While I was working, I had to keep my blood sugar high enough to be able to work without constantly eating something. I was pretty satisfied with a seven something A1C.
Yet now, since I am retired, though I am 62 years old and ill and cannot exercise, I am able to monitor my glucose all day long. And my A1C is five something. Again, I am pretty satisfied.
Was I foolish to be satisfied before, or are the two situations so different that I should just accept the past as it happened ?
Not foolish at all IMO. You deal with this disease and the restrictions your life places on it however you need to. When I was a kid my Dr.s had my BG’s run much higher because I had a tendency to drop very rapidly and lose consciousness and this went on until I was in my late teens. Eventually we got that under control enough that we were able to aim for lower numbers but it was like that for over a decade.
My last A1C was much higher than I have been used to the last few years and I have been scrambling to try and get it back down without much success. So I’m not currently satisfied with my A1C but I am trying to figure out what is causing me to have such high BG’s. IMO as long as you are doing the best you can with the tools/situation you have then you have nothing to regret.
I too found an improvement in my A1c once I retired. I could devote more time and attention to managing my glucose metabolism.
No, I don’t think you were foolish to accept higher glucose levels when you were working. You had to balance earning a living with your health needs.
Good for you for making improvements in your treatment regimen once you enjoyed the increased time retirement afforded you.
Do you use a continuous glucose monitor? If you do or you choose to going forward, I would encourage weighing the time in range metric more heavily than A1c. It better reflects actual glycemic experience as it captures time spent hypo and glucose variability, something the A1c number can miss.
Boy is that the wrong question for this week. )))(((
I have been retired for 8 years and 6.0 or under for the last 10 but stuff happens,
This past year I have moved and moved my daughter. I helped with a terminally ill family member and after the funeral cleaned out the house and got it sold. Basically eating has not been bad, exercise has been really nonexistent (other than stairs and carrying boxes. Gained about 10 pounds So did my annual blood work. A1c 6.3. Ugh
My doc was not happy and and wanted to talk meds (I do diet and exercise only)
No I am not happy, so I need to get out running again (I have lost most of the weight) It would have been nice to have a pause button , during all of the chaos and travel.
Oh well, time to start working on getting my numbers in order.
Turning 74 soon. Can’t slow down now.
Am I happy with my numbers, NO! But I am grateful that I can still worry about them.
I am happy with my A1c if I can keep it around 6.5% or so. That takes a lot of work for me and for now may be the best I can do. For the past several months I’ve put a lot of energy into my diabetes, exercise, and diet (cutting back on carbs) and my A1c came back at 6.6%, which was a smidgen lower than my previous one, but not a lot. @Terry4 mentioned in another thread that anemia could raise A1c, but that doesn’t seem to have had any impact for me. But overall my health is much better than it was six months ago, so that’s a major improvement.
I may be able to hit a lower A1c number when I am retired. Who knows. That is a long way off for me, though, at about 25 years. By the time I retire, I’ll have had diabetes for more than 50 years, and my main goal is to just be healthy at that point so I can enjoy it.
All my doctors are happy with my current level of control, and I put in quite a bit of daily effort to maintain it. If I can somehow get an A1c much lower at some point without too many lows, that is great. But if not, I’m not going to stress about it.
My A1c was actually lower when I was working and had a much, much busier life. It has been in the non diabetic range for almost 20 yrs now. When following Dr Bernstein’s way of eating my A1c was as low as 4.6 and as high as 5.2. I followed that woe for 11 yrs.
Now that I eat a plant based diet which requires low fat to reduce insulin resistance, I eat a substantial amount of good, healthy carbs. My A1c is 5.4, l lost 10 lbs, and I feel much better. I am very happy with my A1c.
Even after 60 yrs of living with type 1, I still would like to go out for a latte and a pastry when I am walking in our little beach town. I don’t, but I sure would like to.
I use a Libre sensor. I think it has helped me check often, without my having to stick my finger (ouch!). But the main difference now, I think, is that I am not working eight hours a day and have more time to monitor my numbers. I loved my job but I hated my boss.
I don’t think I have ever liked my a1c. As a mater a fact when I was a teenager, I hated it! It was a tool used to make me feel like a failure.
