Common Question: Can Diabetes Be Reversed or Cured?

For the next week or so I plan to go over some of the most common asked questions about living with type 1 diabetes.  If you have a common question, please let me know in the comments below and I'd be happy to try and answer or point you in the right direction! Please note that all answers are based on my own experience and opinion and I am in no way a medical professional!

Common Question: Can Diabetes Be Reversed or Cured?

If you live with diabetes of any kind, you likely have been offered some kind of 'cure' or advice on reversing your diabetes.  This may be in the form of a 'book you should read' or a 'spice you should eat' or it could be as out there as visiting some doctor in the hillside of Scotland for a cure.  Regardless what these people are offering, please know that as of right now there is NO CURE for diabetes. There is no Harry Potter Wand Pointing Spell, magic unicorn pixie dust on your oatmeal, or big green vegetable out there to cure your diabetes nor reverse the diagnosis.  

I get so many spam comments (on this very blog) in my inbox, along the side of of my personal Facebook, insisting that there is a cure out there.  I get people in person telling me about their friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend who was cured of diabetes. I get people throwing the pyramid scheme shakes towards my way promising of diabetes reversal and all that is great.

Ahh, and what a life it would be to be cured or reversed (or flipped, turned, set on a different life path diabetes free...) but that isn't happening. It isn't happening today, and likely won't happen for awhile.  I combat this 'cure spam' by recognizing that it is false information.  I decide if I want to cast my energy on education or not and I move on.  I know what makes my diabetes better for myself, not cured, but better and I will stick with that. 

Kayla 

#HealtheVoices17

Since being diagnosed with diabetes I have been to A LOT of conferences.   A LOT.  Since the conferences I go to have so much meaning to me, each time I leave a conference, whether it is a day or a week, I am left with simple reminders and a clear focus.   I must admit, this last conference that I went to has got to be on the top of the list of being THE BEST conference I have been to. 

I attended a conference called HealtheVoices in Chicago (for anyone wanting to learn more, check out the #healthevoices17 to see what we got up to!)  What separated this conference from the rest?  I can't quite decide.

Was it learning that others living with different conditions such as HIV, Psoriasis, Mental Health + Chronic Pain have all kinds of amazing and tight communities like the type 1 diabetes community does? 

Was it hearing the stories that literally brought me to tears knowing that we are all facing battles and some how still find a way to give ourselves to one another relentlessly and unselfishly?

Or was it connecting with others that I know I would have never encountered had I not been diagnosed with a chronic condition?

I don't know.

What I do know is that I am leaving this conference with so much empathy, pride and hope that although sometimes we as online advocates have no idea if we have an impact or not, is anyone reading this? We still take time out of our busy lives to tell our stories, their stories and the stories that would otherwise not be told.  We continue to fight despite not feeling great, not feeling present and not feeling strong. We continue on. 

Disclaimer: Janssen paid for my transportation + accommodations. All thoughts + opinions are my own! 

 

You Have Type 1 Diabetes

Recently someone I know from high school was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. It brought back that feeling of when I was first diagnosed in 2009, just after high school.  I have since connected with her trying to give some insight of what I've learned in the past eight years, and bring myself back to that moment when I first heard those words, "you have type 1 diabetes." 

When I was diagnosed I connected with someone else who had diabetes within the first few weeks.  This to me was key, because when you are first diagnosed you have no idea what you're getting into and it is hard to imagine how living with diabetes is at all manageable.  Now, not everyone will get that experience of one-on-one meetings with another type 1 right off the bat, but I do hope that eventually a connection is made in their local community.   Just in case, I have created a short list of things I think are important to note and remember when first being diagnosed with diabetes.

1. Insulin will not make everything perfect, but you will feel a lot better.   I think I was under the impression that as soon as I took my 'medicine' that everything would be good and I would just feeling perfect and go about my normal routine.  Insulin is amazing, obviously, but diabetes is like a puzzle and it requires a lot of figuring out, ratios, timing, brain power and a magic wand.   It can be really disappointing when you first go on insulin and you are still dealing with the stubborn highs of diabetes. I can remember bawling my eyes out thinking I was doing something wrong because I was taking my medicine but nothing was immediately happening.

2. Your story is my story. There is power in sharing your story with others and if you do not know anyone in your community, check with your local hospital or go online! There are so many resources online of people to chat with or blogs to read.   I can remember when I was meeting another type 1 for the first time, and she told me about her symptoms pre diabetes, I felt like she was telling my story and in that I felt comfort. I wasn't struggling alone, and someone knew exactly how I felt.

