There are at least as many, if not more, people diagnosed with Type 1 in adulthood as childhood, it by no means only targets the young. Though I was only 22 when I was diagnosed and had been married and living in our own house for 15 months in some ways I was pleased cos my size 12 clothes were getting baggy so whoo hoo, under 8 stone at last! - if only this weight loss didn't make me feel so bloody awful with raging - by now unquenchable - thirst and constantly needing to wee ..... eventually I did make an appt to see our GP and in between ringing them before the weekend and first appt after 5pm (because I didn't work locally and my husband took me in the car so no money for public transport both ways so couldn't go in a morning) was next Tuesday .. by which time I'd started occasionally getting this weird fluttering sensation inside my ribs so when the doc asked me if I was getting heart palpitations I had to ask if those feelings were palpitations or what if not? Yes apparently. He told me straight off he thought I had diabetes and did I think I could produce a urine sample - oh yes, most definitely, please, cos I was already wondering how I was going to do the 5 minutes walk from here to my house without wetting myself ..... Pee test done by nurse down the corridor and yes, diabetes. Admitted to hospital next morning and had first insulin jab just after lunch.
It was Type 1 and 'they' reckoned had probably been instigated by a gastric virus I'd had in the February, I was off work for a fortnight with that and couldn't eat reasonably till week 2. Really I suppose it was not ever so long after that when the early symptoms started and mom said she thought maybe I had symptoms of diabetes - to which I said Oh stop being so over dramatic, mom! - and let's be absolutely fair here - never once did she say, to my face, WeIl, I told you so.
Any virus can start the auto-immune response that just happens to overwhelm the body's immune response so it 'accidentally' kills off cells that it needs rather than only the ones it's 'supposed' to kill simply because unexpected things do and always will, go awry with it from time to time. You already know that very well.
Diabetes doesn't usually kill you pdq though - so let's concentrate a lot more on staying alive whilst it does its (sometimes unpredictable) thing underneath it all - and that's exactly what the folk on this forum try to promote and pass on whatever things we have found help us, to other folk. But, whatever has helped me will not necessarily help them cos nobody else in the whole world is me - and likewise, you also!
Stay strong and live hopefully- and most importantly to me personally - keep a good sense of humour ! Giggling about stuff when I can is and always has been one of my coping strategies. Thing about 'here' is that whatever folk tell us - somebody if not everybody will 'get' what you're on about.
