My little 6-year old granddaughter has been feeling ill for a couple of weeks, so far without a determinate diagnosis, but some of the symptoms are T1-ish. Peeing lots (her teacher at pre-school has commented on it), saying she feels terrible all the time, uncharacteristically and persistently moody/irritable. The one specific thing that’s been most consistent is a persistent back pain. It’s that one I want to ask about as it doesn’t seem particularly T1 related to me, but kids are different. Can anyone comment on that?
They brought her to the Dr for tests last week thinking possible UTI but that was negative. My daughter’s not sure if they tested BG or ketones. Going back to the dr today as it continues to persist. I’ve told my daughter she should definitely ask for BG and ketones to be tested–that’s easy and could easily eliminate the T1 worry from the list if negative.
I’ve never heard of back pain being a sign of diabetes.
Is the pain on one side? Is there any water retention? I had a weird kidney infection 20 years ago and I was very irritable before I knew what I’d had (of course we were on a vacation trip at the time)
I’ll be thinking of your granddaughter and I hope you get some answers soon.
Thanks–don’t really know more than what’s in my OP nothing to add. My daughter actually has a BG meter and said she might try to get Bella to let her do a finger stick. But yeah, to me the back thing seems to steer away from the big D though the peeing is a concern. We’ll see.
I encourage you to just get your daughter to do the fingerstick BG test to at least eliminate the worry.
When I first noticed the peeing/drinking symptoms with my little T1 guy, I hesitated testing his BG for a couple days because I didn’t want to hurt him and I had a long list of other causes than T1 for the symptoms. But then when I tested him (and confirmed my suspicions) he didn’t cry at all or get upset and I though why didn’t I do this sooner?
I am still amazed that he doesn’t get upset at all with all the shots and BG tests.
Thanks @AE13. Same advice I gave my daughter (she has a BG meter and knows how to use it). I texted her a little while ago to see if there was any news but haven’t heard back yet.
I was just diagnosed last year. I had the classic symptoms but also had pain in my lower left side of my back. I thought it was from sitting for long periods and tried to explain it away (along with all of my other symptoms).however, when I started insulin treatment and got my blood sugars in range the back pain went away.
Hi, when I have high BG, one of the first signs is low back pain…
High BG causes dehydration… someone mentioned to me that “The last place for the body has too draw water from is the lower intestine”…which causes low back pain The other symptoms you mentioned would point in the same direction.
I also learned that I cannot rely solely upon the way I feel as detection for Glucose problems, Have you heard of “glycemic unawareness”. If I get accustomed to either High or Low BG it begins to feel normal, so I loose the ability to make a proper judgment based on symptoms alone.
I learned that it is very important to always check the color of my urine,
“light is right” If you think of it on a scale of 1-5, clear being best and gradually getting deeper yellows, this is a good way to gauge dehydration.
