Diabetic Neuropathy

I was told recently that a friend had diabetic neuropathy. Symptoms are apparent in feet and lower legs. But further, this friend was not diabetic. I was told this by a family member who would at least know what the doctors were saying.

But later, I got to thinking: 1) What characterizes “diabetic” neuropathy if you are not diabetic? and 2) what characterizes a non-diabetic? For the latter, I’m sure there are a combination of blood tests before and after a meal. But how fuzzy are the lines between “non-diabetic,” “pre-diabetic” and diabetic? I’m just wondering if the diagnosis is based on best medical practice. This is not a trivial question, because it may be associated with more serious complications this friend is experiencing.

I didn’t get into detailed discussion about this because I know so little about it. But with more knowledge, I might. My own experience with neuropathy is extremely limited. I sort of think I had it, but very mildly. I had no pain and could pass the whisker test. And even the limited effects seem to have gone away, once I got my A1c in the under 6 category.

This was posted on this forum so take a read:

hope it helps!

Here is the link: I cured my serious neuropathy completely in 2003

So that didn’t work! In the “Diabetes Complications and Other Conditions” section, scroll down the list to read “Diabetes and Foot Pain.” Very informative and hope it helps you.

Here I am the author of that post you recommended, so thank you for pointing it out. I am still free of neuropathy and it is now 2018…so I would say 15 years makes that a proven cure.

I would like to point out that this tudiabetes site has a horrible policy of not allowing any mention of a site that ends in com, so if I tell anyone reading this who has neuropathy to go look at the site floxiehope dot com you will know that is a work around to give you the link. It is NOT a site selling anything that I noticed and it just allows all those who managed to cure themselves of neuropathy to explain briefly how they did it. I just have not yet added my case, as frankly I am kind of FED UP. This site Tudiabetes is more than unhelpful and when they create rules that prevent people being helpful, you see the problem. I rarely come on this site anymore as in 2015 they obliterated the group about supplements and these people here believe so strongly in drugs and avoid supplements, that I cannot be bothered with a site that is so much into the conventional model of keeping people sick so the drug companies can make a boat load of money by ensuring no one gets better…

Basically there are likely a lot more ways to get better that we do not know about as the drug industry does not want anyone to get better. But I can guarantee you when doctors say there is no cure it is basically to say “don’t ask me to help you” as they do not want to be bothered, but they will prescribe pain medications which pleases the drug companies. I say all power should now be put in the floxiehope site for all those people who get neuropathy in any way they do get it.

All you need to do is take the time to read everyone’s explanation and take as many ideas as you can and chose what you will do for your own case and get busy doing it and then you will see. You cannot just pray it way, but it does take analysis and effort. Choose a wise diet approach and add in the relevant professional grade supplements and the more variety you add into your plan the better your outcome will be and if you divide the does into 4 equally spaced times you will heal faster.

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Thank you very much for reaching out to me. I am on a constant hunt for diabetic information and I, too, find the TuDiabetes site tightly managed and narrow minded.

I have been taking supplements to detox my blood, kidneys and liver along with sugar stablizers. The best thing I have done is to eliminate wheat and simple starches. In less than 4 months I dropped 35 pounds and flipped my A1C from 8.1 to 5.4. Initially I thought it was the supplements that did the trick but I just read a book that lays out the facts on wheat and all of its relationships with diabetes. For instance, a slice of whole wheat bread has more glycemic load than one tablespoon of white sugar. See Wheat Belly by William Davis, MD for the details.

This experience with diabetes has opened my eyes to how much medicine and Food and Drug agency are in it for the money rather than the cure.

If you like (and i would like it), please stay in touch when you can. And thank you for the

floxiehope dot com

Much appreciated,

Jan Fish

Just adding my $0.02…

I agree that the Healthcare establishment (providers and manufacturers) does nothing to help ‘heal’ people – though I’m uncertain that it’s necessarily insidious. Our Healthcare system is geared toward treating symptoms, rather than the root cause of illness. While I agree symptoms, such as high blood glucose, or neuropathy, need to be ‘treated’ before they cause additional damage, they’re still ‘just’ symptoms – the root problem goes untreated. Much more research needs to be done – and quickly – to determine the root causes of illness, so that REAL treatment (and cure) is possible.

