Type 1 Diagnosed Later In Life

Hello Hanna, I was diagnosed at age 56. I had no warning symptoms. For me it began as Diabetic Ketoacidosis, a transport to the ER and 4 days in a critical care unit. The hospital diagnosed me as Type I, my doctor insists I am Type II, because according to him, it is impossible to know the difference between the two types and makes no difference. Needless to say, I don't trust him. I am controlled very well with Novolog and Levemir, and I credit my understanding of this disease and how to control my blood sugar to tudiabetes.org. Before I found this site my blood sugars were ranging 300-400+. Now I am able to keep the range to 85-125. My doctor does not respect my need to keep tight control, he thinks I am "playing with fire" controlling it so tightly. I am glad you have the correct diagnosis and I wish you excellent control! Joan

Later in life? Diagnosed at 20 and that was two years ago.

Some insurance company's fallow Medicare rules which I think states your C-pep must not be > than 110% of the lower target setting on the lab test. My labs Test says 1.1 - 4.4 ng/mL...YLMV

You fall well within the guideline.

Much later in life - it was my 60th birthday present. Now pumping with tslim and during a Dex G4. Has been an interesting journey.

"later in life" ahaha that made me chuckle. I was diagnosed at 22 years old with type 1. I've had it over a year now. I could probably help with some advice but not a whole lot if you're asking about pumps and cgms (as I tried the pump and hated it and have no interest in a cgm , I use pens and a regular ol' one touch meter and I'm fine, I don't need all that crap). As many here have said, it's not uncommon. Most of the people I have met all over the internet who didn't get it as children were diagnosed in their 20's.

I also, personally, reject the LADA label as I see all type 1 as type 1 no matter the speed of onset. I'd assume mine was fairly rapid but I'm not sure. It's hard to tell.

omg joan, please get a new doctor right away!

I was dxd when I was 23 :-/ I was a t2 for all of 5 minutes before the dietitian (who just so happened to be visiting my PCP's office and worked as a PA for a peds endo) straightened out my doc. My PCP is awesome, he just typically deals in t2 and I have taught him some stuff about the tech available for t1. I was seriously lucky because the oral meds made me feel awful and after a week of side effects that didn't seem to lessen, I went off of them in my own little experiment while I waited for my test results. Honestly, for me the hardest part of this whole experience wasn't even the dx itself, it was dealing with a family full of t2's who don't take care of their diabetes and getting over all the negative comments about the changes I was making. A little over a year later I got my pump and my cgm and am working toward better control. The online support is amazing and the advice from experienced D's has really helped me to learn and adapt to this change in my life.

i was 19, you should check out some of the groups.

Hi Hanna T, I was diagnosed six months ago at age 30 and the biggest shock (other than the diagnosis) was friends and family members’ well meaning reactions. They ranged from disbelief to insisting that what I was experiencing couldn’t be correct. Society has the misperception that all T1Ds are children, when in fact there are two to three times as many adults diagnosed with T1D every year (15,000 children v. 30,000 - 45,000 adults). Let’s get the word out!

Hi Hanna,

Both my brother and I were diagnosed at 24. Him first, and myself 5 years later. No history in the family of type 1. It really doesn't seem that unusual now for people to be diagnosed as adults. The name "Juvenile" diabetes needs to be thrown away altogether, in my opinion.

Hanna T. Currently I am in the process of getting an insulin pump. Waiting on the insurance company's approval, 2nd round. Since I was first diagnosed as a T2, I was never tested for C-pep or antibodies until this summer. My C-pep was .6. Endo said I was a good candidate for the pump after the blood test and BG reading for the last 2 years.

I was originally diagnosed as T2D at 27 years old. 2 years later and near death, I got insulin. I'm 50 now, so I've heard.

I've had that confused in my short time already too!

I'm only now discovering LADA but I agree. At the end of the day you end as a type 1 just the onset is different right?

I'm glad that everything is working better for you now! I hope that you can inspire the people in your family to change. I also have many type 2s in my family as well.

I've also seen the rainbow of reactions! I'm excited to educate myself and those around me however!

I'm sorry for you both. It's very obvious now for me that adults being diagnosed is more common!

Thank you to everyone that has opened my eyes to the statistics out there. I appreciate all of the information!

Congrats on being a responsive and present "host" for this thread. Not everyone does that!

Well, I guess there really are lots of us diagnosed "later" (than expected.. above 20 years?). I was also 24.
While my progression is quite untypical (and not that dangerous) it seems, just last year (the same year as me, but later on) my distant cousin was diagnosed in his late 40s. Of course they first thought it was type 2, although he was hospitalized due to ketoacidosis.
It's a dangerous stereotype (?) that only children/teenagers get type 1