The next stage in the suck that is my medical drama.
Despite increasing my meds, my Hemoglobin A1C went from 7.6 to 7.8. This means my body is no longer producing enough insulin on its own to keep my blood glucose levels down. This also explains why I've been so freaking tired lately.
Becoming insulin dependent is bad. In normal non-diabetic people, the pancreas do a wonderful job of secreting insulin to meet the bodies demand for consuming sugar in the blood stream. Drink a coke and your body will secrete just enough insulin for your cells to absorb the sugar which will lead in a sugar rush. As the body consumes the sugar, less insulin is produced and you experience the sugar crash.
In type II diabetics, the body first produces the insulin but the cells don't do such a good job of taking in the sugars. At first this leads to your body having abnornally high levels of insulin in your blood stream as your pancreas cranks out more and more of the stuff to get your body to digest the sugars. One thing that type 2 diabetics discover is that they are eating far more carbs and sugars than they used to because your body does such a shitty job of digesting the sugar.
A good analogy for this would be children starving in Africa. Children are starving in Africa (cells). A benefits concert is raised to send food to the hungry children of Africa (hormones triggering hunger response). Millions of people around the world respond and send food to Africa (we eat). The food arrives in Africa where it's locked in warehouses due to political bullshit or lack of good roads to deliver the food (type 2 diabetes). In turn another benefit goes out, more food is shipped, etc..
It's a vicious cycle.
Eventually the pancreas can't produce the required insulin and no matter what meds you are on, they all work around insulin so you have to go on insulin.
The problem is that you aren't nearly as good as your pancreas at regulating your blood sugar. You tend tend to inject too much, or too little, and go through all kinds of bad shit. Also the body doesn't get any better at absorbing the sugar so you end up with tons of insulin coursing through your system which can lead to hardening of the arteries and slew of other bad shit.
This is why heart attacks kill diabetics faster than it kills normal folks."
So I go to see the doctor next Wednesday to talk about going on insulin. YAY ME!
Becoming insulin dependent is bad. In normal non-diabetic people, the pancreas do a wonderful job of secreting insulin to meet the bodies demand for consuming sugar in the blood stream. Drink a coke and your body will secrete just enough insulin for your cells to absorb the sugar which will lead in a sugar rush. As the body consumes the sugar, less insulin is produced and you experience the sugar crash.
In type II diabetics, the body first produces the insulin but the cells don't do such a good job of taking in the sugars. At first this leads to your body having abnornally high levels of insulin in your blood stream as your pancreas cranks out more and more of the stuff to get your body to digest the sugars. One thing that type 2 diabetics discover is that they are eating far more carbs and sugars than they used to because your body does such a shitty job of digesting the sugar.
A good analogy for this would be children starving in Africa. Children are starving in Africa (cells). A benefits concert is raised to send food to the hungry children of Africa (hormones triggering hunger response). Millions of people around the world respond and send food to Africa (we eat). The food arrives in Africa where it's locked in warehouses due to political bullshit or lack of good roads to deliver the food (type 2 diabetes). In turn another benefit goes out, more food is shipped, etc..
It's a vicious cycle.
Eventually the pancreas can't produce the required insulin and no matter what meds you are on, they all work around insulin so you have to go on insulin.
The problem is that you aren't nearly as good as your pancreas at regulating your blood sugar. You tend tend to inject too much, or too little, and go through all kinds of bad shit. Also the body doesn't get any better at absorbing the sugar so you end up with tons of insulin coursing through your system which can lead to hardening of the arteries and slew of other bad shit.
This is why heart attacks kill diabetics faster than it kills normal folks."
So I go to see the doctor next Wednesday to talk about going on insulin. YAY ME!