I’ve managed pretty tight control since diagnosis, still some days become challenging and my blood sugars decide to go on a trip usually a couple times a month or when i am stressed, I have heard people with tight control who still manage to get complications, this scares me a little… i’ve turned to a soy - plant based diet; i get protein from things like nuts and fish, but i do not eat any meats…its only lately that my feet have been burning and doing weird things… is there anyone out there who has kept stable control throughout the years but still managed to get complications?
Insurance companies keep records about the likelyhood of healthy people to die at a certain age. This means that there is a likelyhood - even a small one - for everyone that he will die tomorrow. The same is true for diabetic complications. But there is an important difference. You can bias the likelyhood for your own good. With tight control the likelyhood of complications can be very well reduced. It will not be equal to a healthy person I must admit since glucose fluctuations and genetic defects can have all sorts of side effects. But still the bottom line is that the struggle with control is worth it. Many complications are developing slower now and with less severity. There are no guarantees at all but at least we could try hard without being consumed by fears of the future.
I have been a Type 1 for 23 years and I can say that my control wasn’t great but it was ok.I would do alot of spiking caused by a low.I was up and down.With the pump I find I don’t have that as much.I have managed to stay free of complications.It scares the daylights out of me.
As a follow up here is a statistic of the year 2007 for Germany:
Number of diabetics that have died from diabetes: 27871
Meaning that diabetes was responsible for 2,6% of all deaths in Germany.
Now the good news: the mean age of death for these diabetics was: 79,5 years