He had a one-on-one meeting with a "diabetes educator" and I'm so sorry I missed it. I had a killer headache and just about any attempt to move would make me throw up, so I couldn't go.
He showed her his record of glucometer readings - all but one within the normal range. The one that was high wasn't off by much. And he has NOT been at all faithful with the dieting. So he asked her, flat out: "If I haven't been staying on the diet and my blood sugars have remained within the normal range, then how can I be diabetic?" She replied archly, "Oh, you're diabetic, all right!" He reworded the question several ways - the numbers all say NORMAL, despite eating anything that didn't bite back - so how does this back up the diagnosis. She would never come back with a concrete answer, but she continued to insist that he is a diabetic.
It probably was a good thing I wasn't there. I would have been in her face with the same question. If it looks like a duck, waddles like a duck, and quacks like a duck, why do you persist in calling it a kitty-cat???
He takes no medicine, doesn't stay on the diet, and yet continues to have normal blood sugars. So how, exactly, is the diagnosis of "diabetic" appropriate??
His highest-ever recorded blood sugar level, taken months ago, was 141. It has never been anywhere near that high since that one time. He is overweight, but has lost about 1/4 of what he needs to lose. He is exercising often. Diabetes runs in his family, so I can see that it is a definite possibility. But the circumstances seem to have changed. What am I not seeing here???
Hmmm, something isn't right
ReplyDeleteAt one time, my doctor told me I was pre-diabetic and started throwing all these scary things at me
She didn't realize how much I knew about diabetes because of Tom
So, I started testing my sugar at various times during the day. Yeah, my sugar probably stayed around 120 sometimes going up a little higher
but really - in the scheme of things - knowing how "real" diabetics are -- that's nothing.
The "goal" for healthy people is around 100 -- anything much off from that is supposed to be "bad" and in today's world, they want to scare you into taking drugs or doing other crazy things.
this is not to say that if one's blood sugar keeps increasing and it becomes 200 and higher that its ok -- I'm guessing your husband probably did make some food changes and is doing better.
but many people in the medical industry have so become tied to the numbers that they have no flexibility. I recommend watching the numbers and try to eat with reason. maybe this was a scare but not as drastic as you thought?
can you try another doctor?
see if he can get a monitor and do more frequent testing to see what his numbers really are and go from there?
just one person's ideas?
Hmmm . . . maybe he does need a second opinion. Also wondering if his weight loss and exercise has put his blood sugars back into the normal range.
ReplyDeleteThanks, TW - his numbers have been both above and below 100, but not a whole lot in either direction. I'm inclined to agree with Lilly's speculation that slight behavior modifications have pulled his blood levels back down into the more or less normal range, and the "diabetic educator" is too full of herself to admit it.
ReplyDeleteShe sounds kind of like a head case (this, from my husband the mental health therapist!!!). Their appointment was for an hour, but she dragged it out to an hour and a half, telling him stupid little stories that didn't interest him a bit, and telling him that she expected all of her overweight clients to have lost so much weight that they will be able to get together next summer at a local beach wearing either bikinis or thong swimming trunks. That little number struck me as massively unprofessional.