PSA: Recently Diagnosed With Diabetes?

[furrbear]

Diabetes affects millions of Americans. If you have been recently diagnosed with this disease, then it's very important that you learn how to manage it before it starts to manage your life. You will have to make certain changes to your daily routine in-order to stay on top of your condition to ensure that you don't suffer from its adverse side effects. There are three main things you need to keep in mind: diet, exercise and blood sugar levels.

• Diet: There are many benefits to having a healthy and balanced diet. Not only will it help you control your weight and diabetes, but it will also help prevent a variety of other diseases. Limit the amount of un-healthy snacks and foods you consume, and save them for occasional treats.



• Exercise: Just like having a balanced diet, including exercise in your daily routine has many benefits. Exercising will help keep your weight down, keep your heart healthy and keep you from feeling some of the side-effects of diabetes



• Blood Sugar Levels: If your doctor has prescribed insulin injections to keep your blood sugar in the normal range, it is very important to keep checking your sugar levels. There are many testing monitors that are small and convenient to carry with you at all times.

By watching these three things, you can avoid some of the serious side effects of diabetes such as heart disease and kidney failure. Staying on top of the disease will help you continue to live life to its fullest. Even if you don't have diabetes or a genetic predisposition to it, a balanced diet and exercise routine will make sure that you don't develop it in the future. It's in your best interest, and that of your loved ones, to do as much as you can to prevent having to deal with its symptoms and side effects.

diabetic_bears is a community where gay men who identify as bears can discuss diabetes and diet. Partners and caregivers are also welcome. It's a place for diabetes recipes, to provide reports on new diabetes treatment breakthroughs, and to provide a place to vent, ask questions, and find links to helpful sites.

Comments

[grizzlyzone.livejournal.com]

I'd like to add that diabetes is not a "stand-alone" disease. It often comes part and parcel with a whole range of other "diseases", including high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity, heart disease, heart attack, stroke, kidney disease, blindness, low testosterone levels, erectile dysfunction, diabetic neuropathy... This list goes on and on.

Managing your diabetes will help you to avoid many of the complications, but you have to be "pro-active" in your approach.

[furrbear.livejournal.com]

Of that list, Obesity is the single most common cause of Type II Diabetes. Losing the weight often makes it possible to manage diabetes without medication.

[grizzlyzone.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I'd call obesity a "cause" per se. I'm thinking more along the lines of a "co-factor".

From the research I've been doing, it appears that the diabetes gene and the obsesity gene are adjacent, and that a single mutation can affect both.

[furrbear.livejournal.com]

First link under obesity+cause+diabetes on Google:

Many recent studies have shown a direct link between obesity and the diagnosis of type II diabetes, or non-insulin-dependent diabetes. Also known as adult onset diabetes, type II is increasingly being diagnosed in overweight children and adolescents. In this type of diabetes, the body produces insulin, but interference from the complications of obesity doesn't allow the body to use it as it should.

The body of a type II diabetic, due to an overproduction of insulin, can no longer produce the correct amount to maintain healthy blood sugar levels and begins to develop a resistance to insulin. Ninety percent of diabetics are diagnosed with type II diabetes. Usually, this diagnosis comes after 40 years of age, but the condition is now increasingly found in children. Since 1968, obesity in American children has doubled, and today, approximately 25% of American children are obese. This increase in obesity has been directly linked to the rise in type II diabetes in both children and adults.

Studies have shown that an increase in abdominal fat is linked to glucose intolerance, as well as to overeating and general obesity. A body mass index (BMI) of over 40 has been linked to a higher chance of developing diabetes. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a healthy BMI ranges from 18.5 to 24.9. Obese individuals often have diets high in carbohydrates, starches and sugars, and low in protein and good fats. The way in which these foods are digested is related to how the body processes sugar

A cofactor is something (eg, substance, microorganism, environmental condition) that influences the progression of a disease or the action of a disease-causing agent. The research is showing the causality between obesity and diabetes to be much higher than a contributing link. An overwhelming amount of research points to a causal link between obesity and Type II diabetes. Genetic causality is found in Type I diabetes, which is only rarely expressed later in adulthood.

[grizzlyzone.livejournal.com]

Grandma "Zone" was a skinny little thing and was diabetic. My other Grandma was full-figured and was diabetic.

[furrbear.livejournal.com]

not very conclusive, huh. Don't know that a sample size of two tells you a lot either.

Diabetes tends to be much more a result of aging in the elderly than any other causality.

A couple more links:

The Obesity and Diabetes Epidemic: The State of the Science and the Challenge to Public Health

The Twin Epidemics of Obesity and Diabetes

[grizzlyzone.livejournal.com]

Ok, then. I'm fat and it's all my fault.

[furrbear.livejournal.com]

That's my excuse. Part of my weight problem is hormonal, but it's still my problem, I can't blame it on something else.

There may be a genetic predisposition to diabetes, just like alcoholism, but I think trying to pin all the blame on genetics is dodging responsibility.

[grizzlyzone.livejournal.com]

The whole health and diet thing is like religion. One group will tell you one thing, a second group will tell you another, while a third will tell you something completely different.

Every time I turn around, I have another "nutritional expert" telling me that if I jump through this hoop or that hoop that all my problems will be solved.

(And, then when you do, and it doesn't work for you, the "experts" have no answers.)

Honestly? I don't care why I'm diabetic. It doesn't matter why. I still have to deal with it.

And, the whole weight thing? One group will tell you it's easy and fun to lose weight. Another will tell you it's next to impossible. (I tend to go with the latter. But, hey, it's my "religion". You can believe what you want to.)

[furrbear.livejournal.com]

Weight thing? I'll go with next to impossible too. Always has been. Couldn't build muscle worth a damn either when I was 19 and 200 lbs.

One doc told me I needed to exercise more. Would've been nice if he bothered asking what I was already doing. 1.5 hrs weight lifting x 3/week. 1.5 mile run 3x/wk. Finally I had one doc listen to me and test and damn whaddya think he found - low hormone levels.

As I've told others, I'm no big fan of the ADA's dietary guidelines. They're only good for giving me a higher glucose level than I have on my own. I also favor a lower A1c target than they do, but that's just me.

[productreed.livejournal.com]

What surprised me is I walked around with Type 1 diabetes, and I had no idea. I finally found out when I passed out at the wheel of my car going to work. I've dropped from 240 to 178. It's amazing how simply eating less and eating better can make a big difference.