if I’m having trouble with my BG then I will - normally I’ll just do first thing in the morning and around the main meal of the day. I be taken to doing the just before bed one because I like to see the change overnight.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Welcome to the forum @SawleyDawn

Well done on your low carb efforts so far. Sorry things seem to have changed.

Checking before and after meals is a well-worn and very successful strategy for many members here. If you find the idea of it all at once a bit overwhelming, you could always focus on one meal at a time to begin with. And gradually build up a picture of the way different foods ade affecting you, and try to tweak meals so that the rise you get between the before and after tests is only 2-3mmol/L.

This ‘test, review, adjust’ approach might really help: https://loraldiabetes.blogspot.com/2006/10/test-review-adjust.html

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

The other thing I find myself wondering, is about your diagnosis story.

If you don’t mind me asking, what age were you diagnosed? And did it come on suddenly? Is there a history of T2 in your family or was it out of the blue? Did you lose weight before you were diagnosed?

Its just that sometimes a sudden change in diabetes behaviour fairly soon after diagnosis sometimes benefits from a little investigation. It may be that you need the support of some meds, or it might be that you have one of the rarer sub-types of diabetes like LADA.

I may be completely wrong of course!

 

[trophywench]

I wonder the same as Mike - especially since you've now said you're hypothyroid - which is of course an auto immune condition. Tell me - does the amount of Levothyroxine you are on keep your TSH level reliably well under 3?

 

[SawleyDawn]

The other thing I find myself wondering, is about your diagnosis story.

If you don’t mind me asking, what age were you diagnosed? And did it come on suddenly? Is there a history of T2 in your family or was it out of the blue? Did you lose weight before you were diagnosed?

Its just that sometimes a sudden change in diabetes behaviour fairly soon after diagnosis sometimes benefits from a little investigation. It may be that you need the support of some meds, or it might be that you have one of the rarer sub-types of diabetes like LADA.

I may be completely wrong of course!

I was 67 when diagnosed last year. I started having urine infections that would not clear up with the normal amount of antibiotics. So they eventually gave me a blood test and I got a phone call to say I was diabetic. Looking back there were signs which I didn't realise at the time. In March last year I had an accident which resulted in a very deep cut on my shin. That took 3 months to heal. July time thirsty but I was drinking a lot due to urine infection. To be honest I felt adrift after diagnosis as I didn't know what to do. Got a book from the library which helped. I was losing weight prior to diagnosis by myself and have since lost another 2 stone. I have to stick to 20 to 40 carbs a day plus some fasting to get it down but as soon as I relax a little it goes back up again. Sorry about war and peace lol.

 

[SawleyDawn]

I wonder the same as Mike - especially since you've now said you're hypothyroid - which is of course an auto immune condition. Tell me - does the amount of Levothyroxine you are on keep your TSH level reliably well under 3?

Hi can't really answer that, drs never tell me what it is just say I'm in the range. I'm on 75mg a day. After just the short conversations with you and Mike I realise that my diagnosis needs looking at more closely.

 

[SawleyDawn]

Hi Dawn, fellow T2 here.
It’s great that you’re testing but is there any possibility of testing more frequently? I can’t speak for everyone but a lot of folks test when they wake up in the morning, before eating a meal, 90 mins after starting the meal and then again before bed.
I know that seems like an awful lot of testing but it’s really enlightening to get a full understanding of what is happening to your BG levels throughout the day. I add that I don’t do that every day but if I’m having trouble with my BG then I will - normally I’ll just do first thing in the morning and around the main meal of the day. I be taken to doing the just before bed one because I like to see the change overnight.

Hi there. Have taken on board what you have said and will be starting to do that. Thanks

 

[trophywench]

Re TSH, they diagnose us hypothyroid when the TSH test result is over 3, hence many GPs think as long as the amount of Levo-T they've prescribed brings us back to about 3, we're fine. However - years ago - I had a normal hospital diabetes clinic appointment when the consultant wasn't there so they'd got another Endocrinologist (not specifically diabetes) to stand in for him and it was he who first said to me that they now agreed (Endos generally) that people who also had diabetes seemed to do better nearer 1 than 3. My GP (elderly and now retired) agreed with him, and continued upping my dose until we got there and stayed there.

I'm on 112.5g a day - 100g not enough, 125g a bit too much, so I take 100g daily, and the extra 25g every other day!

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

I was 67 when diagnosed last year. I started having urine infections that would not clear up with the normal amount of antibiotics. So they eventually gave me a blood test and I got a phone call to say I was diabetic. Looking back there were signs which I didn't realise at the time. In March last year I had an accident which resulted in a very deep cut on my shin. That took 3 months to heal. July time thirsty but I was drinking a lot due to urine infection. To be honest I felt adrift after diagnosis as I didn't know what to do. Got a book from the library which helped. I was losing weight prior to diagnosis by myself and have since lost another 2 stone. I have to stick to 20 to 40 carbs a day plus some fasting to get it down but as soon as I relax a little it goes back up again. Sorry about war and peace lol.

Thanks for all the details @SawleyDawn

I think it might be helpful to ask your GP or nurse about the rapid change in your levels recently, and to make sure they know that you are restricting your carbohydrate intake quite dramatically.

There are a few checks that you could have done which might act as a useful check, such as GAD antibody and C-Peptide. The first can help evaluate if there might be an autoimmune element to your diabetes, and C-Peptide checks how much insulin you are producing yourself - if C-Peptide levels are low, you may well need to take insulin as you are not producing enough of your own.