I also cannot get my numbers right. I can’t seem to affect my BS numbers, and I came from eating so low carb because of the celiac disease.
How do you make a doctor order a test?
I have stomach pains any time of day.
I was taking 500 mg of Metformin in the morning and 500mg mid day and 500 at night.
I have read a lot, but I don’t get balancing my meds or diet.
I never ate much carb to begin with. A normal dinner for me is meat and a salad or plate of vegetables.
So if I am not eating much carb, then I don’t know what to do. I am a celiac, so I don’t eat grains. That means no bread, pizza, crackers, cereals, cookies, cakes, you name it. I’m also not able to tolerate dairy. So I pretty much eat the same foods.
Maybe cut out the vegetables?
I was thinking of just eating meat and seeing what happens…
Amazing.
Doctors are trained to investigate and to do “Differential Diagnoses”…I have to do these as a tech.
Different symptoms present with many diseases or problems. Such as fatigue, a gadzillion possibilities. But they are supposed to put together a history, and what a patient tells them is a huge part.
Thank God your friend found out.
I guess I don’t really know, despite all the literature I have read, how to get my blood sugar balanced.
My job is fairly physical. I don’t see what walking is going to do. I used to walk 4 miles a day, and it didn’t do a thing for me, so I stopped. It became too hard to keep it up when I knew there was no results from it.
I am going to just eat meat and nuts and eggs and see if my blood sugar goes down. Then I won’t be eating ANY carbs. It has to.
You get energy without be tired by balancing your diet with the meds you take
and the exercise that you must do, to achieve a reasonable glucose level.
How do you do this? What the diabetic educators called a balanced diet was impossible. Who can have time to sit there and measure every little bite of food and obsess over it, when it isn’t going to fix the pancreas?
And what will exercise do for the pancreas? Like I said, I used to do 4 miles a day, and I just couldn’t keep it up anymore, because it did not stop my diabetes from advancing.
you know twix stress can cause your bgs to go up too . I think if you raise enough stink with your insurance company to push for things they might just give you what you want to get you off the phone . I have seen plenty of customers of certain stores b*tch and moan untill they get what they want and they are happy . Just try it and see what happens I wish you luck . seems like you are stuck in the insurance crap pile with a piece of work dr .
My doctor has me hooked up to saline IVS when I complain about weakness and that tired feeling. This has really helped me.
Oh, I’ve been on the phone with the person who handles the diabetic issues. This is Medicaid, and this is a good peek at what is in store if we get national healthcare…more rationing.
I am pretty bold about things, and have pushed, and then they push back, but the bottom line is the amount of money they are allowed to spend.
You are right about if we don’t push, we never get anything. I know with the doctor’s office, I have had to be pushy, and they don’t like that. I think, the heck with that, this is my life, they can be petty if they want to be, but when it’s their life on the line, they would be the same.
I am going to find another doctor. I am also changing the plan I am under on Medicaid. But if I find another job to relieve stress ( I work every day, and am on call 24/7 on weekends), I will “make too much” to be on Medicaid. I won’t be able to get major medical if I am diabetic. I have talked to the biggest insurance companies and some of the lesser ones who offer plans, but they are just basic plans and don’t cover catastrophic.
Medicaid, at least in my state, won’t cover Byetta unless you have an AIC of 7 or higher.
I just think they make up these silly, nonmedical rules to save money. Like my doctor told me once, "We can’t give you Byetta, because we have to
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be able to give other patients help too." Such garbage, he doesn’t want to do the authorization work.
Ship, I am glad the IV’s worked for you…
Dear Twix.
I know that metformin is a miracle drug for some people. Some get serious gastro problems and I just get totally wiped out after 3 weeks on the stuff but no gastro problems. I think as a diabetic it is normal to feel more tired than if we would not be diabetic. Exercise if you have any energy left is good and will give you more energy. I would try and add some insulin into the pot and see what happens.
And stay away from the psycho drugs all of them make me more tired and therefore more depressed with the exception of zopiclone a slep pill that is ok for occaisional use.
I can’t get insulin though. Eventually, I will find another doctor.
The best things I have found so far are Jenny’s Blood Sugar 101 and Atkins Diabetes Revolution books.
And this site, some really truly great people on this site.
I can appreciate what you said. Really good people in any profession are priceless.
He should appreciate the compliment!!!
Hope you find a wonderful doctor & one who’ll prescribe insulin. Not that I’d recommend being on insulin without medical guidance, but in some states certain types of insulin don’t require an Rx. Won’t be covered by insurance without a prescription, of course.
Get Dr. Bernstein’s Diabetes Solution. It’s not just about low carb & includes a wealth of valuable info.
