Type 1 as an Aero Student

[A_Mystery24]

Hello everyone! My name is Anish and I am a recently diagnosed patient with Type 1 Diabetes (end of June this year). All of this stuff still feels quite new to me, even though I think I'm managing it well lol. I am a full time aerospace student on a MEng at Uni of Leic. Glad to have the chance to share my thoughts and learn from you all very soon. Thanks for reading!

 

[Carlos]

Hi Anish and welcome.

Like you I was diagnosed during my degree studies (physics in my case), 30 years ago.

I found that the analytical thought needed in a technical discipline helped with managing my diabetes. There's always the unpredictability that makes the job harder from a human perspective, and that's where a site like this for sharing experiences is invaluable. So ask away, there are many years of collective experience in this forum. It it is likely that any problem you come across will have already been encountered by several users in here, so ask away.

 

[Inka]

Welcome @A_Mystery24 🙂 As @Carlos says, ask away with any questions. Nothing is too trivial to ask.

Do you have a Libre? How are you finding things like carb counting?

 

[Alan44]

Welcome to the forum @A_Mystery24 (Anish)
There are many T1's on the forum who were also diagnosed at a young age, so you are certainly not alone

Ask as many questions as you wish.

Alan 😉

 

[A_Mystery24]

Hi Anish and welcome.

Like you I was diagnosed during my degree studies (physics in my case), 30 years ago.

I found that the analytical thought needed in a technical discipline helped with managing my diabetes. There's always the unpredictability that makes the job harder from a human perspective, and that's where a site like this for sharing experiences is invaluable. So ask away, there are many years of collective experience in this forum. It it is likely that any problem you come across will have already been encountered by several users in here, so ask away.

Hello Carlos,

Yeah I agree with you on using our discipline to manage diabetes - I am most of the time comfortable with a problem-solving perspective so I think using that to deal with hypos, highs, faulty sensors etc really helps. You must be fully settled in your job so is it any different when managing diabetes in your career compared to university?

 

[A_Mystery24]

Welcome @A_Mystery24 🙂 As @Carlos says, ask away with any questions. Nothing is too trivial to ask.

Do you have a Libre? How are you finding things like carb counting?

Hello Inka,

Yes I just switched back to Libre as I was facing multiple issues with signal losses for previous sensors and called the team up three times last month.

I ended up trying dexcom+ sensor but overall I prefer the Libre, mainly due to the app's UI and data.

Ermm for carb counting my diet usually consists of Indian foods lol. So its harder to quantify how much but when I do get the chance I do weigh out how much I eat for rice, chapatti etc. Also following the unit per 10g carbs sounds and suits me but maybe too early to say.

 

[A_Mystery24]

Welcome to the forum @A_Mystery24 (Anish)
There are many T1's on the forum who were also diagnosed at a young age, so you are certainly not alone

Ask as many questions as you wish.

Alan

Hi Alan,

Where do I go from here - so I can continue asking questions in specific forums? (I've never used such a website/blog like this to receive others' advice)

And there's no app version for this? Coming from a technical mindset, and app would be more efficient to navigate and use when responding to people's replies. But I'm only a newbie so I'm sure this suggestion is nothing new lmao

 

[Inka]

Hello Inka,

Yes I just switched back to Libre as I was facing multiple issues with signal losses for previous sensors and called the team up three times last month.

I ended up trying dexcom+ sensor but overall I prefer the Libre, mainly due to the app's UI and data.

Ermm for carb counting my diet usually consists of Indian foods lol. So its harder to quantify how much but when I do get the chance I do weigh out how much I eat for rice, chapatti etc. Also following the unit per 10g carbs sounds and suits me but maybe too early to say.

Carb counting is key to control. It’s a pain at first but once you do the work of weighing/measuring your usual meals then it gets a lot easier. Just FYI, it’s not unusual to have different meal ratios for different meals (ie breakfast, lunch, etc) so keep that in mind.

 

[Inka]

Hi Alan,

Where do I go from here - so I can continue asking questions in specific forums? (I've never used such a website/blog like this to receive others' advice)

And there's no app version for this? Coming from a technical mindset, and app would be more efficient to navigate and use when responding to people's replies. But I'm only a newbie so I'm sure this suggestion is nothing new lmao

Don’t worry about putting a thread in the ‘wrong’ place as it an be moved. The General Messageboard is usually a safe bet:

General Message Board

Use this forum for general chat about diabetes and health issues

forum.diabetes.org.uk

You can tick the box to be notified about replies to your posts. It’s under Account then Preferences.

 

[Anna DUK]

Hi Alan,

Where do I go from here - so I can continue asking questions in specific forums? (I've never used such a website/blog like this to receive others' advice)

And there's no app version for this? Coming from a technical mindset, and app would be more efficient to navigate and use when responding to people's replies. But I'm only a newbie so I'm sure this suggestion is nothing new lmao

Welcome @A_Mystery24. As Inka mentioned, feel free to post new questions either in this same thread or by starting a new one in the General Message Board or in another appropriate one.

We don't have an app but you can bookmark the page on your phone which saves it as an app tile on your phone.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Ermm for carb counting my diet usually consists of Indian foods lol. So its harder to quantify how much but when I do get the chance I do weigh out how much I eat for rice, chapatti etc.

Welcome to the forum @A_Mystery24

You might find the World Foods version of Carbs and Cals useful as you gain experience in eyeballing plates of food and guesstimating their carb count. It’s available as a printed book and app, and has photos showing different portion sizes of a wide range of foods along with carb counts etc. It can be a helpful guide in the early days. As can cooking your own measured portions of various staples and working out what size of ‘pile’, or how many serving spoons that makes when you dish it up.

I was diagnosed in the final year of my degree course, and initially put my symptoms down to stress (though I didn’t feel very stressed at the time!).

Hope the remainder of your studies go well 🙂

 

[SB2015]

Welcome to the forum @A_Mystery24
Glad that you have found us.

There is a lot to get your head round at the start, and it is a very steep learning curve, but plenty of experience to tap into on here, so just ask any questions that arise.

 

[SimonP]

Welcome from another engineer (though I studied mechanical rather than aero, but we're all part of the same big family 🙂)

I'm sure you'll be fine, my only comments are to heed the advice around nocturnal hypos (due to guestimating food dosage when out, then doing exercise: dancing/clubbing and lots of walking between bars, and alcohol consumption), and also that mental effort (for me at least) during exams and lectures (double thermofluids, oh dear!) uses up blood glucose and if you do go low it's not much fun trying to understand (I would always be eating even during lectures and exams) - I'm sure with CGMs and better insulins these days life will be simpler (though I certainly thoroughly enjoyed my student days irrespective and it worked fine even back then.) 🙂

 

[Carlos]

Hello Carlos,

Yeah I agree with you on using our discipline to manage diabetes - I am most of the time comfortable with a problem-solving perspective so I think using that to deal with hypos, highs, faulty sensors etc really helps. You must be fully settled in your job so is it any different when managing diabetes in your career compared to university?

Hi Anish.

I haven't really been hampered by diabetes in my career, you just get used to managing your diabetes as part of your daily life. For me it is just one thing I need to consider, but I've never found it got in the way. For the kind of jobs you, I or @Simon P are doing it is easy to work around the routine, and things like sensors, pens and pumps mean that it doesn't intrude massively in real life.

Carlos

Edit, looks like I tagged the wrong Simon, sorry @Simon P, I meant to tag @SimonP.