Hi 2 months ago I answered a post about diabetes , my doctors nurse had told me I was borderline and it would be my own fault if I developed type 2diabetes so I came home stopped take. Suger in my tea. I eat wholemeal bread lost 8lb in weight had another blood test. Last week and guess what I have now been told I have diabetes
Very strange but I was and still am taking steroids but nurse says that's got nothing too do with it ,I have been given 3 months too see if I can get back to borderline
I am fed up of all this now just leave alone with my lovely community matron
That's my moan now I'm going to sit and eat ten pound of jelly babies !!
Take care everyone
Dorothy
Written by
newlands
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hi Dorothy i'm Alan a type 2 diabetic, i take tablets, and three injections a day every day if you want to end up like me, then please carry on eating your ten pounds of jelly babies.i was once in your position and now i wish i was back to where you are now, may i just say this that having diabetes can kill you if you don't watch what you do, you have the easy part of getting back to borderline i can't, and to say that you have lost weight well done, but having diabetes is not just about losing weight. its all about what we eat. please if you would like any further advice i will be happy to help if not, then please just remember what's been said to you and what i've wrote here. i hope you take note of this i'm not joking. Alan
Thanks Alan I don't even like jelly babies I was joking ,but don't understand why after I have tried I am in this position
My daughter s mother in law only weighs 6stone 8lb. and she has been been diagnosed with diabetes and she attends the same surgery as myself
Seems strange to me that last week it was announced that doctors would be paid extra money for each patient diagnosed with diabetes that they refer to a weight watchers etc.
hi Dorothy sorry if it seamed as though i snapped at you, i just get mad when i hear people say things like that. diabetes is caused by your pancreas that helps your food to be digested and it provides insulin that helps break the fat you store in your body when it needs energy, you don't have to be fat or thin or at any age when you pancreas says ive had enough then there not much you can do, if the doctor or whoever sends you to the diet places like weights watchers or slimming world, it to help you see what right foods to have and foods not to have, when you borderline it mean that your pancreas is still working you just need to cut out some foods that are causing your sugar levels to rise. and just by doing that will able you to stay off medication, i wished i had listened, i was 5 years old when i first was diagnosed with diabetes if i had listened right up until i was 40 years old i would still be on borderline, i'm 49 this year and i'm on tablets and three injections a day, if you can Dorothy stay has you are. the doctors are trying to save the NHS from thousand of pounds a year if they can get people like yourself eating the right foods. your other illness has no effect on diabetes, but by helping yourself to eat good foods may help your lungs i'm not saying it does but you never know. i hope this helps you out, if you need anymore advice please feel free to ask. and by the way jelly babies where my favorite sweets. take care your friend Alan
Hi Alan don't for one minute think you snapped at me its just strange that one minute I'm borderline then I cut down on carbs, stop taking suger ,reading labels too see how much supger is in the product drinking water then bang I have diabetes
But it was the week after Christmas and I had been on steroids for 7 days any way Alan I do hope things go ok with you
So you have type one diabetes that's a different ball game altogether from type 2 what they are telling me I have
hi Dorothy good morning type one diabetes is were you pancreas have stopped working altogether, you will find it hard to start with looking at labels not have your favorite things anymore, but you will be surprised at what you can eat, the best label to look for is the ones that say sugar free then you won't have to spend all day in the supermarket looking at labels, i can't take sugar full stop i'm allergic to natural cane sugar which means if i had a cuppa with sugar in it, it would knock my out, i'm also allergic to honey, if having that its like giving me a bomb.
but not to scared the living daylights out of you, just check the label to see if its says sugar free your o.k, but also portion size for you meals as well. anyway i hope this helps please feel free to ask again i'm 49 in a couple of months and had diabetes since i was five. say know more take care your friend Alan
Hi Alan don't where my reply went that's twice it's happened My matron just been she seems very puzzled as to why I have been diagnosed as having diabetes so she is having a word with the doctor
hi Dorothy have you had a blood test and a urine test done, if you have then that's were they have notices something that's gone off in your body, don't worry if you keep to eating health foods you will be ok and try and keep you weight down, i don't know what you weight at the moment by try if possibly to keep you weight at what your comfortable at, by doing that you will be o.k take care remember always here for advice if needed your new friend Alan
hi Dorothy no that's ok i have them twice a year, what its for is to see if you have any protein in your blood or unrine, that's how they can tell what's what. if you keep to the healthy diet you will be ok. may i ask where are you from, i live in worksop nottinghamshire. take care speak to you later your friend Alan xx
hi Dorothy not to far away then. take care and like i say if you need anymore advice regarding your diabetes you know where to come take care your friend Alan xx
I dont understand why your nurse can be so sure that your diabetes has nothing to do with steroids Dorothy. Id ask for a second opinion if i were you as steroid induced diabetes can be a fairly standard side effect of taking steroids regularly. Losing weight must help anyway so well done with that.
