I first discovered I had Type 2 diabetes in1990. Like most people it was first discovered by accident. I was volunteering for a medical study and was told I couldn’t be a part of the study because of “my diabetes”.
What a rude awakening that was! My immediate thought was about my Sister-in-Law and the many times she was in the hospital for “her diabetes”. I knew she took needles, but that’s about the extent of it.
After I started seeing the doctor, which I did right away, they set me straight on the cause, effect and treatment of diabetes. They sent me to a class, which my insurance company paid for, to learn about diabetes. We learned about, among other things, fast food and diabetes, soft drinks and diabetes, which were at that time things which were dear to my heart.
I kept seeing the doctors and following their suggestions. The one thing I really didn’t take their advice on was my weight. I was really a porker then and stayed that way.
About 2002 I received a letter from the University of Minnesota about a study they were doing. It had to do with older, overweight people with diabetes. They were offering free help and a little stipend each year if I participated in their study and they were allowed to use the results to show the effects of losing weight for diabetics. its a little more involved than that, but that’s the gist of it.
I’ll explain a little bit more in a further post.
I volunteered and if you’ll look at the chart below, you’ll see some of the results for me personally:
| |
Date |
BP |
Weight |
BMI |
Right ABI |
Left ABI |
| BASELINE |
08/13/2002 |
036/70 |
254 |
40.5 |
1.01 |
1.27 |
| Year 1 |
07/15/2003 |
122/72 |
240 |
38.3 |
1.24 |
1.39 |
| Year 2 |
07/27/2004 |
138/62 |
233 |
37.2 |
1.31 |
1.17 |
| Year 3 |
07/21/2005 |
133/66 |
230 |
36.7 |
1.20 |
1.58 |
| Year 4 |
07/25/2006 |
136/67 |
230 |
36.9 |
1.27 |
1.16 |
| Year 5 |
07/17/2007 |
120/67 |
225 |
36.1 |
(*) |
(*) |
| Year 6 |
07/17/2008 |
137/66 |
216 |
31.5 |
(*) |
(*) |
| Year 7 |
07/14/2009 |
124/63 |
218 |
34.9 |
(*) |
(*) |
BP = Blood Pressure; BMI = Body Mass Index; ABI has to do with circulation and anything below .4 indicates a possible circulation problem in that leg.
Now what does all that mean to you? It means I lost, slowly but surely, 36 pounds. It also means they’re doing their job by not only helping me to keep the weight off, but to keep losing it a little at a time.
And also that I’ve “been there done that”. Anything I post is from personal experience and not “some guy telling you stuff” that doesn’t know what he’s talking about. See you soon.