I don’t know whether wheat - or grains - is a primary culprit, or whether our wheat (which has been dramatically modified/enhanced) is the issue. Or is it carbs in general? Or other environmental issues/toxins? OR - and I think this is more likely - it’s any/all of the above (and other things), but varies from person to person. In the end, though, what works for YOU is the answer for you! I’ve seen stories of people for whom cutting all carbs worked. Some just cut out grains. Some get relief from avoiding all processed foods. I think there are multiple answers, and the definitive one is still awaiting discovery. I’m glad you’ve found success @JaninaWalker.

On the issue of ‘non-diabetic neuropathy’ that the OP asked…
My mother was Type 2 and fairly well controlled; however, she developed neuropathy that started /before/ she was diagnosed with diabetes. She had two herniated discs in her back that cut off some of the nerves – that caused the nerve damage that caused her neuropathy. (Though, later, when she was Type2, doctors tended to discount the problem as “typical diabetes complications” – her medical history not withstanding.)

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@Thas here’s my 4c worth. This woman Jan30 is doing an admirable job of doing the right thing to get her weight down as that is a prime way to reverse diabetes. Her approaches are working and she is on the right track. I do not know who you were trying to throw the wet blanket on but it is a prime reason why I hardly ever venture onto this site which is led by people who prefer to do the wrong thing.

I did not just accidently get better like someone else here said about 6 months ago and so I left. So I will leave again and let the people here make a mess of their lives. They even ruined the site by moving it twice and taking away the previous good features. There is no saving it now.

I don’t know what you’re talking about. I just said that there is still a lot of uncertainty in this area, and what works for one may not be the solution for another. A couple years ago, when I was still diagnosed as Type 2, I engaged a practitioner of “Functional medicine” and followed a dietary and supplement regimen that was advised. Did I see results? Yes, some; however, at the end of the day, my particular case won’t be “reversed” that way. I still follow many of the protocols because I need to inject somewhat less insulin that way and am hoping that helps me in other areas of my health (weight management, for example), but those were not “the answer.” for me. – And that’s the key: for me. I am glad that those things are working for you and I hope they continue to do so for life.

And I am not now, nor have I ever been an “admin” here nor one of the leaders of this site.

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As the original poster, I’m surprised at where this thread ended up. I described a specific situation and asked some fairly specific questions. But it almost immediately veered off in other directions. Thanks to @Thas for his comment about his grandmother and her experience. Otherwise, this is not my thread!

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It is unfortunate that your thread was hi-jacked. I will speak to your original post.

It puzzles me how your friend can be diagnosed with diabetic neuropathy if he/she has not been diagnosed as diabetic.

There are many causes of peripheral neuropathy with diabetic neuropathy being only one type.

My first brush with peripheral neuropathy came due to a ruptured spinal disc. As years passed diabetic neuropathy overtook the damage from my disc, it did happen faster in my left foot where there was the existing neuropathy from injury.

Not all neuropathy is related to diabetes, it can be from injury or even be a side effect of medication as @JaninaWalker suggest.

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The person you are mentioning is not classed as a diabetic, but the majority of people I helped were also not diabetic.

What you are looking for is an explanation of how can a doctor claim someone has diabetic neuropathy when they are not even diagnosed as a diabetic. Well that is because the doctor doing the assessment does know what he has seen in other people who are diabetic and he sees the similarities of symptoms and may even have said “I know you are not diabetic, but you seem to have diabetic neuropathy.” Well my opinion after helping mostly non-diabetics who got peripheral neuropathy from taking various types of drugs, but most notably antibiotics, they also are stumped for the same reason. But it does not matter what it is called when it is most accurately termed peripheral neuropathy and can be a result in anyone of any age even infants.

I do know a lot about neuropathy after having cured my own case and having helped several over 15 years according to both my doctor’s request and others who came to me based on what I had written.

I am certain it really does not matter how one claims the peripheral neuropathy started except for the distinction if it is caused by an accident or an operation as those cases do exist. I do not help people with that sort of neuropathy as there is unlikely as much of a chance at reversing it simply by nutritional alterations and adding supplements. But let me give you a parallel type of case. If someone harms their leg by falling off a ladder, then taking supplements are not going to reverse the damage to the leg from a trauma like that, but the supplements can still improve the person’s health, so are still worth using, but won’t be as likely to undo the accident’s effect. So the same thing happens if someone is having a spinal cord operation that goes wrong. That is just to say there are cases where the nutritional approach can not necessarily bring full healing. However, to not try is foolishness indeed as nutrition helps all sorts of things in the body and drugs have a notoriously negative effect.

