Guess what happens inside your body when your body does not produce enough insulin? Where does all that glucose go? The glucose remains in the blood resulting in a rise in the body's blood glucose levels. What happens when your blood has too much glucose?
Blood Glucose
Think of glucose like it was a double-edged sword. You need glucose. It's the main source of energy used by the body. You put glucose in your body when you eat and drink foods with carbohydrates, but you don't want the glucose flowing in your bloodstream to be too high or too low.
The safeguard is insulin. Your pancreas makes insulin. It helps your body's cells use glucose. Insulin releases into your bloodstream when you eat too many carbs, and the amount of glucose gets too high. Insulin does what it has to do to bring your glucose back to healthy levels.
After diabetes, the body has trouble controlling blood glucose levels (amount of sugar flowing in the body's blood). Your pancreas makes extra insulin to combat blood glucose levels. After a time, your pancreas starts to get tired of making the extra insulin. Over time, it isn't able to keep up, can't make enough insulin to keep your blood glucose at normal levels and literally wears down, or it stops working altogether. It's as though your pancreas is broken.
Without insulin, diabetes kills, but it can be managed.
Before I was diagnosed with diabetes, I admit that I didn't know what this disease is or how people who have diabetes feel every day living with the reality of how it affects your time and abilities. There are probably a lot of people who don't know they may already have the disease. If someone in your family, even previous generations, has had diabetes, you are more susceptible than those with no diabetic relatives.
Classic Symptoms of Diabetes
High blood sugar produces the classical symptoms of frequent urination, increased thirst and increased hunger, which may be the reason that many diabetics — who don't know they are a diabetic -- are overweight.
Insulin opens the door so blood glucose can nourish your body's cells. Lack of enough insulin in short means lots of ugly life-threatening disease. If a diabetic gets too little insulin, he or she can go into a coma just as when overdosing insulin.
On the other hand, a diabetic with out-of-control blood high glucose levels is at risk for stroke, heart disease, loss of sight, Neuropathy (nerve damage such as in the feet), hearing loss, skin problems, high blood pressure, kidney disease and other complications you do not want including death.
Solution
How do you get more insulin into your body so you don't have face the nasty results of not enough insulin?
It may mean anything from a change in lifestyle (food and exercise) to taking pills or injecting insulin. The remedy is different for everyone. Of course, you want to see your doctor and follow the prescribed health plan.
One of the best and important steps to take is to control the amount of "glucose" you put into your mouth in the first place. The less glucose you eat... the less your body has to process.
Sugar referred to as "glucose" is one of the top energy sources for the body. The body gets it in many forms, not just from the sugar bowl on the kitchen table... but mainly as carbohydrates that are broken down into glucose during the digestive process. Examples of food rich in carbohydrates are pasta, rice, bread, potatoes, and of course, all sorts of sweets.
When your body doesn't produce enough insulin to process blood glucose into your body's cells... does it make sense to eat food that raises your blood glucose?
Control Your Blood Glucose
According to the American Diabetes Association, the key to keeping blood glucose levels at your normal goal is to balance the food you eat with your physical activity and any pills or insulin prescribed by your doctor.If you eat too many carbohydrate foods and don't exercise to balance the intake, you can expect your blood glucose levels to be higher.
Finding the balance for yourself is important so you can feel your best, do the things you enjoy, and lower your risk of diabetes complications (the nasties).
Understanding the effect of food on your blood glucose levels is key to managing diabetes. The carbohydrate in food makes blood glucose levels go up. Eat right. Eat healthy. Choose food that your body loves. Avoid food that raises your blood glucose.
An Unhealthy Body is Expensive
Diabetes like any disease... is expensive. That's the big surprise that most people aren't prepared for. It's not just the pain, discomfort and threat of death, it's the cost to survive. It's the doctor's, hospitals and the pharmaceuticals and non pharmaceutical over-the-counter collection of life-saving, make-me-comfortable, stop-the-pain stuff.Even the best insurance and its excessive monthly payment... does not cover unlimited everything. Diabetes is an ongoing disease. Once you get it, you have it.
