Lewis Mushin
New Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
My names is Lewis Clark, I live in the UK, Im a type one diabetic (have been all my life) and a meditation teacher 🙂
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Please Remember: Members are only permitted to share their own experiences. Members are not qualified to give medical advice. Additionally, everyone manages their health differently. Please be respectful of other people's opinions about their own diabetes management.
Hey everyone, I'm new here hope you are all well
- Thread starter Lewis Mushin
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rebrascora
Well-Known Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Hi Lewis and welcome
What took you so long to find us here on the forum or perhaps I should ask what prompted you to reach out to fellow diabetics now particularly?
Would you like to tell us abit about your diabetes and how you manage it... ie which insulin(s) do you use? MDI or pump? Do you have Libre or some other CGM? How well you manage it or any particular difficulties or frustrations.... we all have those right!
Anyway, look forward to hearing more from you and hope you find the forum as supportive and beneficial as I have over the past 2.5 years since diagnosis... I'm a late starter with Type 1
Oh and if you fancy getting to know many of us a bit better feel free to join us on the "Group 7-day waking average" thread. These days we don't bother so much with weekly averages but just log in with our waking reading each morning and exchange a bit of news/banter/frustrations and success stories with each other. It is a massively long thread so don't try to read it from the beginning, just jump right in tomorrow with your morning reading and say hello and I am sure you will soon get the hang of it and get to know us and vice versa.... We treat is more as a sort of virtual coffee morning. Hope to see you there tomorrow. Link below to the thread in question...
What took you so long to find us here on the forum or perhaps I should ask what prompted you to reach out to fellow diabetics now particularly?
Would you like to tell us abit about your diabetes and how you manage it... ie which insulin(s) do you use? MDI or pump? Do you have Libre or some other CGM? How well you manage it or any particular difficulties or frustrations.... we all have those right!
Anyway, look forward to hearing more from you and hope you find the forum as supportive and beneficial as I have over the past 2.5 years since diagnosis... I'm a late starter with Type 1
Oh and if you fancy getting to know many of us a bit better feel free to join us on the "Group 7-day waking average" thread. These days we don't bother so much with weekly averages but just log in with our waking reading each morning and exchange a bit of news/banter/frustrations and success stories with each other. It is a massively long thread so don't try to read it from the beginning, just jump right in tomorrow with your morning reading and say hello and I am sure you will soon get the hang of it and get to know us and vice versa.... We treat is more as a sort of virtual coffee morning. Hope to see you there tomorrow. Link below to the thread in question...
Lewis Mushin
New Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Hey Rebrascora, Thank you for a lovely warm welcome!
What prevented me from joining all this time? I would have to say ignorance and ego for that one. The main reason for joining is that I wanted to share my diabetic journey with others. Speaking form experience it can be a very heavy burden I went around 10 years (my teens and early 20's) not caring about it at all, I had a HbA1c of on average 120 (20 mmol average) over the 10 years, turns out trying to live the chad life style with zero control isnt a great idea. I developed retinopathy and macadamia at the age of 21 (if you dont know these conditions can lead to blindness) and now have eye injections and laser treatment to prevent anymore loss of sight, I cant tell you now I would rather watch paint dry then have an eye injection.
Moving on to the greener grasses after being scared out of my **** skin, I have a very strict low carb, high fat and high protein diet, I am currently using Levemir at night and Novo Rapid throughout the day, I'm using the Libre sensors for testing, I go for long walks every day to keep fit and healthy, I tried the gym but when I lifted a weight a load of blood vessels popped in my eye and I couldn't see for a month, so that's a no go.
I manage my diabetes probably over the top now just because of what happened. My HbA1c is now 40 (6 mmol average) so pretty happy with that, I have a very low carb diet just enough to stay out of ketosis but low enough that I dont have to jab 20 times a day to avoid spikes.
