We’ve all seen that headline. It pops up every year of so and I get excited until I remember that I’ve been hearing that for THIRTY years. The cure is always five years away. Kinda like trying to sneak up on a mirage. It always stays just ahead of me.

I guess the message here is that I can’t stop doing the things I have been doing the last three decades to stay healthy. If I had let down my guard all those long years ago waiting for the cure to save me; I wouldn’t be around to take advantage of one when it did come along.

So, I stick to the basics day in and day out. Hopefully when a cure for Diabetes does come along, and it will; I’ll be in good enough shape to go back to, what I only vaguely remember as, a normal life.

That puts me in the normal range for non-diabetics. It is possible that my case is easier to manage. Some folks have a more brittle form of D and have a harder time managing BS through no fault of their own. But, I think the lesson here is that paying closer attention to the basics can make a big difference. Wishing for lower BS just doesn’t cut it. I actually have to do what I am supposed to do every day. No days off.

I looked at a couple and they all look great! The one I picked to join is tudiabetes.com. It felt comfortable and is populated by knowledgeable people who are not letting Diabetes push them around.

A couple of members surprised me by welcoming me, which officially put an end to my being a Diabetic lone-wolf. One of the first questions I got along with a welcome was, “Why aren’t you using a pump?” The only answer I could give was that it had never been suggested that I be on one. Guess I’ll look into that one.

I was writing a blog and being a know-it-all because of my long experience with Diabetes and I learn that there is some important stuff I don’t know much about.

Just goes to show that a community of people with a common interest takes the concept that two heads are better than one to the next level and then some. One person cannot keep up with the rapidly expanding knowledge base on any subject. If a lot of people share an affliction they tend to pick up bits and pieces of information about it, some of which can be just plain useful. Some of it may be garbage, but the group tends to work all the information over and come up with a pretty good analysis of what’s worth keeping and what’s not.

These networks also have groups within the group you can join. I got together with the Diabetes Veterans. People who have had Diabetes at least twenty years. There are eighty in that group alone. Also are groups for people using Insulin Pumps, Continuous Glucose Monitors, Type II‘s, Parents of Children with Diabetes, etc., and they all trade information and offer support and encouragement.

I am glad I joined up and look forward to learning more about this disease I share with a lot of great and caring folks. It’s nice not to be alone. I just wish it hadn’t taken me so long.

Because I know I have a problem, I have to do certain things on a regular basis to avoid complications of high blood sugars. So, I exercise regularly, watch what I eat, and see my doctor on a regular basis. The last one is pretty important, because although I am there for my Diabetes, I also get checked for other stuff that might in the long run be more serious than diabetes.

So, by doing all the things today that I had once promised myself to do someday, after 35 years with Diabetes, I am physically in better shape than the rest of the 64 year olds I know. All because I have one disease that I didn’t ignore. I guess that’s what folks mean by a “blessing in disguise.”

While all the legs are important I never found a physician that encouraged me to exercise. Probably just the ones I had, have. I think doctors are more in tune with drugs and not so much with nutrition or exercise. Mine could stand to get some exercise and lose about 50 pounds. He’s a great doctor, but doesn’t set the best example, which is OK, because it’s me that has diabetes, not him, yet.

Anyway I got to thinking about my Bowflex and excer-cycle and that they can be kinda expensive. Then it occurred to me that almost every garage sale I have ever been to had exercise gear for sale, cheap. It’s like folks want to get rid of it so they won’t have to feel guilty every time they walk past the idle, dusty relics of their good intentions. Not to mention the newspapers, on-line auctions, etc. Anyway, having your own gear is a whole lot cheaper than a couple of hundred a month for a gym membership, which also quite often doesn’t get used. You don’t have to go out, burn gas and it’s sitting right in front of you making you feel guilty, which is the push I quite often need.