3. You can cry, but be sure to end with a positive note. I have cried a lot about my diabetes.  When I was first diagnosed I would break down about the unknown future, would my hands become gapping holes after all these pokes? Would I be able to have a baby? Would I live as long as my friends? All of these questions flooded my mind and I would literally break down. I think this is just us being humans, we deal with things differently, and there is nothing wrong with crying. But, be sure to remind yourself of how far you've come, and prove to yourself what you can STILL do!  I often would cry and find myself in a deep dark hole of 'why me!' and as time has gone by, I have realized the answer to, why me?

4. All this structure will eventually become your routine. No one is a perfect diabetic, and if someone claims to be, here is your gold star.  When I was first diagnosed I did everything to the book. I counted individual french fries, I changed my lancet every single time, and I never once left the house without my bag of supplies. All of this, which every doctor, dietician and nurse would praise, eventually adapts to how you decide to live your life with diabetes.  You become an expert of carb counting via eye-balling and you 'joke' about only changing your lancet every few months... Diabetes is 24/7 and you have a million other things going on, at first it seems impossible to fit it all in and to follow the guidelines and rule book, but you'll adapt and find ways that make sense for you.



Kayla

Functioning Human with a Plastic Pancreas

CGM is such a wonderful invention, I truly believe that my next a1c will be so much better than my last and I honestly believe that over all I am working on being healthy, restoring the feeling of having steady blood sugars and just feeling like I have some sort of grasp.  But, I am both emotionally and physically exhausted and even putting my thoughts together on this cold rainy Thursday is a task.

I was up likely every hour listening to pump alarms, finding a comfortable position to sleep after getting up to treat a low and moving Cola from beside my head to my feet every hour or so.   Poor M, spent a good chunk of time listening to my frustrated grunts as my alarms went off and wrappers unfolded and I feel guilty about disrupting his sleep.  

Between mental breakdowns this morning, chasing a high from a yogurt and bran muffin I ate that I didn't want to eat and sipping my cold coffee between working and trying to grasp energy from upbeat songs on youtube. I am trying. I am trying so hard to be a functioning human with a plastic pancreas.

I want to be healthy. I want to see straight lines and I want to have the best a1c yet, but that comes with a lot of focus, energy and time. It comes with being proactive in a world where we are busy and don't always know when we will eat next or what is for dinner.  It comes with patience that it is going to be okay and it comes with strength that I sometimes just can't muster up.

Kayla

High Blues

I wrote earlier about Low Blues  and now here comes the post about the High Blues, which are equally as defeating, if not greater.  You see, for the most part when you're low, or constantly going low the solution is a bit easier, eat more sugar.   Most often eating will bring your blood sugars up in no time (at least for me) the repetition of low after low is what gets super irritating because believe it not, eating yummy snacks constantly for lows isn't as lavish as it sounds.

Now, then there are high blood sugars that charge into us like a raging bull, a freight train or your worst nightmare.  When I get the alert my blood sugar is high and I see two arrows up on my pump screen (CGM) and I lose my mind.  It's like trying to catch a rabid animal (you get the point that highs suck!) Often times as long as I have a sensor on, I can sometimes detour it with a correction bolus, but other times when I am not alarmed (no CGM) it sort of just hits me out of nowhere and then I have to spend all my concentration on trying to bring it down.

Bringing down blood sugars seems easy in theory but for me, I'd say 9 out of 10 times, I have to literally tackle it down and it drives me crazy - literally crazy.   I spend most of my time looking at my CGM screen hoping that I see trending down arrows, or a drop of any kind.  I spend time trying to calculate if I should correct, override my basal, or run laps around the house.   I spend a good chunk of time swearing at my pump, wishing that I didn't have to deal with diabetes and ultimately feeling defeated. 

Alas the high blues, that feeling where you are pretty sure diabetes is running the show and you are left to deal with the after math.  That feeling where you wonder how long this could possibly go? How much time will this take from me? How much brain power do I have left to give to anything else?  It feels like defeat.

For the most part I have been trying so hard to keep between the lines of 3.8 mmol/L and 8 mmol/L. Some days are easier than others and those easy days usually mean that I have kept my carb intake super, super low.  Anytime I even attempt to 'treat' myself to something carby, I pay the ultimate price of being high for what feels like forever.  When you have been within 'range' for days then a high blood sugar hits you, you feel awful.

There are so many times I have felt on the verge of tears, wondering how I am going to keep up with this constant struggle, not knowing why my blood sugars do what they do, and trying to understand what my body wants from me.

Kayla

THIS CARB RATIO ISN'T COOL ANYMORE!

