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Incensed!

bev said:
Hi!
So if not all diabetes type 1 is genetic - what is the cause? Do we know? Bev
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Although there can be a genetic link sometimes, it appears this isnt the cause. They simply dont know the cause, although they(scientists/doctors etc), believe in a lot of cases a virus in the body can cause an autoimmune response, we simply attack our own beta cells in the pancreas and kill it off. (something like that!), but truth is it cant be proved, and in my case i do not remember being ill before hand, although some can pinpoint an illness, for some we will just never know. Hope this helps.
 
No-one in my family, immediate or extended, has/had diabetes. My father, however, has suffered from psoriasis for many years, and I believe that this is also thought to possibly have autoimmune origins, so maybe that's some kind of link for me. I certainly haven't had any clear and definitive answer from any of the health professionals I have asked, so the bottom line is that they don't really know...!
 
Thanks goodness for that! I'd lost my login password and couldn't get in...

Anyway, the news on the BBC site today / ITV / Channel 4 has angered me beyond belief.

The headline virtually reads ' If you're fat and feckless and too lazy to do anything other than stuff McDonalds in your gob, you'll be punished with Diabetes, and it's your own fault '

Tossers.

No mention of bereavement, surgery, or an accident affecting your insulin levels. No mention of the fact that it's a complete mystery for some people as to why diabetes occurs. Not even a mention that it's merely an exacerbation - just that a Royle family type with a large stomach will end up with something they deserve if they don't start acting properly.

The TV coverage shows slothful waddling feckless people eating fast food / lard in slow motion with a soft focus on a fat belly. The coverage is sensationalist journalism at its worst.

.....and people lap this up. Such utter and complete garbage.
 
and just to add... my post isn't attacking larger people - I was larger than average, and eating healthily, exercising and unable to shift weight. I wasn't having a marathon binge of Mars Bars like the coverage mentioned, implying we're all simpletons.
 
I did do some research when he was first diagnosed and the only 'link' that i can think of is that 1 year (almost to the day )before , Alex had to be hospitalised with an 'inverted absess' on his bottom! The research suggested that there could be a link to genital infections etc. I dont know whether this is accurate or not - but i am wondering why some people with type 1 are 'upset' with the tag of 'genetic link'? I am not being critical - i just dont understand? :)Bev:)
 
bev said:
I did do some research when he was first diagnosed and the only 'link' that i can think of is that 1 year (almost to the day )before , Alex had to be hospitalised with an 'inverted absess' on his bottom! The research suggested that there could be a link to genital infections etc. I dont know whether this is accurate or not - but i am wondering why some people with type 1 are 'upset' with the tag of 'genetic link'? I am not being critical - i just dont understand? :)Bev:)
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Hi Bev, no i am not upset by a "tag", my problem and i presume that of others is that when news/media reports go out they are not correct. There may be a genetic link to some people with type one, but as we have said this is not the absolute cause. I am upset that type one and indeed type two are reported in a lame way, as if they cant be bothered to get all the facts right and educate the rest of the population properly. I totally understand where Paul and others are upset too in the fact that it is "assummed" if you are fat and cant be botherd to do anything about it then you will probably get type 2! Infact i have just written a lenghty complaint on the radio 1 website, not only about the reporting of type one today, but that of type two also.
 
Blimey, I've just read my post again.

I'm an angry bunny. You shouldn't laugh at your own stuff, but I was laughing at how Victor Meldrew I sounded, though hopefully a little more articulate than him.

I'm still just a bit sensitive that the message, though right in some ways, and hopefully encouraging education, is rather wide of the mark in so many ways.

I just wish they would show someone with Type 2 diabetes (or Type 1 for that matter) as the rest of us are - normal. The thing that is so insidious and concerning is that (as we all know) diabetes can strike anyone at any time. Sadly, Steven Redgrave, that great Diabetic Ambassador doesn't seem to be headline news for our skewed press. Misreporting can be very dangerous, and that's another fear for me.
 
Good for you ! Let us know if they bother to reply to you? Although i think a lot of people will be complaining given the way they have been reporting it. I am hoping the children at school wont 'tease' Alex tomorrow -as the report was saying kids with diabetes eat too much food! Only once in the report did they mention type 2. Bev
 
hi all i heard the radio broadcast on radio 2 while out working and thought it was a good thing to have, but the facts were wrong on all accounts. yes type 2 occurs due to being obese but there are also other contributing factors!!!!

the type 1 explanation totally blew me away as i have not inherited it at all!!!!! my pancreas just stopped working due to being attacked by a virus that killed my beta cells. how can someone from diabetes uk be so irresponsible?? i was so angry that i had to switch the cd player on to try and calm down!!!! i would love to be able to help put the point of diabetics across and i was thinking maybe we should put some sort of press release together regarding what we all know as diabetics and send it to the major radio stations??

mike
 
It annoyed me what that GP said on the breakfast news this morning. She said that some Type 2 Diabetics if they lose weight they can get rid of Diabetes. I completely disagree. You never get rid of diabetes. Granted you might be able to get near normal levels but I thought you never got rid of diabetes. Is this a inappropriate statemtn to make?
 
it's annoying because it's completely wrong. I've lost over 3 stone and I'm still diabetic. Even if I get normal levels, I don't stop being diabetic or having the associated problems and risks.
 