Point here is that so-called natural remedies are based on hearsay and often don’t work. What I hear is usually that they heard from somebody, that somebody that person knew, knew somebody that used something and got better. I remember as a little boy in Key West I thought I was catching a cold, so I bought a box of Luden’s Cherry Cough Drops and ate them all, while sitting on our fence in the sun. Lo and behold the very next day not a sniff of a cold. Eureka, I had discovered a cure for the common cold. Well, next time I caught a cold I tried it again. Same fence, same cough drops, same sunshine, but no cure, I got really sick. Years later I realized that it was probably allergies the first time, not a cold. Happens all the time with herbals, anecdotal evidence can’t be trusted. No, cough drops don’t cure allergies either.

So, I use stuff that I know works. Diet, exercise and insulin. This stuff is tried and true. Herbal remedies are not usually tested by the FDA and are almost never subjected to testing by anybody else to eliminate chance or chicanery-for the most part.

After 35 years of living with diabetes, I have decided there is no magic bullet, pot of gold or fountain of youth. But there is something that works. Common sense, discipline, diabetes education, dedicated professionals to advise me, meters, medicines and looking diabetes in the eye. It takes courage to face up to this disease. We may have to live together, but I make sure it knows I’m in charge.

Lyle

A major portion of that feeling better comes from getting myself off the couch and doing something to help myself. I feel better mentally when I exercise, just like I do when I don’t eat that ‘fat pill’ or I stay on top of checking my blood sugars regularly. Since diabetes is a lot about discipline, I feel good when I am disciplined and show I am in charge – not my disease.

As an aside, I hope you forgive my use of the word diabetic. Apparently a major magazine dealing with diabetes doesn’t like to call its readers diabetics. Wonder what they do call us? Seems like a bad idea as it helps reinforce denial which is a big problem for that condition ‘ which must not be named.’

Anyway, it doesn’t take much exercise for me to feel better and be in better control. A long walk, riding my bicycle around the neighborhood or being chased around the yard by the dog. Actually I take it a bit further. Over the years I have settled on a Bowflex for strength training, an excer-cycle for cardio and some simple mat Pilates all approved by my doctor. Tried meditation for relaxation, but my mind wanders. I’ll keep trying.

All this stuff doesn’t take much time, a half hour a day seems to be fine. That’s like one TV show I really don’t need to see anyway. Besides I find exercise more relaxing than television anyway.

 Lyle

When I first got the good news, I carefully studied the ‘Exchange Groups’ touted in the pamphlet I had been given as a diet plan. In case you don’t know, it went something like this – one slice of bread was one starch exchange, an ounce of meat was a protein exchange and part of a fat exchange, etc. I think they called them exchanges because you could ‘exchange’ one equivalent exchange for another, bread for rice and so on. You were allowed so many starch, meat, vegetable and fat exchanges a day depending on how many Calories in your diet.

Then came along Carbohydrate Counting, which you probably use. I do too, sort of.

To scurry back to the beginning, I also looked for substitutes for all the ‘bad’ stuff I liked – ice cream, beer, cheese, Cheetos. I finally gave up on that sad approach. It all tasted like various reincarnations of cardboard. I finally hit on what worked, for ME. Once I was sure my disease was under control and I really knew what I was doing; I ate what I wanted to. But, and this is a big one, I don’t eat a lot of what was bad and I didn’t do it very often.

Pretty much I live on lean meat, complex carbohydrates- brown rice not white- lots of veggies and no liquor. OK, that doesn’t sound like much fun, but neither is having yours toes sawed off.

For me what works is to accept no substitutes. Eat a balanced diet, exercise and once in a while eat something on the ‘no no’ list. Just not a lot and not often. That way I don’t feel so confined or restricted or hankering after forbidden fruit. I feel more normal and proud at how disciplined I am and how good I feel and most important, not a victim of a disease, but its boss.

Thanks for reading.

Lyle

In those days they put you in the hospital to establish your insulin requirements. I was supposed to stay in bed so the calories I burned walking around wouldn’t throw off their calculations. That lasted about 2 hours. I realized the nurses didn‘t care as long as I was in bed when the doctor made his rounds. After he left; I wandered around the hospital, looking in on the newborns and trying to kill time until meal or snack time. I was so hungry on the 1800 Calorie diet they had me on, I looked forward to hospital food. I didn’t even get an orange to practice injections on. I think they were afraid I’d it eat it.

