Interesting. I always try to err on the side of caution with things “we know” to be true because every year, it seems, there’s some shit that science shows we were wrong about for decades or more. Maybe you’re like me and have skirted the line as pre diabetic? That’s what it has showed for me since I started getting tested regularly in my 20s. My blood glucose bounces between 95-110 or so with my fasting labs.

After COVID, I started to notice body changes in myself with the prolonged lack of social activity. I stopped being able to tolerate extreme temps as much as I used to be able to handle, especially extreme heat. I noticed I started to sweat more, like a lot, lot more, when previously I had not sweat that much. I was having issues with shaking and twitches and muscle weakness when doing things as simple as picking up my child (born in December 2019). My arms and legs fell asleep more frequently than they used to. I also stopped being able to remember, talk good like and stuff, and would sometimes lose my train-of-thought mid-sentence, for instance. Generally, just noticing changes that I knew were out of the ordinary.

When I threw those things into ChatGPT (back a year or more ago, now), it immediately said my symptoms appeared to be MS, which I had suspected, though not prompted the generative AI to confirm. I gave it a list of new symptoms, no matter how attached they appeared, and it spit that out. Many symptoms of MS overlap with diabetes, including bladder function, vision issues, and numbness/tingling in extremities. The human body is so weird!

Schrodinger’s Diabetes! It both exists, and doesn’t exist, until you confirm it!

In all seriousness, take care of yourself, please. If a one-time, fasting lab test can either alleviate your fears or get you help before it becomes an even bigger issue, then I’d suggest talking to doctor about those tests. I know, at least if you’re in the US, the healthcare system sucks, and you might not have insurance to afford a full battery of tests, I’m not shaming. I get why you may not have seen a doctor or gotten tested before now. However, we (human people) are not around long enough to spend part of it in fear of something and the another part of it in pain treating the thing that we were initially fearing.

I’m rooting for you!

Ahh, the way social media was expected to work: sharing information, asking questions, connecting, and helping your fellow human beings with their suspected, though not confirmed, medical diagnoses! Instead, it’s mostly just bots talking to bots with an obnoxious Times Square-level of ads compelling us to buy, buy, BUY! If this post can help anyone other than me, yourself included, that’s just the icing on this delicious Lemmy cake!

If you do get tested, I’d be curious to know the results if you don’t mind sharing them, as I think lived experience can go a long way toward helping not only those who see this post today, but those who may find it years from now! Thanks for the reply!!

Thanks for the reply. I’ll check my test results again and look for something in there that references A1C. I get a comprehensive blood work, but there’s just a bunch of acronyms, haha!

You’re amazing! Keep it up and diet changes are already helping! Thanks.

I mean, shit, I don’t even want to be here most days because of the absolute embarrassment that is our government and the corporatocracy this country has become. Most other English-speaking countries would be preferable to traveling to the US, imo.

Dude.

You nailed the reason for this post, actually. After 41-years, I know what to expect from my body. What prompted me to write this was that I was not feeling the same as before and, like you, I’m finding that eating makes me feel worse, not better. It used to just be a dull, malaise feeling. This post is because it feels much more present than before Thanksgiving. Like a head-rush or from drinking too much coffee. However, my coffee intake hasn’t changed over the years and I usually am done drinking coffee by 9-10am. Eating or not eating leads to slight nausea, a head-rush feeling (as mentioned), and almost like minor movement is slurred or delayed.

Ruling out illness or some sort of late-onset allergy, and given my family history, it got me thinking that these ill feelings may be the indications that I’m tipping more toward the diabetic side of the scale after striking a balance for so many years. Thank you for your reply!

That’s what I hear, about the catching early, so that’s great to hear you caught yours early. Thanks for the comment!

Sounds like you dodged a bullet (to the foot), so to speak! ;) Thanks for the comment.

Isn’t that always how it goes. I had high hopes that generative AI could help find cures to all sorts of diseases and ailments, or links between things we previously wouldn’t have linked because of limited scope of info. Then, ya know, capitalism had to do it’s thing and now AI is used to replace the jobs we want to be doing so we can more focus on the jobs we hate! I bring this up to say that if you could put in your symptoms, no matter how detached, and get a decent idea where to look, it could have saved you and countless others that doctor lookup time. Maybe one day that’ll be a thing we can rely on!

and in the past .gov

Ain’t that the truth. Was just telling a friend of mine that we sacrificed so much science and technology for a bunch of red-hat racists and that the GOV sites we used to rely on for accurate and adequate info are all but farcical now.

Thank you, friend! I actually stopped drinking soda with the Supersize Me documentary. Haven’t looked back since. Now it’s just water (and beer, with meals) for me! My son is gonna be 6yo this month and since we don’t have soda, he drinks only water and juice (with no added sugar)! I used to be a lot more stringent on my no sugar diet. Anymore, with a kid, I fear I would have a hard time doing that!

Still, thank you for your replies!

I used to make better choices and be more active. I want to return to those ways but things just seem so…hard…and almost not worth the effort sometimes. It’s my hope that by making this post, feeling the way I have the last couple of days, will snap me out of my funk and focus on my health more readily. I’m so much better at helping others get their shit together, compared to my own.

Thanks for taking the time to comment!

Thank you so much for your insightful comment! I think I’m going to look into getting some sort of monitor just so I can, as you outlined, get some peace of mind. My doctor also suggested in our last visit that I invest in a blood pressure cuff to check for high blood pressure so finding both medical instruments might be worth purchasing together!

I hear you on the uncontrollable diabetes and difficulties for people. My dad, when he was diagnosed, was a consultant and had to move around to various parts of the country a lot. It wrecked his body and lead to the start of his issues. He went from drinking a 6-12 pack of beer almost daily to quitting cold turkey. He probably wouldn’t have made it to mine and my siblings graduations had it not been for his fortitude. Anymore, diet seems to be a huge part in the equation and unless you’re loaded, it’s really difficult to eat well. I wish our system of food processing was better and we didn’t constantly have to fight the battle against proper nutrition and affording other necessities in our lives.

My hope, from this post, is that I can get a sort of “scared straight” result that’ll snap me out of my current funk leading to the harmful, antithetic actions I’ve found myself repeating. Thank you again for your comment!

Thank you. I’ll check the test results page again and see if it was on there but under a different name.

Wow, scary! Thank you.

Before that, did you ever notice any general feelings, like feeling specific ways after you ate, or body process changes outside of peeing a lot? Thanks for the reply!

Yes, I suppose I should specify the Type-2. I’ll update the title, now, thanks! And thanks for your reply!!

Thank you for sharing and sorry to hear about your health issues. I get my glucose checked at least once a year, but only since talking to my brother about his health issues did the term A1C come up. I don’t understand why my doctor hasn’t had that test on the docket for labs. Seems like a good thing to keep track of given, ya know, the family history and my line-riding of the glucose scale.

You have skin, don’t you? Don’t be a weasel!