I've Been At A Loss For Words

Can you believe it? Me of all people, at a loss for words? Call the press, people! This just doesn't happen!

I guess I've had some news but didn't want to blab it until I had notified my family first. And, since this has been about the only thing on my mind for the last few months, I am having a hard time writing about anything else.

Type II Diabetes

I can't even say those words out loud. But, that's the news I got at my last physical a few months ago. Now, I know, I've been sitting around here boo hooing and oh why me and all that. It's not necessarily a death sentence. Although, my Dad died a slow painful death due in part to diabetes. I also see others in my family losing the fight with this disease as well. I guess it's my choice what to do and believe it or not, it's a choice I have to make every single day, every single hour, ever single minute. After all, up to now, I have lived to eat.

How could this diagnosis come as any surprise? Have you looked at my thighs lately? Or my family history? I knew this was coming, but I was happily living in my world of denial. I miss that world. Like I said, I've been boo hooing and having visions of my Dad getting his leg chopped off and not being able to see any more. I am not convinced that this isn't in my future, but I am giving it an honest effort to change my outcome. But, I am paying another price for cleaning up my act. It's a no win situation.

Let's go back to where this new journey began.

Back about four months ago, I had my physical. I peed in a cup, I had blood drawn, I stopped just short of turning my head to cough. All of my tests came back and I heard nothing from my doctor. I did have a mammogram and they were at least nice enough to tell me that came back ok. This was the only notification I received.

About a month later, I found out the hard way that I have developed a food sensitivity to shell fish. While at the doctor's office for that, he offhandedly mentioned that he saw my sugar was up when I had my blood work done and perhaps we should talk about it when I was feeling better. Ok, no problem.

Finally, two months after this, I have my appointment for my Pap. Don't ask why he couldn't do this when I had my physical. It made NO sense to me especially after I told him I'd put this off for a few years. Why he told me to wait a few more months to have my Pap made no sense to me, but I digress.

So, there I am in all of my glory and he again mentions that my sugar is higher than he'd like it. He did a finger stick test called the A1C test. This measures the amount of glucose cells that have attached to your red blood cells. Since your red blood cells live for about 90 days, this test will be able to tell you how your sugar has been running for the last three months. He explained this much to me and told me that my results were just over 10%. I don't know about you, but when you want little numbers, 10% of anything sounds like a good number to me! What do I know! I came to find out that 10% is bad. Way bad.

He suggested I talk to the dietitian. Ok, that sounded reasonable. I know I don't eat right, so maybe with a little guidance, I can learn to eat a little better and take care of my possible problem that way.

I made an appointment with the dietitian and in an hour with her, my life has changed. I have Type II Diabetes. I guess this shouldn't have come as such a surprise but for crying out loud, why in THREE appointments is my doctor not overly concerned or prescribing anything. An hour with the dietitian, I have a new diet, orders to exercise, a glucose meter and needles (YES, NEEDLES), and what I feel is a death sentence. As I've said, I've watched my Dad die a slow painful death from this disease and I am now watching others I know do the same thing. Why do I think it will be any different for me? I am so frustrated and in the middle of a good pity party for myself. To top it all off, within two hours of leaving the dietitian, the doctor has now called in a prescription that I needed to start taking IMMEDIATELY. I've seen him three times and it wasn't necessary to write me a prescription, but one hour with the dietitian and it takes HER to tell HIM to write me something? While I'm not convinced of his abilities as a physician who has my best interests at heart, I do have some faith in her.

The only bright spot of this is the dietitian. She has been very supportive (she's a diabetic herself), non judgmental, and full of suggestions and ideas. She taught me how to use my glucose meter, how to prick my freakin' finger, and went over my diet with me. Here's where we had to compromise.

We grew up eating unhealthy food. Why? Because we weren't well off and you could feed a lot of people with crap food. It doesn't cost much to feed an army on orange spaghetti or cabbage and noodles. Do you have any idea how expensive it is to buy fresh vegetables? Or lean meat? For real, healthy eating is NOT cheap.