I know it is hard to believe with all the great support new diabetics now get, but I was discharged without ever meeting with a dietician or being offered classes to help me learn to manage my disease. I was sent off into the world with a prescription for NPH (a long acting Insulin), syringes, some test tubes and tablets with which to test my urine for glucose and a sheet of paper outlining a diet. My visits to the doctor consisted mostly of weighing me, listening to my heart and asking me how many times I got up at night to go to the bathroom.

I coasted along for several years testing my urine for sugar, seeing my doctor maybe once a year and trying to stay away from too many carbohydrates, especially the sweet ones.

When ‘dip sticks’ became available, replacing the difficult tablet and test tube technique, I was thrilled by this cutting edge, high-tech approach to measuring blood sugar. You dipped one in urine and tried to match the color change on the stick to a chart, giving a rough measurement of blood sugar. ( What did you do if you were color blind? ) It was a very primitive approach to measuring blood sugar. More of an educated guess than a measurement and I always wondered if my ‘measurements’ bore any resemblance to reality. Was my blood sugar higher than I thought? Was I damaging my eyes or my kidneys?

When the Hb1Ac test and electronic meters became available, I finally felt that I had some real control over my disease. We take these wonderful tools for granted now, but years ago they were just a dream. With the Hb1Ac test I could tell how well I was controlling my blood sugar over the last three months or so. My meter gave me accurate readings of my real time blood sugars. This made things easier for me, but not my wife.

Luckily for me, my much better half, Laurie, was interested in cooking and also took a keen interest in helping me manage my disease. We changed from the traditional American meat and potatoes diet to one consisting of complex carbohydrates, high fiber, lean meat or fish. With only one injection of long acting insulin in the morning; we had to time my meals to the activity level of the Insulin or vice versa. That meant having meals at times set by the time I took my injection. That made dinner tough for her. She was working full time at a hard job and we had two teenaged children at home. No matter how tired or busy she was, she always tried to have dinner ready ‘on time’. You may rightly ask yourself ‘Why didn’t the selfish dope cook dinner himself?’ Well, I did sometimes, but the majority of the meals were cooked by Laurie. I never realized until I asked her for some details for this article how much stress my disease caused her. I mention this because when one member of the family has a disease it affects the whole family. It is easy to think because you are the one who is ill, you are the center of the universe. Try to remember other people have needs and those needs can’t always be secondary to yours. Sorry about the lecture, but I think it’s important.

Years passed with no change to my treatment until one day I came across an article in a magazine about research that showed Type I diabetics who took a shot of fast acting insulin just before a meal controlled blood sugars better than those taking one shot of long lasting insulin a day. I asked my doctor about this. His response was, “ Why would you want to do that?” I found a new doctor.

My new doctor started me on a fast acting insulin before meals and a slow acting insulin before bed time to fill in between the doses of fast acting Insulin. Control of my blood sugar was much better. I see him every three months and have my eyes checked by an ophthalmologist once a year.

Along with diet and insulin, exercise is important in controlling diabetes. I do it regularly, weight training as well as cardio workouts, but I don’t like it. Watching my diet, although not easy, is easier than getting my lazy carcass to exercise, but I do. It is really worth it.

Two years ago at age 62 I got my Pilots License. The folks at the Federal Aviation Agency did add a requirement that I see my doctor every three months and pass a physical once a year. I am also required to check my blood sugar one half hour before takeoff and landing as well as every hour during the flight. Up in the air alone is not a great place to be with low blood sugar. I carry jelly beans for emergencies. Licorice if possible. The only problem was that I forgot one of the major tenants of aviation- if God had meant folks to fly he would have given them more money!

In case you were wondering, the point I am trying to make is that by admitting I have a dangerous disease and taking care of it; I have been able to avoid the complications that can come from having diabetes.

Don’t be afraid of your disease, but don’t ignore it. Diabetes, whether it is Type I or II, is a ‘do it yourself disease’. Your doctor can only advise you. You are in charge. Use the wonderful tools available to you to manage your disease and you can live a pretty normal life.

Take care of your illness. You’ll be OK.