I guess a1c’s now should be used as a tool and a bit of info to help with any treatment plan options. But I have kinda removed myself from that number. There is no good or bad, just where you are at in the moment. I really do use time in range and standard deviations as my tool to see how well my treatment plan is working.
I do agree that this target is also a moving target. As a persons situation changes, that target might change. Maybe when I retire, I can focus more time on it but at his point my numbers are good enough for me to lead a full happy, productive life and there are no diabetes issues. So I just take a deep breath and move on.
Your goal, is your goal. It’s one that works well for you in the situation you are in. So, enjoy your retirement! You worked hard for it, so kick back, relax and enjoy!
A1c for me is a mild point of curiosity. It is out of mind within 5 minutes of seeing what it is this appointment.
We base our treatment on controlling the highs and lows and using the Dexcom Clarity graphs for picking out areas of improvements that are not necessarily obvious when looking at isolated numbers of “right now”.
If that happens to provide an improved A1c then great. Minor side benefit. I guess.
I’ve had T1D for more than 37 years and have been fortunate to have HbA1C under 7.0 the entire time, even through 3 pregnancies. I think that is mostly due to luck, just not having big issues controlling my blood sugar. Each diabetic is different, so it’s important to only look at your numbers and progress, not anyone else’s. My last HbA1C was 4.7. That’s because I went on the ketonic diet 19 months ago. Since I did, my blood sugars are incredibly stable unless I have a carb load or I’m sick. When I’m sick, my fasting blood sugars are horrendous (170 this morning and I only have a summer cold!). Keto took away a lot of blood sugar stress for me. It’s also raised my good cholesterol so high that my overall total registers as “high.” Of course, when they look at the numbers, my medical team is astonished that most of the 220 is good cholesterol. That’s just a side benefit of keto!
Your number is what’s best for you and/or what your target is for you. since my BG drops over 100 points (sometimes 200 points) from one unit, I have always struggled. I cannot just eat and bolus. It’s usually too much insulin no matter what I do. A 7 would be fantastic for me, no cause for being upset. I really feel each person is completely totally dealing with uniqueness and comparisons just are not possible. Not judging anyone’s post, just how I feel. And it’s just occurred to me that this is my diabetes anniversary…
I like my A1C fine, but as mentioned somewhere above it is but one metric amongst dozens and I don’t find it the most important. Standard deviation (SD) and Time-in-range (TIR) are far better indicators of quality of control.
BTW, my doctor doesn’t like my A1C, but he’s just a spectator in this show
With the advances in technology it appears that A1C will soon no longer be used for diabetes management as it does not measure how well a patient’s diabetes is being managed. It will continue to be part of blood testing to determine if a patient is diabetic or not but once a patient is found to be diabetic, doctor will look at AGP (Ambulatory Glucose Profile International Standard) and inside AGP look at TIR (Time In Range) of each major range - BG very Low Range, Low Range, In Target Range, High Range, Very High Range along with SD (Standard Deviation) to assess Glucose Variability which is becoming a hugely important factor.
My doctor no longer looks at A1C as these new metrics are so much more granular which is really what is of paramount importance in diabetes management.
I am happy with my 6% A1C! And I was happy when it was 6.4% before!
I don’t think my new doctor pays a lot of attention to anything specific except mostly A1C. But maybe that’s because she considers me doing well. And so many people still don’t have CGM’s.
I feel old. I recall in the mid-2000’s when 7 was the gold standard for A1c! Literally—my sister’s doc had a “7” lapel pin he got from a drug rep. He was a sweetheart— when my developmentally disabled sis finally got down to 7, he took the lapel pin off his jacket and put it on her favorite hat!
Wow! I am certainly new to all this as my son who is 10 was just diagnosed T1D in June. However, all the information they have given me states 7.5 as the A1C goal! My son upon diagnosis was 8.3. I am even more scared to see what it will be next time bc we are having such a hard time getting his meds adjusted right! I had not idea that the goal was truly much lower it looks like
The goal at this point is not perfecting his A1C but figuring your way through this new challenge. If your Dr.s are recommending a 7.5 A1C then stick with that for now and consider a lower A1C as something to try for later.