Yes I'm really getting fed up of different nurses opinions , it's the same with respiratory nurses one says one thing and another will say something entirely different I just listen to my community nurse now and she s coming tomorrow
I don't know how they can be sure I have had so many steroids the last few months
You take care
Dorothy
Hello Dorothy,
Great - losing the 8lbs is brilliant. Personally I believe that steroids must take some of the blame but then I am no physician. It isn't just giving up sugar in your tea, but you have to retrain yourself as bigalan says. He gives you sound advice. I also found this link which I hope you will find helpful.
Been given loads of paperwork and told I can still have treats in moderation
Very difficult I can't cook for myself anymore apart from my slow cooker have people who bring me meals they have made for me so they now know what I can and can't have
I've not just given up suger I have cut lots of things out carbs I read labels and drink water instead of juice
Thanks for caring
You take care
Dorothy
Hi Dorothy sorry to hear that. I know an elderly lady (very slim) who has type 2 diabetes and has done for many years. She said she was told by her consultant that all this stuff about fair, fat and forty is rubbish. He said it is genetic.
My counsin got suger diabetes with her last pregnancy 25 years ago and unfortunately it never went away again. She has to inject 4 times daily, She is not overweight and has a good diet. So don't believe all this rubbish that it is all your fault.
I didn't know about the steroid link, that is quite shocking. Take care xx
Ooh don't do that Dorothy - you will fade away to nothing.
Hi...my ex brother in law went blind from not looking after himself better....not long ago I was told that he had also died. ..he was just 45.
Two of my closest friends have diabetes and they take it very seriously and have a good life..both these guys are enormous 6 foot 4/5 inches they were over wight but not now as they are very careful on what they eat..
Sometimes I wouldn't mind a cigarette....but I never will.
Just to confirm that yes you can develop steroid induced diabetes. I was one of the unlucky ones who did indeed get it. In fact mine was type 1 and I presented very poorly in A&E with diabetic ketoacidosis. My blood sugar was 33 and it was beginning to affect my heart (thankfully A&E sorted it).. I ended up on an insulin pump for three days before commencing on insulin, injecting 4 times a day. I spent a total of 9 days in hospital. It took weeks for my diabetes to become controlled.
At that time I had been taking prednisolone 20-40 mgs for the best part of a year and my consultant commenced kenalog injection (another steroid). My symptoms came on very suddenly within a few days of this injection.
Much to my amazement my diabetes resolved after around eighteen months and I was no longer a diabetic. I have been warned however that when my prednisone increases the diabetes can return and so I have to monitor my blood sugars then.
I class myself as very lucky to no longer have diabetes. However, the steroids have taken their toll on my weight and I fight a constant battle with this!
You CAN do it! We've gone through some MAJOR diet changes the past 2 months, and I'll keep changing more. We are now ..98% + off of sugar of ANY type, hidden or otherwise. We've stopped bread, unless I make it from a sourdough starter..which I've been too busy to do for some time..., and have made a zillion other diet changes, too. It took a week, but now, we are actually preferring our new changes and NOT HUNGRY anymore!!
You can pull back to not only borderline, but better! Look it up online, read, study, and do. I'm totally sure you can do it!
Hi newlands, I'm sorry you've been hit with this and can quite see why you're so annoyed - I would be.
I think it's fantastic that you lost 8lbs, amazing. What ever the outcome you have kicked having sugar in your tea. Sugar has so much to answer for.
Good luck with the community nurse. I haven't seen an NHS diet sheet for diabetes 2 for a while but years ago it wasn't much cop. Suggesting a 'treat' isn't good either.
It's nearly as hard to change the habits of a lifetime as it is to stop smoking (I think).
