husband is diabetic

[Dozydoe]

Trying to find out if anyone has any suggestions that could help my husband. He was diagnosed with type 2 about 2 years ago, and had probably been diabetic then for about 18 months . He was prescribed 4 tablets a day of metformin and had done a good job of reducing his glucose levels and had now been told he could reduce to 2 tablets a day.
However, in what I understand is a common side effect, the medication is affecting his digestive system, in that most nights he is woken by the need to open his bowels any time from 1.30 onwards. After this he finds it difficult to get back to sleep, and if he does do so has a very broken night thereafter. His medication has been changed to the slow release metformin, but this hasn't helped with this problem. Over the last few weeks he's been experimenting with when to take the tablets to see if his body adjusts but the only thing that seems to work is not eating, this is obviously not sustainable.
He had a review a while ago, but while sympathetic, the diabetic nurse couldn't offer any real solution saying metformin is the best.
Anyone here got any ideas, or does he have to accepting permanently sleep deprived?

 

[SB2015]

Welcome to the forum @Dozydoe . Glad that you have found us.

Sorry to hear that your husband is experiencing the problems with taking Metformin. I have no experience of taking this but know that many find that they have to be careful about the time of taking these, usually needing to take them with food.

With T2 Diabetes your husband’s body is not able to make enough insulin for the amount of carbs that he is eating, or the insulin that he is making is not working very well. Does he monitor his glucose levels with finger prick tests? Most Practices do not recommend this and this may be around lack of funding. However many on here find that this helps them to find how the foods they are eating are impacting their levels. This then helps them to make swaps and /or reduce portions sizes in order to bring their levels down. This has enabled some to come off medications (with medical advice).

I will leave it to T2s to give you more info on how they have worked on this.

 

[Toucan]

Hello @Dozydoe and welcome to the forum to you and your husband.
He has done well to get his blood glucose levels down.

He is probably aware that the general advice of when to take the tablets is immediately after eating, but some times it causes less problems if they are taken mid-way through a meal.
Sometimes the bad effects go away after a couple of weeks, but if they persist then I would suggest contacting the medical team again, I think there are alternatives available, or maybe if his blood glucose levels keep improving as @SB2015 suggests, he may be able to cope without any medication.

 

[ColinUK]

When does he take the metformin in relation to eating? If I take a morning dose I'll take it mid morning (which goes against the advice but I found works for me) whereas the evening one I'd take during the meal or immediately after.
I had all the usual side effects before switching to the slow release version however and now it's rare I have any at all. Side effects I mean.

 

[grovesy]

I was advised to take mine with my biggest meal.

 

[Drummer]

Metformin might be the best laxative in the world, but controlling blood glucose by eating only those carbs you can cope with is the only option I would consider. Having tried Metformin for a few weeks along with Atorvastatin, I felt wretched, got to be suicidal, so I stopped taking them. I do need to eat low carb, no more than 40 gm of carbs a day, but am absolutely fine with regard to the type two and also my general wellbeing. Maybe get hold of a glucose meter and argue for less medication with the numbers to back up your argument.

 

[Dozydoe]

Thank you for the above suggestions, I will pass on the information to him .