Diabetes Risks

Diabetes puts virtually every system in the body at risk for deterioration and damage. This is because high blood sugar affects every kind of cell, and either kills or damages cells, one by one.

The most common affects are blindness, nerve damage, kidney failure, and heart disease. But it harms more than that, because no part of the body is immune from the damage.

Diabetes is now the number one cause of blindness in the US. It causes a condition called Diabetic Retinopathy, which is a deterioration of the retina.

The relationship between kidney damage and diabetes is reciprocal. High blood sugar causes damage to the kidneys, and poor kidney function in turn causes further damage to the pancreas, and makes utilization of insulin more difficult. So once the process is started, it develops into a downward spiral that feeds itself and continues to worsen.

Diabetes is also often accompanied by severe depression. This may be partly because a diagnosis of diabetes can be traumatic, and certainly requires major adaptations, but it is also partly because diabetes causes chemical changes that perpetuate depression.

One of the first negative effects that is noticed in many diabetics is peripheral neuropathy. A deterioration in the peripheral nerves causes loss of sensation. Along with that, abnormal sensations sometimes develop, causing aching pain, prickly feelings, or sharp stabbing pains, even the sensation of bugs crawling on the skin or just under it. This set of symptoms are so common with diabetics that warnings to check feet for bruises, cuts, torn nails (which can cause bleeding), or other injuries, are everywhere in relation to diabetic care, because nerve damage means you may not feel small injuries to your feet. Doctors hand out mirrors for diabetics to use to monitor skin changes or injuries which are not in places where they can see. They advise wearing shoes that fit well, so that they neither slop enough to cause blisters, nor fit tightly enough to reduce circulation, because pressure sores can easily develop. Walking outside without shoes is also unwise, because you may step on small objects that injure your feet, without being aware of it.

The complicating factor to neuropathy is not just the fact that you don't feel injuries as well anymore, but also that diabetes depresses the immune system, so infections can get out of hand very rapidly. And when you don't feel the difference between a small cut, and an infected wound, the infection can spread without the individual being aware that it has.

This is not a disease that responds well to being neglected!

50 years ago, if you received a diagnosis of diabetes, it was a given that all of these things would catch up with you. Your life expectancy just dropped by 20 to 30 years, and you had no choice but to do the best you could, and prepare for the eventual deterioration in spite of your care.

Two sisters lived on the hill I grew up on. Both had diabetes. One had been diagnosed as a child, and was diligent in her care. The other was diagnosed in her later years and was negligent - she refused to give herself shots, or to follow dietetic counsel.

The one who refused to take responsibility for her disease became blind in her middle years, and died shortly after from heart failure. Her sister, who had done all she was asked, and was careful about her own care, did better, but not by much. She also became blind a few years after the other woman, and died as a result of diabetes.

In that age, the options for tight control simply were not there. Doctors often had to guess at the proper doses, based on blood sugar tests performed in the office rather than tests based on real life. They had to keep blood sugar levels higher than they should have been in order to keep the patient from being killed by hypoglycemia. Balance was more of a "by guess and buy gosh" activity than it is now.

With the current simplicity and availability of home monitoring, your options for control are vastly different. While diabetics, even with tight control, still develop secondary conditions at a higher rate than people without diabetes, the differences are not as great as they used to be. People with diabetes now live normal life spans, and the deteriorative affects are much milder if they have controlled it well.

Now, to a greater extent than ever before, the affects of diabetes are a choice, not a requirement of the disease. How soon you develop problems has everything to do with how diligent you are in controlling your diet, medications, and activity levels.

I don't intend to go blind. I don't intend to lose my ability to feel and function. If those things come, I'll deal with them if I must, but I don't intend to invite them by any action of mine!
 

Diabetes destroys. But it can be controlled now, better than at any other time in history, and more and better options for control are coming all the time. You cannot control some aspects any more than you can avoid being hit on the road by another driver who is out of control, but you can get behind the wheel and at least determine where you direct the course of your own treatment.

Written by Laura Wheeler, Owner of Firelight Business Enterprises, Inc.