Carbohydrates turn to sugar in the body. There are good carbs and bad carbs.
These are shown on the 'glycemic index' which is very useful to learn. I mentioned it before. Basically bad carbs gave a much higher sugar spike than good ones, just a learning curve.
Newlands, so sorry to hear about your struggles with Type 2 diabetes. I too was diagnosed 18 months ago and the first thing the doc did was try to put me on Metformin, a drug with some very nasty side effects. I decided I wanted to tackle this without drugs as I already have 19 items on my script. With the great help from my wife who is an avid reader of dietary advice articles, I have converted to the Caveman Paleo diet. Diabetes is a disease of modern day lifestyles, the main culprits being the Global Food Processing and Sugar Production Industries and Big Pharma working cap in hand to sell drugs of dubious benefit based on limited and selective scientific research. Steroids do indeed induce Diabetes, as does the absolutely shocking over prescription of Statins to control cholesterol, despite their horrific side effects, and unproven effectiveness. 70% of heart attacks occur in people with normal levels of cholesterol, but the medical profession are actively and financially encouraged to mass prescribe these drugs.
I was sent on a DESMOND (Diabetes Education & Self Management for Ongoing & Newly Diagnosed) course last year which is now the flagship NHS dietary/lifestyle education course and frankly it was not very good. One of the 2 trainers knew very little about how the body actually works (I subsequently discovered anyone who works for the NHS can apply to become a DESMOND trainer) and the dietary advice was the standard NICE carb rich staple diet which has been around for at least 20 years, despite Diabetes numbers continuing to rocket, and this advice now looks very dated and wrong.
I had my diabetes review yesterday and my HbA1c was 6.5% which is border line non diabetic. This was down from 7.8% a year ago, and achieved purely through diet, no drugs. I have lost a stone in weight (but still got seven to go) and due to being on 3lt/24hr of O2 and having FE1% of 28% involved minimal exercise. Blood pressure and cholesterol readings are comfortably ok despite converting to a fat rich diet. I now firmly believe that fat is not the problem, not many cavemen had diabetes. I eat all meats, fish, eggs, nuts, green vegetables, fruit - but not too much as the sugar content can be high, particularly bananas, dairy including full fat milk, cheese and butter. Food even tastes better than the low fat rubbish the food processors push on us.
It takes a great leap of faith to reject pretty much everything you've been told about food for the last 30 years, but ask yourself this. Has this advice resulted in less or more Diabetes diagnoses? Does this advice seem likely to control the explosion or not?
If the answer is no, you need to find a better way.
If you need some assurance before going against the flow I will offer 3 good reads as a starting point to your new journey, which others on here will have seen before as this is rapidly becoming a hobby horse of mine. Sorry for the repetition to those souls.
Pure, White & Deadly by John Yudkin
The Great Cholesterol Con by Malcolm Kendrick and
The Calorie Myth by Jonathan Baler.
Very best of luck, and don't give up, the answer lies with you not the drug peddlars.
Thank you for that very interesting reading like you I have 26 items on my script ( some are creams etc) and don't want to add any more plus I am on statins . I'm fed up now when one gets into the 70 s You don't need the hassle of different medications
Thank you for caring will take on board your advise
I am not diabetic but it is my understanding that an A1C test measures your average over three months so the fact that you made some changes may not yet have affected the results as it may have been too soon.
I'm not diabetic but my late husband was diagnosed in his early sixties - his Dad also had late onset diabetes. To cut it short, he was pumped full of insulin for years then started having "hypos" and in the end I was desperately trying to keep his sugar levels up while he was still having to inject because no-one seemed to be taking it on board - they were very dismissive. Finally saw a great geriatric doctor who took him off the needle and replaced with tiny tablet dose as I recall; the sister at the unit told me very sniffily that "He couldn't have had diabetes in the first place" - well, I wasn't the one who diagnosed hm! Totally agree with Warwickstag's very insightful post - had I known the score back then re carbs I'd have put him on a low carb diet and told them where to stick the insulin! Just my thoughts and you have to do what you feel comfortable with, but please read up on all the Pharma con tricks before deciding- Utube have some revealing videos.
Thank you for your reply ,my community matron came yesterday and more or less said I was still borderline and she didn't know why I was been diagnosed as diabetec so now how to wait 3 months for another test so its wait and see
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A change for the better
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