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Originally Posted by Tobra
Good job. Sugar levels matter, too high is not good, too low can be deadly. Sugar is what your brain runs on. If it goes too low, your brain stops working, which is very bad. Important suggestion:
ALWAYS carry a little something with sugar in it, hard candy, glucose tabs, whatever. If you are feeling shaky, headache, sweaty, just not right, chew it up and eat it, then check your blood sugar. If you are too high, going from 400-450 is not that big a deal. If you go from 50-100, you just saved yourself a trip to the hospital.
The A1C(glycosylated hemoglobin) measures what percentage of your hemoglobin is bound to sugar. The red blood cells live about 90 days, hence the A1C is directly proportional to what your average sugar has been over the last quarter.
The numbness you describe is not consistent with diabetic neuropathy really. Do you have any back problems?
If you want to be motivated to control your diabetes, go to a dialysis center and look around at those poor souls. If you ever start to lose your resolve, go back for a little refresher. Go take a nutrition class, get a foot doctor too, I can maybe hook you up with one if you like, the foot doctor, not the nutrition class.
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This. A nutrition class is invaluable. Your body doesn't uptake sugar like everybody else does. It takes a lot of practice to balance sugar/carbs, fats, and proteins. Exercise plays an important role because it helps your body use that extra sugar floating around since your body can't take it in. When I was first diagnosed with gestational diabetes, I thought I had a good grasp on the disease since I was a nurse. Wrong! The only way you are going to fine tune your diet is with a diabetes specialist or nutritionist. I didn't know that grapes, watermelon, and many fruits were banned from my diet because of the high sugar content. Start to learn about glycemic index and how to use it to your advantage. There are ways to have certain "sweet" food if you know how to balance it with fat or protein to slow down the absorption.
At the beginning, all I ate was cottage cheese and veggies because I had no idea what to eat. No corn, no potatoes, no pasta, no bread. What was I supposed to eat? That's why you need to educate yourself on your diet and how to incorporate some of these foods the right way. My mom is a diabetic and has been able to control it with just exercise and diet. She DRASTICALLY changed her diet. It can be done but it isn't easy. I have to admit it was a pain during the time I had it (during two pregnancies) but that is why I try so hard now to keep the weight off and make sure I stay active and healthy. Trying to keep diabetes away as long as I can. Sucks even more if you are a major foodie like me.
And things don't always get cut off... Sometimes they just fall off. True story. I was transferring a patient from the gurney to the bed with another nurse and the patient's toe fell off. Their feet were black and already dead but that's beside the point. THEIR TOE FELL OFF! We had a lot of diabetic patients getting admitted here in AZ because they burned the soles of their feet on the hot asphalt and didn't know it. They couldn't feel it.
Keep yourself healthy...