Since I began venturing into the world of e-diabetes, I have read many comments posted by people on websites, blogs and e-diaries. I have met people who age between 16 and 57 and have for the first time in my life felt like there really are other people out there going into daily battle with this disease. I have read things I have agreed with, read things I didn't and read things I couldn't even comprehend. But perhaps the most striking thing about diabetes, is that everyone has a different kind. Not a different kind per se (as in type 1, 2 or MODY), but a kind that reacts very differently to similar triggers.
Just this morning I was at my monthly pump-review meeting with the two people who I joined the insulin pump 'club' with. The most interesting thing that comes out of our meetings is that each and every time we hook our glucose monitors up to the PC, so that we can download and analyse our reading in the hope of finding a pattern, it is completely different for each person. One of the guys, we'll call him Jack (I don't think people would appreciate me naming them all over the net!) struggles immensely with high sugars over night and first thing in the morning. I on the other hand, find my waking sugar the most predictable of the day. The third person, Mike (name changed for privacy reasons!), has blood sugar readings which look to me as though he isn't even diabetic. Yes, he has highs and lows, but the highest Mike had were around the lowest that Jack and I had! So this disease appears to be completely unpredictable....
Or maybe not so.
Last week, my partner contracted a cold. We now know all too well that living together means you invariably 'contract' anything the other person has. Be it a simple cold or full blown flu. So when he gets a cold, we immediately remind ourselves to be wary, because I'm likely to struck down by whatever it is too. So, towards the end of the week, the sugars started going up to over 10mmol and would not, despite a vast amount of effort and frustration, come down again. Looking at the factors, I should have seen it coming a mile off. The fact that the other half was ill, the fact the sugars were going up, the fact that I needed about 10 hours sleep a night just to function. But I still missed it.
BAM.
Sunday night - funny tummy, sore throat and immense tiredness. Yup, I got a nice dose of man flu. The funny thing is, I say "Bam", but really, my diabetes (for once)was giving me the warning signs about 5 days before the disease set in! I know from the past that if I'm fighting something off (and losing) I develop insulin resistance and the sugars don't like to come down.
So perhaps diabetes isn't as unpredictable as I thought. Really, if I tune in more to what my body is trying to tell me, I coulde probably plan ahead and take those days off! Then again, maybe it's just my body's way of telling me to slow down and repair itself. Anyway the sugars are behaving once again and I now know why 15 was last weeks magic number.
Maybe next time I will take heed of my body's warnings!
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