In 1990, I had my first experience with gestational diabetes. The care was less than ideal, but I did deliver a premature baby boy. (He’s healthy today).
In May of 2007, I started having horrible headaches that would not go away, no matter what I did. It wasn’t like a migraine or sinus headache, nothing I’d ever had before. It was like a pressure pushing from the inside out. After 5 days, I finally went to First Care. I didn’t have a family doctor yet, so this was what I normally did, because I never really had anything too serious. They gave me morphine and sent me on my way. A couple of days later, I went back to First Care, the headache was back. This time they gave me some kind of “cocktail” that I slept off for a couple of days. After this, when the headache returned the third day, I went to the ER. They ran several tests, and blurted out that I was diabetic (300 was the number they gave me) and had to get it under control. They told me I was to see my family doctor within one week.
I came home and started calling doctors in the area to find that no one would see me for 3 months. Even after explaining to office personnel that this was an ER follow up and I was suppose to see a doctor within one week… Turned out, I was able to see a Physician’s Assistant in 3 weeks, and one local doctor finally “accepted” me as her patient. I started reading everything I could get my hands on about diabetes until I went into overload and couldn’t take anymore in. My next step was to quit smoking. My last cigarette was in July 2008.
After a year of not seeing the numbers I wanted to see, I decided to find an endocronologist, only to learn that there wasn’t one in my area. The closest one in the state was 350 miles away. And that would include mountain driving. So I finally found out a few months ago that there is one doctor in my area whose specialty is in diabetes. I’m finally seeing him, along with my general practitioner. I’m seeing some changes in my numbers after my first visit with him. It was purely accidental though. I was taking my metformin and glyburide midday, and after forgetting to take it one day, I took it late at night before going to bed, and the next morning my BG was barely over 100 instead of the typical 170-190. So I experimented, and changed to taking my meds in the evening. I’m also starting to do paired blood glucose checks in preparation for my next appointment. I’m finally encouraged!!
I recently learned that my older brother has been diagnosed as Type 2 Diabetic also. He lives 4,000 miles from me, so I’m not there to help him like I want to be… but, with education and encouragement, we’ll both make it through this.
By Colleen
Leave A Comment