Yesterday Mike and I went shopping and I happened to witness the fun moment where a thirteen year old girl didn't want her mother picking out her clothes.  As I looked at the clothes on the racks, I couldn't help but listen as the mother-daughter pair stormed around the store. The mother threatening to not buy anything and head home, and the daughter complaining that the mother never let's her pick what she wants to wear.  The mother trying to make things better, holds up a black sweater with a popular logo on it and the girl screams, "THAT BRAND ISN'T COOL ANYMORE!"  I remember those days of my mom not letting me wear certain things, or straight up telling me something did not look good, cue in the days of orange foundation. I so badly wanted to just tell the girl, 'listen, your mom is right...' but the more I watched the mother-daughter duo go in and out of the isles, the daughter walking faster and away from the mother as the mother yelled, Don't walk away from me!'  I began to realize, you know what, my diabetes is just like an angry thirteen year old girl.

My diabetes is usually angry at me.  Even when I remotely try to be nice to it, it somehow finds a way to test my patience.

My diabetes is always complaining about my choices.  Remember the time I gave myself a cookie, ONE COOKIE, and I spent the next two hours regretting something that I treated to myself.  Or, I take myself on a nice walk and what do I get in return?  a low blood sugar that sends me back home.

My diabetes changes its mind, of what it prefers and what it doesn't.    There are times when a bolus of 3 units for a meal is perfectly fine, same meal the next day, and 3 units just doesn't cut it.   THIS CARB RATIO ISN'T COOL ANYMORE! 

Lastly, my diabetes seems to have its own opinions and mind of its own and the more I try to come to terms with how my diabetes works, the more I want to just work with it and not against it... I want to understand it, but I also don't want it to take away from me, whether that's my sanity or ambition to keep going on.  Diabetes isn't actually a teenage girl, it can be a lot of things and honestly, sometimes I feel like that angry teenager rather than the mom.  But, regardless, sometimes as we watch our blood sugars rise & fall we have to find that middle ground where we can try to make things work, we try to compromise, but also take a stand, that we will not just give in.

Kayla

Low Blues

There are two extreme sides of blood sugars, the highs and the lows.  Anything in between is all good, no sweat... but when you find yourself on either end of the spectrum, you're bound to feel some pretty awful feelings and I am not talking about physical symptoms right now, but mental.

Today, I am going to focus on the mental aspect of low blood sugars because after a ROUGH night of five low blood sugars and a few during the day today, the feelings are raw.  I am about to share a part of diabetes that is often masked with positivity and that 'we can do it' attitude from my end.  But, here it goes. 

 I am mentally and physically exhausted.  Since putting on a sensor, I have changed my diet drastically to keep that daunting line of blood sugar within the two targets.  I have gone fairly low carb in order to make this happen and the results - AMAZING. I have been able to stay within the target lines with ease, except the time I slipped up and had a cookie . . . but to be honest the cookie was out of stress this morning (yes I ate a cookie for Breakfast) and even though it was delicious I paid the ultimate price with a high blood sugar that lasted HOURS.  

Anyways, back to my emotions. After getting hardly any sleep, constantly waking up to a screaming alarm telling me I was low, shoving rockets into my mouth as I was half asleep, wishing diabetes would...leave, today I woke up less than refreshed.. in fact I am pretty sure I felt more refreshed pre bed time, than post.    I had to be out of the house by 9 a.m and after the 'cookie accident' I began to get frustrated with my now high blood sugars.   

 Like seriously body, you wanted sugar all night, 

and then I generously give you a cookie and you betray me like that! 

As I rage bolused and bumped my pump up to 150%, within a couple hours I was trending down and by lunch time I was at my ideal blood sugar. Then it was all down hill from there, low after low, treading water just to keep my blood sugar stable and not plummeting. I am sure it was my fault for stacking insulin, but I was frustrated.  I wanted to punch diabetes right in the face.  I was tired.

By 8:00 p.m I was so low I felt myself becoming less like myself, trending down arrows and a low suspend shouting at me from my pump. I wanted to cry.  Mike watched as a smothered peanut butter on everything (yes, I know PB is low carb, but you can smoother it on carbs and it's delicious)  and I am sure he knew that I was frustrated because I am pretty sure I yelled at him... but regardless, in my mind I felt so completely drained. So over trying to keep myself within those lines. So tired of eating for the sake of feeling normal.   

Diabetes totally drains you.  It can make you literally go crazy, low after low after low, you start to not want to treat it and that's the scariest part.    The catch is that once you start to eat and your blood sugar begins to come back, you start to feel more like yourself...but it's getting to that point that takes the work.  

Kayla