So for the majority of cases I helped the problem was brought on by drugs which deplete B vitamins. So the answer is simple and will take either 3 to 4 months to correct if done in the repeated dosing in an overlapping manner or it will take a full year to get better if done in the once a day manner. Also I warn you any person who uses a single vitamin is unlikely to make any improvement and will give it up before noticing any benefit.

People are too used to taking a Tylenol when they have a headache and feeling an improvement within an hour and if not, they take a second. One does not get instantaneously better from neuropathy like that and that is why it is often required to take pain medications in the short term until the healing is noticed and the pain medications can be reduced gradually. That was my experience. But I was also employing a wide variety of supplements orally and by injection and I did get better over 4 months after suffering and figuring it out by reading and researching online for solutions for the first 10 weeks and thereby devising my own way. Lots of people have done that and you can see all the different efforts employed by people who got themselves better with their own experimentation. You can see those cases by visiting floxiehope dot com. What was very common in all those people and in my case is that we did not want to stay sick and tried relentlessly to find a solution, so we were all highly motivated to get well. The site is not a commercial site but one where people just explain it is possible to get better. That is so important to point this site out to a doctor and explain it is false to say there is no cure. What there is lacking is a double blind study pointing out a single cure and most doctors just don’t want to bother. So when they are saying there is no cure it is an excuse to say, “don’t ask me what to do other than to give you pain medications which is so far the standard of care” Since doctors can’t be sued if they provide the standard of care, be warned that if you want to get better you need to look into it yourself, like I did.

Where there’s a will there’s a way.

It does cost money to buy supplements and it does take effort. But if the motivation is not in the person and they listen to their doctor who often misguides them by saying there is no cure and even mislabeling it to begin with means it must be the person themselves who takes the initiative. It is far too hard to convince someone who listens to the drug touting naysayers who apparently prefer to sell drugs that make people worse, than spend the time to find a solution that helps.

Thanks for all the comments. Since my original post, I learned that this friend has “pre-diabetes.” I think of this as similar to being slightly pregnant. Something more significant is likely in the future. Don’t know about medications, but that’s certainly possible. There was no known injury that could have precipitated the neuropathy.

Anyway, thanks to Stemwinder and Janina for their helpful comments. I intend to explore this subject in more detail.

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Suggest you also look up the class action lawsuit against Pfizer for marketing Neurontin to be used for neuropathy which is an anti epileptic drug and was not designed for neuropathy… That will do nothing at all to heal the neuropathy and given I was 3 weeks on the generic version of it and know how unhelpful it is I luckily stopped it before becoming adapted to it. The reason I choose to use the word adapted instead of addicted is there is no feel good element to taking it but the person does become adapted to it and then cannot withdraw from it without encountering a slew of withdrawal effects that one person I helped found was so much worse than the minor neuropathy he had that he hardly ever mentioned the neuropathy.

What Pfizer then did was develop a pretty close cousin to the Neurontin called Lyrica and did get it approved by the FDA for neuropathy, but that does not really solve the problem for people who want to get better.

So that is why I suggest anyone who has neuropathy from whatever cause take a look at floxiehope dot com as there people who got it from the antibiotics are explaining how they got it better on their own with their own figured out cures. That is similar to how I got better by devising my own approach and it certainly was NOT a vague problem to begin with as my case was extreme. So I would say the sooner a person tries to solve it the easier it will be to solve and the absolute worst thing to do is listen to anyone who says there is no cure. The sooner you fix the problem the easier it is to do.

I had looked up the Neurontin lawsuit probably 15 years ago when a doctor tried to prescribe it to me for some leg pain I was having. My recollection is that company reps were wining and dining doctors and telling them about all the wonderful off-label uses for the drug — biggest fine against a drug manufacturer up to that time I believe. Didn’t know about Lyrica though, probably because I’ve had no need to look into it.

I can’t tolerate neurontin. Makes me sleepy/lethargic.

I use Lyrica 3x a day to keep the stinging from PN at bay. Works great! and I get it for free from the mfgr.

Yes that is all correct and has been written about extensively in books by doctors and even pharmacists who decry the way the medical profession is being handled and that is why I decided to apply the old saying about “the tail wagging the dog,” where the tail is only supposed to be a small part of the picture yet is in the end far too significant. There are more deaths attributed to drugs than there are to supplements by a long shot. It is frankly not supposed to be this way, but you will see a very good rendition of how it came about by listening to the Ty Bollinger series on cancer. which is still available online.

Naturally eating a proper diet and having enough exercise is supposed to be the base of good health, but supplements can be used very effectively to bring on healing.