Life With Type-1 Diabetes

I have have had Type-1 Diabetes for over 35 years. This means my pancreas produces no insulin, and I require daily external injections of insulin to survive.

My Overall Health

I was quite healthy with the exception of being diabetic, and very active, playing tennis three to five times per week, and living an active life. My health played a role in qualifying for the transplant – I had no serious health issues that might be aggravated by taking the immunosuppressant drugs required by transplant recipients.

My insulin requirements had grown during the most recent few years, as I developed a condition called insulin resistance, which means that I was slowly requiring more daily insulin to keep my diabetes under control. I needed about 60 units per day of fast acting insulin, depending on my carbohydrate intake.  I was a healthy eater, but I was also about 15-20 pounds heavier than I had been in prior years, primarily due to this increased insulin requirements – an unfortunate side effect of insulin resistance.

How Does Type-1 Diabetes Develop?

Millions of people around the world live with Type-1 diabetes, a life-threatening autoimmune disease that strikes both children and adults. There is no way to prevent it, and at present, no cure.  The exact cause of Type-1 diabetes is unknown. In most people with Type-1 diabetes, the body’s own immune system — which normally fights harmful bacteria and viruses — mistakenly destroys the insulin-producing (islet) cells in the pancreas.

How is Type-1 Diabetes treated?

During the first few years I had diabetes, I used syringes to inject the daily insulin I require. For the past 15 years, I have been using an insulin pump for these injections.   I wear the pump on my belt or waistband and the insulin is injected through a very small catheter placed under the skin. I rotate the injection point around my abdomen every 3-4 days to avoid infection.

Type-1 Diabetes Challenges

Hypoglycemia and Hypoglycemia Unawareness

Every Type-1 diabetic deals with diabetic hypoglycemia – unexpected low blood sugars. It’s part of being a Type-1 diabetic.  One of the more distressing problems in diabetes is hypoglycemia unawareness. Normally, a person will feel warning symptoms when their blood sugar goes low, such as shaking and sweating caused by the release of stress hormones. However, those with hypoglycemia unawareness have reduced warning signals and do not recognize they are low. Even if they happen to do a blood sugar test they may not realize what they need to do to treat the low, because their logical thinking has already been affected.  The longer you have Type-1 diabetes, the more likely you are to experience hypoglycemia unawareness.  It is not rare, occurring in 17 percent of those with Type 1 diabetes.

It was my most severe diabetic problem.  I had, over the last 10-15 years, developed a pattern of hypoglycemia that I could neither predict or detect, and which frequently resulted in “hypoglycemic episodes” – some of which have come close to being fatal. Your blood sugar levels drop suddenly, without explanation, sometimes while driving, and sometimes while sleeping.  Diabetic hypoglycemia starts first with mild or rapid mental disorientation, and can, if not treated quickly, lead to seizures and loss of consciousness, and sometimes death.  It has been a constant issue for me, and all of my family, friends, business acquaintances, and tennis partners have seen me experience some pretty bad low blood sugar episodes.  It is a trauma for the diabetic, and often a greater trauma for a spouse or family member.

My Conclusions

Additionally, the increased insulin my body was requiring can frequently cause other long term physical problems – affecting kidneys and other organs – so one begins to feel a bit like a time bomb, waiting to go off.  I’d come to the conclusion that this was probably going to be the “it” that was going to “get me” eventually.

The only question was when.

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