What prevented me from joining all this time? I would have to say ignorance and ego for that one. The main reason for joining is that I wanted to share my diabetic journey with others. Speaking form experience it can be a very heavy burden I went around 10 years (my teens and early 20's) not caring about it at all, I had a HbA1c of on average 120 (20 mmol average) over the 10 years, turns out trying to live the chad life style with zero control isnt a great idea. I developed retinopathy and macadamia at the age of 21 (if you dont know these conditions can lead to blindness) and now have eye injections and laser treatment to prevent anymore loss of sight, I cant tell you now I would rather watch paint dry then have an eye injection.
Moving on to the greener grasses after being scared out of my **** skin, I have a very strict low carb, high fat and high protein diet, I am currently using Levemir at night and Novo Rapid throughout the day, I'm using the Libre sensors for testing, I go for long walks every day to keep fit and healthy, I tried the gym but when I lifted a weight a load of blood vessels popped in my eye and I couldn't see for a month, so that's a no go.
I manage my diabetes probably over the top now just because of what happened. My HbA1c is now 40 (6 mmol average) so pretty happy with that, I have a very low carb diet just enough to stay out of ketosis but low enough that I dont have to jab 20 times a day to avoid spikes.
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NotWorriedAtAll
Well-Known Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 2
- Pronouns
- She/They
Hello Lewis.
Welcome to the forum.
I recently started doing some meditation to reduce anxiety and stress and found it worked wonders at helping keep my blood sugars stable. I have been completely won over after being quite sceptical about it.
Welcome to the forum.
I recently started doing some meditation to reduce anxiety and stress and found it worked wonders at helping keep my blood sugars stable. I have been completely won over after being quite sceptical about it.
Lewis Mushin
New Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Hey,
I started to meditate because of the medal battle, I had so many thoughts going through my head about going blind that thats all i could think about, I then later found my sugar levels stabilizing over time while meditating, I personally think its a great addition!
admc26
Well-Known Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Hi @Lewis Mushin, and a very warm welcome to the forum!
Thank you for sharing that with us! It's always really interesting to find out people's experiences with diabetes. And I'm glad to hear that you're back on track with it now. Growing up with T1D through teenage years is certainly no easy feat and I think you've done a great job to get to where you are now despite any bumpy patches along the way!
Please feel free to ask any questions or jump into threads to give advice from your experiences as we would all really welcome your input!
Thank you for sharing that with us! It's always really interesting to find out people's experiences with diabetes. And I'm glad to hear that you're back on track with it now. Growing up with T1D through teenage years is certainly no easy feat and I think you've done a great job to get to where you are now despite any bumpy patches along the way!
Please feel free to ask any questions or jump into threads to give advice from your experiences as we would all really welcome your input!
Lewis Mushin
New Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Thank you!
mark king
Well-Known Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Welcome @Lewis Mushin there are plenty of knowledgeable members on here who are a valuable source of assistance on all manner of subjects.
Maybe you could add to the knowledge bank and share a simple Meditation method so that we all might try.
Stay safe.
Maybe you could add to the knowledge bank and share a simple Meditation method so that we all might try.
Stay safe.
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Welcome to the forum @Lewis Mushin
Glad you have found an approach that works for you. Hope your improved BG management helps stabilise your eyes and that your laser treatment is successful 🙂
We have a few members who have experienced various stages of retinopathy, maculopathy, and laser surgery for you to compare experiences with.
Glad you have found an approach that works for you. Hope your improved BG management helps stabilise your eyes and that your laser treatment is successful 🙂
We have a few members who have experienced various stages of retinopathy, maculopathy, and laser surgery for you to compare experiences with.
Lewis Mushin
New Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Thank you @everydayupsanddowns I cant have anymore laser now the retina is to scared, this might sound strange but im glad i cant have any more done, I hated laser haha
mark king
Well-Known Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Hello @Lewis Mushin I too have had eye treatments starting with the Laser to stop the small veins in the eye bleeding and clouding my vision.
I now have had both Cataracts done, there was quite a time gap between all these treatments and finally yesterday some more Laser work.
This was carried out in the same way ie chin on a rest with forehead pressed forward up agains a rail to keep steady for the Laser.
This is a very different laser to the one used for cauterising the small blood vessels which is a very bright beam of light while this latest one they tell you to clench your teeth and then they ping away.
You feel no pain only a little "BIP" sound in your head as they fire the laser. The process take minutes it's super quick.
