If I'd known then what I know now......

Status
Not open for further replies.
aymes

aymes

Senior Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 1
My Mums moving house, which means I've got to clear out all my stuff I've been storing (/hoarding) there. So I've been spending today going through boxes of old card, letters, photos etc, all quite fun really!

Anyway, some of you may know I was diagnosed with diabetes when I returned from a year studying abroad. Today I found my medical report that I had to have done for my health insurance before I left. In there it says that I had '++ glucose' in my urine sample. Looking back I do remember that they called me back the next day to give another sample and me and my friends decided that the best thing to do would be to not eat before I went back to make sure there were no problems! Consequently I have a note from my doctor categorically saying ' this patient shows no sign of diabetes....' Oh the irony!

Looking back it appears that I must have been developing diabetes for quite some time before I got really ill. Of course now I realise what a stupid thing starving myself before the test was, but then I had no knowledge of diabetes so just didn't know. And of course if anyone else was telling me the story now I'd be suggesting they had a 3rd test/blood test to confirm things.

Just a general pondering I guess, no real question or message behind the thread!
 
I completely ignored symptoms for about two years until I caught a virus that really floored me. I lost two stone in weight, when I really didn't need to and without explanation, but as a typical bloke it never crossed my mind to go to the doctors!

I wonder what they would have done for you at that time? Do you think the test they took they thought was random rather than fasting?
 
Definately was a random test, well the second was self inflicted fasting I guess.

I don't know what they would have done if they had diagnosed then, would I have been able to go abroad when I was meant to I wonder, would have been a lot to take in in one go.

Interestingly, the doctor who wrote the note saying I was defiately not diabetic was the same one that spotted it when I was misdiagnosed as T2 (by a doc at a different surgery) and got me hurried to the hospital and put on insulin etc. I wonder if she remembered or not....
 
before I was diagnosed I had been back and forwards to my doctors for ages, I'd go the classic sympoms, always thirsty, always tierd, lots of itching in all the usual places. I remeber talking to a friend and complaining to her about it and she prounced you're diabetic. Anyway I went on like this for ages. Then at work there was a health awareness event, which I went to. Had various tests done and they said you're diabetic and sent me to the doctors who asked why I hadn't seen him before till I told him to take a look at my records. Wish I had been a bit more forceful with doctor idiot before!
 
I think what is really terrible is when people like Kei, who has a recently diagnosed little girl, recognises the symptoms in her son, takes him to the doctors and the doctor pronounces him non-diabetic. Then, last night, he ends up in hospital with levels in the 30s. How STUPID are some doctors? How on earth can you have any faith in them with regards to your child's health if they can't even put 1 and 1 together, let alone 2+2?

I have little doubt that I would have been misdiagnosed as Type 2 if I'd gone when my symptoms originally began. At 49, I functioned reasonably well for a couple of years.
 
Despite being a bloke, I did go to Docs for a variety of ailments. I had suffered from depression and was on a course of tablets so saw Doctors regularly. I developed genital problems (presumably sugar related?) which initially I shied away from telling the GP about but it became a bigger issue which I had to take care of.
Then as I stopped my depression meds I was acutely aware of excessive tiredness, especially in the afternoon. Drinking lots of water, but no excess trips to the loo. Eating more sweets to give me energy (BIG mistake).
Consulted the Doc about the tiredness, don?t worry it?s just you coming off the tablets.

Ok. Well I had looked up the symptoms and considered diabetes, but at that time I accepted the Docs would be right. (Hmm, not sure now though).

I moved house, joined a new practice, they took blood. Guess what? Come and see us you have diabetes, a BSG of 24.1. No wonder I was feeling awful.
But unfortunately the diagnosis didn't surprise me.

The rest, as they say, is history. It was a wake up call and has changed my life.
And I don't think medical staff are as knowledgeable as I used to.😱
 
My diagnosis happened all in one day, but I nearly slipped through the net. I went to a walk in clinic, who said 'oh that's nothing, but I'll do a urine test if it would make you feel better'!

Good job I said yes. I got told 'oh, there's quite a lot of sugar there, you might want to see a GP at some point'.

I've spoken to people on my team about this, and they were SO mad at this person for letting me walk away.
 
I think I was diabetic about 3 years prior to diagnosis. I was always thirsty, going to the loo all the time, not sleeping, feeling tired, itching, pins & needles and loss of feeling in my feet. As I worked long hours and did shifts up at the Airport I put the tiredness down to that, and didn't really take much notice of the other symptoms.

The only reason I was diagnosed was because I went to see my doctor because I though I had a reacurrence of a stomach ulcer I'd had a few years before. He asked me how I was feeling generally and when I told him he said he wanted to do some tests. About a week later I got a call from my surgery asking me to make an appointment with my Doctor and when I saw him he told me that I was diabetic!

It was quiet a shock as I didn't really know anything about diabetes at the time, and certainly never thought I would develop it.

Just goes to show how many people take years to be diagnosed.
 
I was only diagnosed as a consequence of investigating something completely unconnected. In retrospect I did have some symptoms of hyperglycemia but these are much the same as the side effects of cardio-vascular drugs that I was taking like beta-blockers. So I when I had a dry mouth and bouts of extreme tiredness I never thought anything of it.
 
I was probably, in fact almost certainly suffering from hyperglycemia for at least 6 months before i finally went to see someone. And that was only after my vision went all blurry which scared me more than the doctors...
 
Thats really interesting Aymes. I like looking at old Dr's letters and things like that.

When my mum first took me to the GP's, we were told it was only hormones and I didn't have diabetes. She finally agreed to a fasting blood test which came back normal. My mum had to push and I was reffered tot he hospital where they did an OGTT and showed that i was clearly diabetic. I wondered what the GP thought when she found out she was wrong. I saw the same GP several years later 1-2 times a week, for other problems and she was fantastic so not a bad one, just made a mistake.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top