Poor choices do catch up with you, even if poor choices are made innocently. If you don't take care of yourself, your body, your liver, stomach, pancreas... if you fail to monitor your health, if you take food and fitness for granted... not only does it affect you physically, but it affects your life expectancy and costs you money.
Money goes fast when you have to feel good enough to function, let alone maintain some level of health. Please understand, it's great big gobs of money... for prescriptions, doctor's visits, hospitalizations, medical supplies. I did not realize just how much money it takes to get and stay healthy (after you lose good health).
If you fail to maintain good health throughout life, you pay for it later in more ways than one.
My Story
My life changed when I ignored the pain in my legs and feet -- until it grew worse, and I couldn't ignore it anymore. I went to the doctor. My doctor told me I probably had diabetes for at least 10 years. I was shocked.
The fact is that my body didn't produce enough insulin to move the high blood glucose in my body to the cells. It stayed in the blood stream and that caused me to feel hungry a lot of the time. I ate. I didn't exercise. I gained weight. A path that many people are familiar with.
When my doctor tested me in the office and I tested near diabetic coma level, it was a wake-up call. She suggested hospitalization.
The sugar level was over 600 mg/dl and that can cause dehydration (loss of body fluids), which makes the sugar level even higher. The build up of acid in the blood stream from breaking down fat for energy (since the sugar can't get into the cells) affects breathing, heart function, and consciousness. Death can occur if insulin, fluids and other medication is not given promptly.
When the blood glucose levels registered near coma level when my reading was supposed to be more or less 100. Well... that would alarm anyone, but it frightened the hee-be-ge-bers about of me. I was in jeopardy with life-altering complications on the horizon, and that can really motivate a person. When I was lab tested and my AIC was over 8, it was confirmed.
I only had a passing knowledge of what diabetes was about. In the beginning, like many people, I thought it means I need to cut out pies, cookies and cakes. I was right, but I was also wrong.
Most people think that diabetes means you eat too much sugar. So cut down and that's that. No big deal, right? Not exactly. I also mistakenly thought all I had to do was lose 20 lbs. I followed Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, Weight Watchers. I spent quite a bit of money. I got a few books, such as the Atkins Diet. Long story short, losing weight wasn't the solution. I listened to my doctor, but I thought I knew what to do. I listened to the myths and lived partly in denial.
I already had signs of neuropathy, serious wake-up-in-the-night leg pain, high blood pressure, and blurred vision as well as a few other not-so-nice issues. But I was still not a complete believer on the subject of exercise and how physical activity really helps the body stay healthy — until... My Aching Feet. One of the affects from diabetes, that I suffer, is still my feet. They ache. Sometimes, they give off so much pain especially at night that the pain interrupts my sleep. Besides the pain which is no laughing matter, my feet are rough and getting rougher. Scaly. I am worried that I may be on the path to ulcers or worse... amputation, which I pray is a silly worry. There is a pain cream available from the American Diabetes store but it seems out of stock most of the time.
Foot pain is serious. It's a diabetic complication called Neuropathy, and it is one of the scariest and most difficult to treat. Nerve damage in the feet, leading to numbness (yes, I have this) or pain (this, too) and, in severe cases, amputation. According to recent studies, neuropath affects up to 60 percent of diabetics.
Various kinds of treatment are available, many of them treating the pain of neuropathy. But the real challenge of the complication isn't pain -- it's the loss of sensation itself. That's what can lead to the worst outcomes.
The best advice for diabetics, of course, is to let your doctor know what concerns you... what's going on with your body. For a long time, I'd go to my doctor's appointment with a smile and say, "I'm fine, nothing to report." I was foolishly living in dreamland.
You want to keep tight control to prevent complications from happening. Regular visits with the doctor helps detect problems early on. Be honest with your doctor.
I had to educate myself, I had to learn to be healthy. I had to understand what I was eating and why it was good or not good for me. If I'd only done this years ago... before my health suffered.