Please don’t forgo eating vegetables in favor of an all protein diet. About 58% of protein converts to glucose & you won’t starve from lack of carbs despite what dieticians say, but you need the nutrients & fiber in vegetables. You could eat nothing at all & still see BG rises from hormones, stress, liver dumping glycogen, burning fat stores & just from the basic metabolic process of being alive with diabetes.
I would # 1 switch doctors and # 2 switch medications. I have been though 4 doctors before I found one that actually listened and knew what to do to me. I had one doctor tell me that I was doing something wrong and it was my fault that glucose levels were not what they were supposed to be. What the doctor did not realize that what works for one diabetic does not work for the next diabetic.
I was on pills and they made me feel exactly the way you do. I could not handle them. They also did no good at lowering my blood sugars. I ended up going to shots. I felt quite a bit better since switching to shots. I feel even better since going on the pump.
Keep fighting! You are worth it!
Thanks for saying that. I am changing docs. I guess it took enough to be able to tell I wasn’t going to get anywhere with him.
My insurance is very picky about insulin, so I don’t think I am going to get that.
But maybe a new doctor would go to bat for me on it, if he thinks I need it.
There aren’t good doctors on my plan. This is the third one I have been to. But I will keep looking.
I have been eating Atkins now, stopped the ADA diet, and I feel great. I am doing low carb, very healthy. The diabetic educator hated Atkins. But her diet made me feel horrible.
You are right, they don’t work with each case. I think the hospital groups they work for or the insurance only allows them a certain amount of time per patient, and this is part of the problem.
Thanks for your good words, and I am glad you got somewhere with another doctor!!
I don’t see why your insurance should have any say about insulin. the more so since with low dosage it would not be that much more than pills. !0 years ago my diabetic dietician was talking muffins and I was talking sauerkraut. I found her not just useless but harmful.
They have a say because they want to to it the cheapest way possible. The pills are cheaper and do not expire quite as fast. If a doctor prescribes insulin then they have to cover medication, needles, more test strips, alcohol wipes etc. This is also one of the major factors why the insurance companies do not want to cover the pumps. Cost. It is more expensive short term but long term the pump ends up being a lot cheaper.
Good point.
Medicine is all about cost now. Very scary. Scary to think life and death decisions are made on cost effectiveness.
Doctors were trained to do the best for the patient, to figure out what was wrong, but now, they are controlled with this.
We have to be our own advocates!
I wonder if you might get better results with your doctor or other health care providers if you kept a journal and could explain very specifically what symptoms you are feeling. I am a CDE and have managed both type 1 and type 2 patients for many years and although some of the things you mention like gastointestinal problems on Metformen are common some of the other symptoms you mention are not. I am not clear what you mean by attacks and perhaps your doctors also are not really clear about what you mean.
Everyone’s blood sugar goes up and down and especially in early type 2 you might be pretty sensitive to the changes in blood sugar levels. Still most people don’t feel anything at all until their blood sugar goes way up into the 300s - 400s or goes down below 70. Metformin should not cause low blood sugar and unless you are changing the amount of carbohydrate you eat from one day to the next very significantly I would not expect you to have really high blood sugar spikes. I hope you are not overly worried about changes in blood sugar from 70 to to 170. These are to be expected unless you are exceptionally consistant with the carb you eat at each meal. These levels are very unlikely to cause short term symptoms and also are very unlikely to cause long term complications. It is the exposure to long term high blood sugar levels that causes complications. If you test often and get very upset about your numbers the anxiety itself can cause your blood sugar to rise. Your A1c is an average and it is excellent but you are right that an average is not always good if it reflects too many lows. Still unless you are having true hypoglycemia with levels below 60 your A1C is a good average and you should take comfort in the fact that you have excellent control. If you are having true hypos then you should change therapy and you should in any case if you are having abdominal discomfort from the Metformin. Ther are lots of good oral medications available and your doctor should certainly change your medication to find one that is more suitable for you. Actos or Januvia come to mind.
It sounds like you have lost confidence in your doctor so if you can find a new one and start fresh it might really help. I would write down my symptoms and how and if they relate to my BG levels in a log and take that to your next provider. There may be other physical problems that are cousing some of your symptoms and it may take a bit to sort them out. But don’t dispare most folks with diabetes really feel good most of the time and find that although they naturally would love to not have diabetes they can control it and really enjoy life fully.
I hope you are
If you have read my posts, I talked about how I went into my doctor’s with a log of my blood sugars and he said he didn’t want to see it.
I also talked about how my insurance will not allow Actos or Januvia, and will say it again, if your AIC is under 8, you can’t get it. I cannot get anything but Metformin.
It is up to me to figure things out and deal with my diabetes.
I also talked about how I had blurred vision, fatigue, and neuropathy.
A blood sugar over 120 is significantly bad.
I know enough about medicine to know these things are bad. Why is it you diabetic educators think high blood sugars are okay? They are harmful to the vital organs.