Diabetic "Sucess"?

I know what I consider being successful at this disease. Reaching say, 80 or 90 without getting any of those nasty complications will definitely be a success. That's my ultimate goal.

The problem with this goal is that the only signs of success are the lack of signs of failure. I know my A1C's have been good, so I assume that I'm on the right track. So far I'm able to keep my sugars in control with the combination of diet and exercise and medication I'm on now. I don't have any diabetic complications.

But I wish I could go in to the doctors and find out that I've sustained the same amount of beta cells, or that my nerves are free of damage or see my level of insulin resistance go down. I'd like some way to guarantee that I'm holding my own.

I come out of each A1C feeling like I've gotten a report card: really good at measuring past performance, but still no guarantee of the future. Just because I have an A this term doesn't mean I'm not going to flunk out next year.

I wonder if I'm going to go to the doctors one day, and they'll do some tests on my eyes or nerves and give me bad news. Even if I feel like I'm more or less doing everything right, there's always that push to try and do better, just in case some silent damage going on in the background. Something that I won't know about until it's too late to reverse it.

I know there are no guarantees of the future, but that blindfolded feeling is one of the things that scares me the most.

A1C's Should Make Sense

At the end of last year, I was in the zone. I ate my meter. I stuck to 150 gms of carbs a day. I exercised semi-regularly. I did all the stuff I was supposed to do. And my A1C went UP. From 5 the year before to a 6.

This freaked me out. My meter averages had me expecting an A1C in the low fives. After that, I pretty much stopped testing. Between the holidays, finding a new job, moving, my diet was out the window.

We made dozens of cookies for Christmas. With sugar, not splenda. I ate bread, muffins, and, on the many long car trips, potato chips. We ate out every night for weeks. And of course I started putting on the weight, which is always a danger sign.

I was worried about getting my A1C back after those months of reckless eating. What number do I get today? 5.5!

I have no idea if it's the reduced stress or if my meter is less than precise, or what. I was expecting to leave the doc's today with some plans for getting my A1C under 7. Instead, I'm trying to remember what I was doing back then. I sure wasn't food logging. I'm still not testing, but in the last month or so, I've been back to a reduced carb diet.

But I guess I can relax a bit with the carbs. I'm still going to try and lose those holiday pounds, but I'm really not sure what else to do to keep this level steady. And for now, bask in that pretty number.

So, so weird.

Conquering Fear

Sometimes I think it's better to not do something at all instead of doing it badly. Sometimes I realize that that kind of thinking is going to prevent me from doing a lot of things I want to do. So, we'll give this a try. The worst that can happen is no one reads it. I can live with that.

I can't eat for the rest of the night - A1C and Cholesterol tests tomorrow. I'm kind of nervous about it as I was not eating by my diet in any way shape or form over Dec and January. I had a lot of excuses - It's the holidays, we're moving and don't have a kitchen, but that wasn't the real reason.

The real reason was: I ate what my blood meter said didn't raise my sugars much (ei, I tried to keep it within 2 point range ( 160 in US units). I was expecting an A1C in the 5's. But it was a 6 - which is higher than I had the year before, when I wasn't trying the whole low carb and whole grain thing. It was incredibly frustrating - not only did I lose faith in what my meter was telling me, but I felt I'd really hit the limit of what carbs I could cut from my diet. It felt like all the work I'd been doing - we're talking adding exercise, changing my diet, and losing 40 pounds accomplished nothing.

Now I have a new doctor who should be more pro-active. Which I need, because I'm really not sure where to go from here. I'm on the max dose of metformin. And a 6.0 isn't a bad number. Many people would kill for those numbers. But I don't want to see them higher. I have no idea what my diagnosis number was - I've only got 2006 (5.0) and 2007 (6.0). This is a very bad trend. I don't know at what point I become officially 'type 2' instead of 'insulin resistant', but I'd really rather not cross that line, as arbitrary as it seems to me.

So, tomorrow, I get some blood drawn, schedule a follow up, and try to tackle this whole thing again.