Diabetes Day 1- J's Story

T's Diabetes diagnosis was a complete surprise. Mine was not a surprise at all. It was not a matter of "if" I would become diabetic, more just a question of "when".

My mother's younger sister has been on insulin for over 20 years. My mother's father was diabetic. My Mom was able to control her diabetes with diet and then oral meds for more than 10 years. Now, at age 76, she has only been on insulin for 5 months.

During both of my pregnancies I gained a lot of weight. I thought I was eating well, but I gained 33 pounds with my first and about 50 with my second. My first baby was over 8 pounds, my second was over 9 (she was born a week early, can you imagine if I had been been overdue?). With both pregnancies, I had + glucose in my urine with every prenatal visit. I had Glucose Tolerance Tests that were normal, so I was never diagnosed with Gestational Diabetes. The OB/GYNs did tell me that with my family history and my pregnancy history that I could potentially be diabetic in my 50's.

Did I take this seriously? Not enough. I kept my weight at about 150-160 until I was 40 years old. Then I really started to pack on the pounds. I spent the next 10 years living on carbs. And Peanut Crack&M's.
By the time I was 50, I weighed 235. My fasting glucose levels were always normal, but the doctors were telling me I needed to lose weight.

That's when I decided to start losing the weight. It came off very slowly, by July of this year I had lost about 30 pounds, but it wasn't enough. I wasn't exercising and my fasting blood sugars were running in the 190's. At one of my routine checkups for other issues (fibromyalgia and arthritis) the Nurse Practitioner gave me an official diagnosis of Diabetes and handed me a whole lot of brochures about Diabetes and a prescription for Metformin.

I was joining T on our journey to get healthy.