TheClockworkDodo
Well-Known Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
I'm so sorry to hear about your son, Helen. There's no way you could have known - but I can understand your feeling that people ought to know, there ought to be more awareness of the signs, and particularly of the fact that type 1 is not just something which develops in childhood.
I developed type 1 when I was 44 and I am very grateful to the optician who told me to get tested for it when I went in with blurred eyesight - she probably saved my life. I had no idea it was possible for a slim adult on a healthy diet to develop diabetes so I couldn't believe it was that. I booked a non-urgent blood test on the off-chance, but a few days before that was due I felt so ill we had to call out an emergency GP. She did a urine test for ketones only because the optician had suggested diabetes, was very surprised to find I had DKA, and sent me straight to hospital, where I was put on an insulin pump and diagnosed with type 1.
Even the hospital diabetes consultants acted as if I were unique - and yet on this forum there are many other people who developed type 1 as an adult, and recent research shows that this is actually quite common. Many members here were given an incorrect diagnosis at first and it took a serious bout of DKA to get them a correct one.
As other people have said, it's not just the general public who need to be aware of the symptoms of diabetes, it's also GPs and other medical professionals. I hope you are able to find ways to campaign - I'm sure everyone here will want to support you in this.
I developed type 1 when I was 44 and I am very grateful to the optician who told me to get tested for it when I went in with blurred eyesight - she probably saved my life. I had no idea it was possible for a slim adult on a healthy diet to develop diabetes so I couldn't believe it was that. I booked a non-urgent blood test on the off-chance, but a few days before that was due I felt so ill we had to call out an emergency GP. She did a urine test for ketones only because the optician had suggested diabetes, was very surprised to find I had DKA, and sent me straight to hospital, where I was put on an insulin pump and diagnosed with type 1.
Even the hospital diabetes consultants acted as if I were unique - and yet on this forum there are many other people who developed type 1 as an adult, and recent research shows that this is actually quite common. Many members here were given an incorrect diagnosis at first and it took a serious bout of DKA to get them a correct one.
As other people have said, it's not just the general public who need to be aware of the symptoms of diabetes, it's also GPs and other medical professionals. I hope you are able to find ways to campaign - I'm sure everyone here will want to support you in this.