My Story of .01%

I am hoping the whole story will help! LOL
2008 June, I had just lost my job for falling asleep. I had been so tried lately, also a drug problem! I had reach the point I was getting to old the screw up like this any more! Left my wife and came back home broke and with nothing. Laying on the couch in parents house 52 years old I prayed “Lord I know I am not strong enough by myself !, could I could just a little help so I don’t mess up again Please!” Well you know that old careful what you ask for!!! It’s after that it seems my diabetic story begins!!
Aug./08 after of about 2 weeks of feeling so sick!! I never in my had been so sick, weak, so tried!!, then one morning I woke up and I couldn’t see anything!!! I mean so bad with super magnifying glasses and sticking something so close to my face it was funny, sort of I could barely read!!! Then I started to have pee… A LOT!!! LOL I just knew if I wasn’t getting up every hour and draining what seemed like gallons, I could just some sleep and feel better. One other thing I stopped being able to taste anything sweet!!! I was so thirsty, Heck the thing I drank before the next part, lol was a large fruit juice drink smoothie thing!!!
Sooo, I am outside smoking and feeling like I am dieing. Again I tried the praying thing “Lord I am feeling so bad any help?? Please” May sound weird but I swear this thought pops in my head!! Real clear “Check your blood sugar!” My sound like no big thing, except up until this point my whole knowledge of diabetes was my mom. My mom was 4:11 and 350 lbs and who did nothing but lay around and watch TV with type 2. Wonder how that happened??? LOL Sorry don’t mean to offend anyone!!! Just what I knew of diabetes! So, like most I had tried her meter before this. LOL Anybody else have friend or relatives want to try the meter and see their bs. ROFLMAO!!!
So I go inside and tell my mom what had just happened!! OK, Honey here use my meter. Now begins my story!!!
After sticking my finger and watching the little hourglass that stupid meter didn’t give me a number!! Nope all it did was keep flashing the word “HI !” over and over. Oops hold on mom let me do this again. Well that didn’t change a thing. Well mom looks like I need a ride to the VA Hospital in Loma Linda!! So off I go. I tell the admitting desk my story. Sick, weak, peeing A LOT LOL, blind, lost over 25 pounds in a week and a glucose meter that said “HI !” Have a seat and someone will be right with you. Sitting down I look around, Oh poo it’s pretty full looks like I might be here awhile! Mind you I still really have no idea how sick I am, not a clue!!! LOL
It seem like so quick they are calling my name, Wow that’s great I thought, like I said not a clue of how my whole life is about to change!! LOL Now I am in the exam area, again with the story. OK sir well I have to check you with my meter. Does the test and also gets no number!!! that stupid HI thing again. He takes a look at that and goes,“Ohh, excuse me I’ll be right back.” He returns with not 1 but 2 IV’s and starts to fill me up. LOL and tells me someone will be right here to take me upstairs. Oh, where I am I going and how long? I have someone in the waiting room, I asked. These next words were my first clue as to how sick I was for me!! You, sir are going to ICU as you are a very sick man!!!
Now for me this quite a shock cause up until this I had never been overnight in a hospital!!! 52 years old.
Hooked up to all kinds of tubes and wires, a nurse come in and gives me injection. What is that I ask?? Insulin she replied! Now I am thinking “insulin, insulin, wtf the only people I’ve seen or know use insulin were being slowly cut down piece by piece!!!” Like I said I no real knowledge of diabetes!!! Then the curtain swings back and my Dr. says the endocrinologist has dx’ed you type 1 diabetic. Stats at dx. bs 672, a1c 13.2, DKA, C-pep barely a reading and 52 years old.
That is my start of my diabetic road trip! LOL
At the beginning it was so over whelming. So much to learn! First there’s the meter, my friend sometimes feels like my enemy. lol It does have a name, mine is Dracula!!! Then the insulin, short, long, needles. Oh, on the needles I WAS one of those that wasn’t to keen on them!!! Got over that real fast. Truth be told after my first shot of insulin by the nurse, when came time for the next I asked if I could do it after all I was going to be doing for the rest of my life!! That first shot is the only insulin shot I have ever gotten by someone other than me!! I take this serious!!!
The next few months were trying learn how to control my bs!!! I remember eating a sandwich and having my bs hit 350 and then 4 hours later treating a hypo. I think that sounds type 1 LOL So after figuring that out thanks to people like Alan S. and the ADA website, here, etc… I found my baseline 30 units Lantus in the morning and a ratio of 2 units of Novolog to 45-50 grams of carbs. My aic was coming down 13.2, 7.8, 7.1 etc… At this time my knowledge of diabetes is such that my Dr.'s leave me to tell them if I make any changes!!! LOL
Then about a little of a year ago, things started to change!! Out of the blue I started getting some pretty bad low bs. Seems I was fighting lows everyday. So I did a baseline test the 12 hour fasting, me. And my bs was dropping, OK adjust in half actually, tried 15 units of Lantus No go still getting lows!! Stopped Lantus, after a week did another baseline, flat!!! I mean really flat!!! That when I made a Dr. appt. and asked for a C-pep. Test result, normal!!!
Stage 2 I guess. LOL Now I am being seen by the Endo group in record time!! less than 2 weeks, normal 2 mos.!! Sitting a room of Endo’s, students (the hospital helps train endo’s from Loma Linda Medical Univ) and the head of Endo!! They OK you a little overweight at dx. so maybe a touch of type 2, a little more info, ok your LADA try going without insulin completely. This was not good!!! Without my minor corrections and watching my bs started to climb!!! Told them after less than a week NO WAY!! I told them this isn’t going to work for me!!! Again they try Lantus 12 units, nope the lows are back!!! So now I am kind of limbo taking care of my diabetes the best I can!!! I do real good with what little insulin I use about 1/2 to 1 unit once in awhile if I notice my numbers higher than what I like!!! Kind of like starting fluid for a cold engine!! LOL
Stage 3, I start to get that low bs feeling, wait I haven’t needed insulin in days??? Check my bs and it’s 70??? You mean I am just low because I forgot to eat??? WTF!!! So now I have to eat a little all day or I get shaky and weak!!
The reason they are saying I am not diabetic now, is simple the Dr. said a dx. of diabetes means having to treat everyday!! Mine is more like an old car some days it runs great and some days it don’t LOL My pancreas got to love it. They do want to study my pancreas (c-pep was almost not there to normal) and my immune system ( positive to almost not there).
Me my feeling are simple I don’t care what they want to call it it’s mine and I am going to take care of it the best I can and not let hurt me!!! I am the master of my bs!!!

My Mom does about 50-70 units of Lantus, she's type 2. I think I've been almost every type. LOL

I have also been almost every type and I can trump you because if I didn't already have full-time antibody-positive diabetes, I am 100% sure I would currently have gestational diabetes hahahahaha

I compare your story to mine (admitted to hospital in DKA as a teenager, although I think I was a bit less lucid than you).

And about a year after diagnosis for me, in honeymoon and not needing insulin for a while.

And can identify with you 100%. And tell you that you are not exceptional. I went through everything you went through (I did it 30 years ago!), and I'm willing to discuss it to help you understand.