After a couple of serious conversations with my Endocrinologist and primary doctor, I wised up and spent time with my dietician, optometrist and dentist. It is difficult to modify a lifetime of bad habits. My doctor showed me how to test my blood glucose level and told me my ranges.
Test Time: Before meals
Target Range: 70-140 mg/dL
Normal Range: 70-110 mg/dL
Test Time: After a meal, 2 hours
Target Range: Less than 160 mg/dL
Normal Range: Less than 140 mg/dL
Test Time: Bedtime
Target Range: Less than 160 mg/dL
Normal Range: Less than 120 mg/dL
Diabetes kills. Diabetics who can't afford medication are at high risk. Diabetics who feel alone, get despondent and fail to follow their health plan. A diabetic — just like anyone with a serious illness — needs your care and concern. Get involved, be supportive. Educate yourself.
I still struggle with the food choices I make. It is not easy. I sometimes make poor choices, because I have a lifetime of eating habits, along with food likes and dislikes. I find myself saying "This one time won't hurt me... or "Just a little won't hurt me..." Of course, I'm wrong. It's a process... that doesn't end.
1. I test my glucose four times a day.
2. I take insulin injections every 12 hours.
3. I take two timed medications once a day.
I also have to drink a glass of water every hour, because I have severe pain in both feet. Drinking a lot of water eases the pain. The happy outcome is less pain and a good night's sleep.
With the testing, insulin injections, meds and water, I have to be available to serve my healthcare needs 16 times a day. 17 or 18 if you count time for exercise; planning and cooking diabetic meals.
I soaked in nutrition information like an obsessed sponge, learning more about what the body needs to be healthy than I ever knew before. I educated myself on how to read facts on food labels. I learned about big, bad carbohydrates, but did I learn? Here's the rest of My Story.
I changed my lifestyle, or at least I worked on changing it.
My health is most important, and as long as I make time to follow my planned schedule, I keep my health. With the testing, insulin injections, meds, exercise and water, I have 18 reminders on my iPhone to be sure I do what my doctor wants me to do.
But to make sure I drink my water, I set a timer for this, because if I don't drink my water throughout the day, my feet hurt so much I can't sleep. Just hearing that timer buzz buzz buzz every single hour drives me crazy.
I have to stop and start so many times a day, it gets frustrating. But... I have to do what I have to do. The outcome is less pain and a good night's sleep. Getting and staying organized is the key to keeping my heath plan schedule.
It takes time to do what I have to do, because the alternative is pain, more money for new health issues, shorter life, hospitalization, surgeries and even death. Without my health, there can be no relaxing leisure life, so this is important.
Once I schedule the time to do what I need to do for my health, I organize household chores, schedule the chore for different days and set reminders.
The good news is that I can stop the out-the-door flow of money by making better choices now today and following through. You see, that's another problem I think a lot of people have. "I'll start tomorrow," or "One time won't hurt me." Yes, it will. I know. I am paying for all the self talk that didn't keep me on the right path.
What's next if I fail to follow through? Pain. Misery. Suffering. Regret. More health issues and needless loss of money. The real solution is to get educated. Make a plan to eat healthy. Be healthy. Take better care of your body. Reduce the stress in your life. Get organized. Focus on what's important. Clean your closets. Purge bad food from your pantry, your kitchen and your life.
Take stock of your life, because if you don't, your life will do it for you… and you'll be in a boat you can't get out of. I've learned. Life is funny that way.
It's not too late. I have health issues I wish I didn't have, but I am doing something about it. I am heading off new health issues. I am facing the truth and the reality. It's not easy, but if I want to live a happy life without going to misery island, I must be proactive. It's costing me now, but I can save money and be healthy for better days to come. I can make better choices.
If you have a family history of diabetes, are in danger of becoming a diabetic or are already a diabetic... make an appointment with your doctor. Keep a close watch, because even if you don't have symptoms today, you could tomorrow. That's diabetes.
If you know someone or have a loved one with diabetes, be there. Do not discount the news as if it's no big deal, "Yeah, I know lots of people with diabetes (big deal)."
Source: American Diabetes Association