The Life of Diabetes

Living with diabetes is difficult. There are so many different things one must do in order to keep blood sugars under control. Proper diet, exercise, testing your blood sugars levels, doctor visits, insulin, testing, testing and more testing. For someone who has had diabetes almost their entire life, your body begins to desensitze itself after so many years. One no longer notices the little signes that their blood sugars are getting low enough that it is time to do something to bring them back to normal levels. If you don't know or understand how diabetes works, here is a simple explanation.

• Diabetes occures in several different ways:

a. The organ in your body that produces insulin (the pancreas) shuts down and no longer produces the insulin the body needs to regulate the sugar that is put into your body. Everything you eat, is broken down in your body and produces sugars, in which your body needs to create energy. Insulin helps break down those sugars and helps to keep your body regulated. Once your body stops producing insulin, your body cannot effectivly break down the sugars. This is known as Type 1 Diabetes.

b. Another form of diabetes is when your body slows down the production of of insulin and due to a build up of sugars around the pancreas. This is usually due to poor diet and exercise which in turn leads to extreme amounts of weight gain. This issue is usually treated with medications and proper diet and exercise to bring your body back to normal levels. This is known as Type 2 Diabetes.

There are many smaller versions of these issues such as Insulin resistance, hypoglycemia, hyperglycemia, and so on.

Living with diabetes is difficult for the individual, but it is as difficult for those in the family as well. The responsibilities of family members is to help when a diabetic get low blood sugar is tiring. The constant observation, helping them get food to raise blood sugars, or even in the frightening situations where they begin to have serious effects such as seizures, is not only physically exhausting, but mentally as well. Having to give a shot (glucagon... basically a shot that releases the body's store of sugars), waiting for them to become coherent, feeding them... It can be an exstensive and exhausting time.

Some signs that a person might be having a low could be;

1. Sluring their words
2. Shaking or tick (such as face twitching, legs, ect.)
3. Cold sweats or clammy feeling skin
4. Sometimes they may appear to be drunk
5. In more extreme situations, they may become beligerent, aggressive, or defiant. Sadly, some times they seen like a child.

If you are unsure what to do when you see these types of signs, simply call a family member... They can give you instructions on how to help. Get them orange juice, or a high sugar drink, candy or food of some kind, if they are still able to eat or drink, or call an ambulance if you can't do anything else. I hope some of this information is helpful and if you would like more information on Diabetes, visit http://www.lilly.com Eli Lilly Company or even http://www.webmd.com/ WebMD.