I did tell my dietitian that I have an addiction to salty things. I NEED pretzels. She wrote them into my diet. I like this woman!

We are doing a low carb diet with exercise. Hmm. Everything I love has a LOT of carbs. For that matter, almost everything has some carbs. It's crazy. To help me get my mind around just what I was doing to myself, I started a journal of sorts. It's mainly my way to keep track of everything I shove into my mouth. I have an allotted number of carbs I am to be ingesting in a day. Believe it or not, your body does NEED some carbs. Just not a gazillion grams a day like I've been doing. Go figure. She gave me a range, and in my mind, it made more sense to cut that number in half. Don't ask me, but I've self imposed a worse limit than she gave me.

Then I bargain with myself. If I have a cup and a half of the best cereal in the world, Special K with red berries with a half of a cup of 2% milk, that's 44 grams of carbs. That's a lot for one meal. Lunch better be a spinach salad with tomatoes and cucumbers and only 7-10 grams of carbs for 2 tablespoons of dressing. I guess my life is now all about decisions. Every single day, every single meal. Have I mentioned that before? Talk about a life change. No good answers to these decisions either. Where is the decision where pizza is the right answer??

As much as I cut back, I try to cut back enough so that I can still have my pretzel stix at night. A girl has to have her standards. Besides, I fought hard to keep them in my diet! I love this mondo sized pail of the Utz's pretzels, found of course at Sam's Club. Unfortunately, to fit into my diet, I get eight stix for a 30 grams of carbs snack. That's a lot of carbs, so I better be good all day to fit that in at night!

Now on to exercise. This part is killing me. I spent a ton of money years ago on the tread mill that takes up too much of my living room. I guess it's now or never to finally get my money's worth out of it. The walking has now aggravated my back to the point of unbelievable pain. I also have something wrong with my heel which I am suspecting is a heel spur. The walking isn't doing much for that, either. It seems I am taking ten steps backwards to take one step forward.

What do I have to show for this? Well, in the past year, I've lost 29 pounds the easy way. I have come to find out that when your sugar is out of control, you lose weight like mad. I don't know if my body is eating itself or what. But, the first 29 pounds, I ate all I wanted and just dropped the weight. Bonus! Personally, I was all for continuing on that way, but no one else seemed to go with my suggestion.

My diet is limited to carb restrictions. I am not counting calories or worrying about anything else. Carbs. I hate that the word "carbs" is my new buzz word. But, I digress. I try to eat less that 100 grams of carbs per day. Plus, I do 40 to 45 minutes on the treadmill, at least six days a week. What do I have to show for this?

Since June 8th, my sugar is no longer elevated like it was, but remains within the tolerances set out for me by the dietitian and the American Diabetic Association. I have lost an additional 14.2 pounds and I am fitting into clothes in my closet that I haven't worn in years.

On the flip side, I'm back to where I was physically a year ago. I hurt. Daily. Hourly. I can't sit, I can't stand, I can't lay. But my sugar is going down.

I know I should quit bitching. The diagnosis could have been a LOT worse and I do realize that. That doesn't change the fact that at 47 years old, I have fucked up my life so much that I don't know if there is a coming back from this or through this. I know, one day at a time, one hour, one minute, one decision at a time. I am not convinced that I can really keep this up, but so far, I've been giving it one heck of a try.

I hope this blog won't become a diet journal, but I'm afraid that might happen. Sorry in advance! But this has taken over me to the point of obsession. I can think of little else, I know I talk of little else any more.

This is what's going over here and why I've been so quiet. I wasn't sure I was going to write about this, but I just have to. My life is forever changed.

I am a diabetic. In trying to get this under control with my exercise, my back is killing me and my foot hurts like hell.

My kingdom for a couple of Vicodin.

And a bag of potato chips.