my son brought a tear...

[Newfie]

Nice story with The Boy Sid, and take care of yourself Pal. Stay healthy a long time to enjoy those cigars!!!

[SmokinDVM]

Not bad at all. Keep up the good work. Seriously a lot of damage can happen if you are not careful.

Hey DVM, I read what you said about hyperglycemia/ketoacidosis. Yeah that happens, but hyperglycemia is not really the cause. It is pretty interesting how the body makes matters worse for itself. A diabetic has plenty of glucose in the blood, but the body can't use it because it can't enter into the cells. In essence, the body is starving. So, the body makes use of the glucose which is stored into the body (glycogen), to release more glucose into the blood, which only makes matters worse by further increasing the blood glucose concentration. Well, I thought it was pretty interesting.

Because the body is starving, the body turns to alternative means of producing energy, which is the breakdown of fats. Fatty acids are broken down to ketoacids. The ketoacids can accumulate and release hydrogen ions into the blood, which causes ketoacidosis.

Not sure you were aware of the process. Sorry if you already knew.

Didn't really think it needed a complete description of all the pathways involved in glucose production and its use by different cells in the body.
BTW, treated 2 cases of ketoacidosis last week.

[CgarDan]

Sid I am sorry to learn that you have diabetes. But glad things are working out ok with your son. I guess in life you never know what is behind the next bend. But it is sure nice to know that you have people who care for you and will be there for you no matter what life throws at you.

[dHUTCH]

Exercise, eat right, and stay on top of your meds and you will be fine. Since I've been alive my dad has had diabetes. Insulin dependent since college, when he found out during a lab test of his blood in Pharmacy School. He turns 52 on Sunday. Make a routine of going to the gym at least 3 times a week and doing some sort of workout. Dad doesn't goto the gym anymore because we have an elliptical trainer in his house now so he just exercises at home. He never seems to have problems when he has a steady exercise schedule and eats right.

Do what the doctors tell ya, and you'll live a happy normal life.

[cigar no baka]

Sorry to hear that Sid. My wife is a type 1, but she got it as an adult, not as a child. She's had if since 1999 and she's made major efforts in her life to get it under control. She's doing very well, she takes a quarterly test to measure how well she is doing and she's been in the 6.0-6.9 range for a long time now, and anything under 7.0 is doing well.

So if you exercise and eat right, it will come down, type 2 is not typically chronic like type 1 is (type 1, your body basically stops producing any insulin at all and you are insulin-dependent).