Agreed. If you're diagnosed diabetic, you're diabetic, plain and simple.........like the GP this morning!
 
I am just furious if this did in fact come from a complete, not edited statement from DUK.

This 'genetic' marker business for T1 like so many others is meant to indicate a greater possibility of developing the genetically marked illness.
A study many years ago showed a link between a physical or emotional trauma and onset of T1.

Onset of T2 with increasing age seems also to have been lost in the archives.

Don't forget that stress can upset bs levels and BP.
I just feel sorry for youngsters and those who are treated as some sort of lepers because they are not gold medal Olympians
 
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Many types of diabetes have some genetic element but it may be stronger for type 2 than for type 1.
'if you have type 2 diabetes, the risk of your child getting diabetes is 1 in 7 if you were diagnosed before age 50 and 1 in 13 if you were diagnosed after age 50. '
If you have an identical twin with diabetes then you have a 75% chance of also developing it. It is difficult to separate out environmental factors (most people develop their eating and exercise patterns for example in the family)

MODY is very strongly genetic, some of the specific MODY genes have been discovered. There is a very specific inheritance pattern. If you have a parent with it then you have 50% chance of developing it.

People with type 1a (autoimmune) seem to have a specific genetic predisposition but it takes an environmental factor to actually trigger the condition. ( a virus, the time of the year, lack of vit D, infant feeding patterns, immunisation are amongst the suggested culprits). 'If you are a man with type 1 diabetes, the odds of your child getting diabetes are 1 in 17 If you are a woman with type 1 diabetes and your child was born before you were 25, your child's risk is 1 in 25; if your child was born after you turned 25, your child's risk is 1 in 100. Your child's risk is doubled if you developed diabetes before age 11. If both you and your partner have type 1 diabetes, the risk is between 1 in 10 and 1 in 4' . If you have an identical twin with diabetes then you have a less than 1 in 2 chance of developing it.(inheritance figures in quotes from the ADA website)
There are also people with 1b (idiopathic/unknown origin) and nobody knows why they develop it!
In addition some cases of diabetes are caused by trauma, drugs or another illness, for example people with too much iron in their blood can develop diabetes.
 
I am a type 2 diabetic, and I am overweight, my brother is a type 2 diabetic and is not over weight, my maternal uncle is type 1 and has been since he was very young, several of my friends are type 2 and one in particular is probably underweight - Arthur Smith does not appear to be overweight, so I would assume type 2 can be inherited.:confused::confused:
 
You can have a predisposition to Diabetes, sure. I have absolutely no one in my family with diabetes so it's certainly not genetically linked as far as I am concerned.

I had signs of diabetes for around 3 years, but tests all revealed normal blood sugars.

My diabetes came on within a week of quite a serious car accident where my insulin levels were massively affected.

I eat incredibly healthily before diagnosis and lived a good lifestyle. I didn't feast myself on Recycled crap from KFC and was a gym member. I don't drink and don't smoke.

So, statistics aside, I don't figure in that data. Diabetes sufferers don't fit into a box of terminally unhealthy or feckless and fat as the media seems to want to portray. I take real exception to the sensational headlines peddled and feel that the entirely wrong message has been circulated.
 
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Admin said:
Maybe for you Lizzie - but certainly not for me and a lot of others. It's like most things with diabetes - everything put under one blanket and what's right for one is not for another. What I objected to in the report was it was making the assumption that all people with Type 1 diabetes had it because they had inherited it - and this just isn't so.
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Fair enough. But I am impressed that the media now seems to know that 2 types of diabetes exist, that seems to be a recent development. We can't expect too much - there are word limits for articles, and BBC news website articles seem especially short so there is not enough room to explain exactly what each type of diabetes is, what causes it etc.
 
paulnicholls said:
The TV coverage shows slothful waddling feckless people eating fast food / lard in slow motion with a soft focus on a fat belly. The coverage is sensationalist journalism at its worst.

.....and people lap this up. Such utter and complete garbage.
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I agree Paul. I hate those 'headless fatty' photos and footage. It is so nasty and dehumanising not to see someone's face. And heaven help a fat person who is caught actually eating something by these photographers. If anyone is interested a British writer called Charlotte Cooper has written a really good article about this and why it is so offensive at http://www.charlottecooper.net/docs/fat/headless_fatties.htm
 
What an interesting article Lizzie. Excellent, I like thought provoking journalism.

Isn't it funny that Getty Images were recently locked in a battle with a church for using a stock picture of a church spire owned by them? They were after a phenomenal amount of money calculated on a daily basis, yet they seem perfectly content to take pictures of people very obviously without their consent or payment.

My point was on a tangent really, we're lumped into the 'headless fatty phenomenon' as diabetics by the link to obesity. Some of us are, some of us aren't, yet there's this very nannying 'careful you don't eat like a pig, or you'll 'catch' diabetes' element.

Anway, thanks for that link Lizzie, that was ever so interesting.
 
I agree with the writer of this article wholeheartedly - but i wonder why she is re-printing all the pictures - surely she is just adding fuel to the fire? Bev
 
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