Best
I now have had both Cataracts done, there was quite a time gap between all these treatments and finally yesterday some more Laser work.
This was carried out in the same way ie chin on a rest with forehead pressed forward up agains a rail to keep steady for the Laser.
This is a very different laser to the one used for cauterising the small blood vessels which is a very bright beam of light while this latest one they tell you to clench your teeth and then they ping away.
You feel no pain only a little "BIP" sound in your head as they fire the laser. The process take minutes it's super quick.
Best
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rebrascora
Well-Known Member
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Hi again Lewis
Thanks for your update. For some reason I didn't get notification of your reply so apologies for my delayed response.
I watched your video clip on your other thread so I now understand a lot more about your journey and challenges. I hope my opening comment "What took you so long to find us here on the forum" didn't seem flippant, particularly when you have been through such a difficult period. I can't begin to imagine what it must be like to try to navigate through adolescence and young adulthood with diabetes as a hanger on. Not surprising that you struggled but absolute respect to you for your current positive mental attitude and I hope that your fantastic control now will go a long way to stabilizing things with your eyesight etc.
I too have chosen the low carb high fat and protein route. For me I was a sugar addict pre diagnosis and came into diabetes as assumed to be Type 2 which with hindsight was really beneficial for me as it gave me the impetus to try to reverse it and as a result I went pretty well cold turkey with the sugar and sweet stuff in the first few weeks, gradually cutting more and more carbs from my diet to try to get levels into the normal range. By the time I was started on insulin, I was very low carb (approx. 20g carbs a day) but also low fat and low salt and whilst I didn't find it enjoyable I would have done anything to push it back and I confess that I cried when they told me I wasn't going to be successful and needed insulin. I was then told to eat normally which I had no idea what that meant, going form very high carb diet to very low, but then, thanks to this forum, I discovered that fat was my friend and I can now keep my carbs low so that I don't get into that vicious cycle of craving, but still enjoy my food and I feel fitter and healthier than I have for many years.
Meditation is something that I need to get into a habit of practicing on a regular basis not just once in a blue moon when I have a panic attack, so perhaps you joining the forum will help to motivate and encourage me to set time aside for something which I have no doubt will improve my quality of life and diabetes management. The calmness and thoughtfulness in your whole attitude in that video was really inspirational. Thanks for posting it.
Thanks for your update. For some reason I didn't get notification of your reply so apologies for my delayed response.
I watched your video clip on your other thread so I now understand a lot more about your journey and challenges. I hope my opening comment "What took you so long to find us here on the forum" didn't seem flippant, particularly when you have been through such a difficult period. I can't begin to imagine what it must be like to try to navigate through adolescence and young adulthood with diabetes as a hanger on. Not surprising that you struggled but absolute respect to you for your current positive mental attitude and I hope that your fantastic control now will go a long way to stabilizing things with your eyesight etc.
I too have chosen the low carb high fat and protein route. For me I was a sugar addict pre diagnosis and came into diabetes as assumed to be Type 2 which with hindsight was really beneficial for me as it gave me the impetus to try to reverse it and as a result I went pretty well cold turkey with the sugar and sweet stuff in the first few weeks, gradually cutting more and more carbs from my diet to try to get levels into the normal range. By the time I was started on insulin, I was very low carb (approx. 20g carbs a day) but also low fat and low salt and whilst I didn't find it enjoyable I would have done anything to push it back and I confess that I cried when they told me I wasn't going to be successful and needed insulin. I was then told to eat normally which I had no idea what that meant, going form very high carb diet to very low, but then, thanks to this forum, I discovered that fat was my friend and I can now keep my carbs low so that I don't get into that vicious cycle of craving, but still enjoy my food and I feel fitter and healthier than I have for many years.
Meditation is something that I need to get into a habit of practicing on a regular basis not just once in a blue moon when I have a panic attack, so perhaps you joining the forum will help to motivate and encourage me to set time aside for something which I have no doubt will improve my quality of life and diabetes management. The calmness and thoughtfulness in your whole attitude in that video was really inspirational. Thanks for posting it.
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