Check out the rest of my diabetes story - part 1 - part 2 - and part 3!
I'm sorry it took me a bit to get back to writing. It's been a busy couple of weeks on the home front! I always think once the holidays are over that things will slow down. It seems anything but that in reality! It's mostly fun get-togethers with friends and community events that are purposely planned after the holiday rush, but I'm finding that things are booking up fast!
Anyway, it was September 2017 and I was on my way to see the endocrinologist for the first time with my hubby. I remember being nervous and really unsure about what to expect from the appointment. Throughout that week I had been researching every test result that I saw on my online chart and trying to figure out what it all meant. Was this something that I was going to deal with for life or will I eventually "grow out of it?"
I'm a school librarian by day, so I pride myself on being able to find valid information online. However, I dove hard into the interweb and found anything and everything I could read about diabetes. There were a couple nights I barely slept at all because my mind was RACING and one website of information would lead me to another question and it just kept going! I wouldn't recommend looking online at all when faced with any medical issue. Just don't do it. At all. It's not worth it. Find people you trust and talk to professionals. Everything else just leads to mental anxiety! [PS: You can keep reading my blog as I won't give you any actual medical advice! I am just sharing my story and hoping others find comfort in knowing they aren't alone.]
When I arrived at my appointment (thank goodness we made it to that day so I could get actual advice) I thought they may do more blood work or run me through a gamut of tests when I got there. However, I really just met with the nurse and doctor that day and just talked. He looked at my test results from the previous week and saw my A1C was 11.4%. Since it is recommended to be under 7% when you have diabetes, that was much too high. That day he prescribed me Humalog, which meant I would be taking insulin with every meal from that point forward. He also suggested I meet with a diabetes educator to learn more about living with diabetes.
I wasn't too excited about meeting with another educator (I know, I know, that was a dumb thought based on the sleepless nights I'd recently had)! I had previously met with an educator when I had gestational diabetes and I figured this one was going to tell me the same things I already knew. However, I listened (probably persuaded by my husband to take the suggestion of the doctor) and we met later that day with the educator. I came to find out that meeting with the educator was one of the best decisions we made that day.
We discussed checking blood sugars, when to be concerned about my numbers, how to overcome highs and lows, but most importantly that it was okay to eat carbs. Throughout that last week I had hardly eaten any carbs, and let me tell you, I WAS HUNGRY!! She explained that the body actually needs carbohydrates in order to function and that it was okay to eat them. Of course, I needed to track them and take the appropriate amount of insulin when I did eat them, but it wasn't feasible for me not to eat any carbs for the rest of my life.
That was a huge weight lifted off of my shoulders! I was very dedicated to controlling my diet when I was pregnant because my choices were not affecting just me, they were also affecting my children. I didn't want them to be at a disadvantage before they were ever born, so I did whatever I had to do to ensure they were healthy. Then after finding out I was going to be diabetic probably for the rest of my life, I felt like I was faced with the challenge of having to eat perfectly for the rest of my life! That was a daunting task. Did I care about my health as much as I did my kids' health? No. Did I think it was possible to never indulge in lattes and scotcheroos ever again? That's a HARD NO!
I was hesitant to accept the fact that I was going to be on insulin and would have to give myself multiple shots daily, possibly for the rest of my life. However, it was also very freeing to know that I could have a normal diet and still be healthy.
My task going forward was to get my blood sugars in check so that they could do some more testing in the coming months and determine the type of diabetes I was faced with. At the time of that first appointment with my endocrinologist, they labeled my diabetes Type 2 because they had to call it something and they didn't have enough evidence at that point to call it Type 1.
My thoughts at the time: if it's Type 2, I can probably get rid of it and I will do whatever I have to do to make that happen.
Stay tuned for more!
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