Story about Diabetes , Hypothyroidism.

Myths about Diabetes

Feb 22, 2019

By: Vanessa

Year Condition Began: 2007


Many people think that diabetes is not a serious disease, but that is not true, juvenile diabetes is a tough disease to have. Diabetes is the single most costly chronic disease. People with diabetes in the U.S. incur medical expenses that are approximately 2.3 times higher than people without diabetes. (NDIC, 9) Diabetes is likely to be underreported as a cause of death, but even then diabetes was the sixth leading cause of death listed on U.S. death certificates in 2002. Overall, the risk for death among people with diabetes is about twice that of people without diabetes of similar age. (NDIC, 6) Diabetes affects many parts of the body and can lead to serious complications such as blindness, kidney damage, and lower-limb amputations. Diabetes currently affects 246 million people worldwide and is expected to affect 380 million by 2025. (NDIC, 8) Type 1 diabetes occurs when the body's immune system attacks and destroys certain cells in the pancreas called beta cells. The beta cells produce a hormone, called insulin that helps the body move the glucose contained in food into cells throughout the body, which use it for energy. When the beta cells have been destroyed, no insulin can be produced, and the glucose stays in the blood. When the glucose stays in the blood it causes high blood sugar levels and through the high blood sugar levels it causes damage to many vital organs.

There are a lot of myths, misunderstandings, and misperceptions about diabetes; while people do care and want to help, it is all too common for them to ask questions that reflect their lack of knowledge about type 1 diabetes, such as, "When will she outgrow it?" It can be frustrating to explain the conflict that all families face every hour of every day, and how it can be multiplied by having to deal with people's common misunderstandings and misperceptions, including the widely-held belief that type 1 diabetes is not a serious disease. This disease, is a serious disease, and it isn’t something that can just be outgrown. It comprises a lifetime of lifestyle changes for both the diabetics and their families. JDRF International Chairman Mary Tyler Moore said, "Both children and adults like me who live with type 1 diabetes need to be mathematicians, physicians, personal trainers and dieticians all rolled into one. We need to be constantly factoring and adjusting, making frequent finger sticks to check blood sugars, and giving ourselves multiple daily insulin injections just to stay alive." (Countdown, par 5)

People generally seem to get the diabetes from ages 7-9. There are many ways to find out if you have diabetes. A lot of the time it can go unnoticed for many months. As many as 3 million Americans may have type 1 diabetes, and each year over 15,000 children are diagnosed with diabetes in the U.S. That's 40 children per day. (diabetes facts, par 5) There are a lot of symptoms and signs that could show you if you have diabetes. A few of these symptoms are: being thirsty, wetting the bed at night, going to the bathroom all the time, blurry vision, extreme weight loss, fatigue, extreme hunger, and dry skin and headaches. The symptoms don’t stand out very much at first, but can get bad really fast especially if you have type 1 diabetes. People have died and still die from undiagnosed diabetes.

I got diabetes when I was 8 years old. I found out that I had diabetes because I had many major symptoms. The disease almost wasn’t caught in time for me. This is because my mother had a thyroid problem that she had to deal with at the same time. My mother knew that something wasn’t quite right with me. I was skinny enough to be mistaken for a skeleton, my knuckles were always bloody, and I never had the energy to play outside or do anything but read all day. When I went to bed and woke up five minutes later sobbing because I wet the bed for the third time that night, she finally took me to the doctor’s office. I was afraid to go to sleep because I felt like I didn’t have control over even the simple mechanics of my body. My mother took me to the doctor’s office. They used my urine to check where my blood sugars were, listened to all the symptoms I had then sent my mom and I out into the waiting room where we waited half an hour for the diagnosis. The doctor invited us into his office to explain that I had diabetes. He offered me some crackers and said to not eat too many because I now would have to take into account everything that I ate. He discussed some things with my mother and I went straight to the hospital till I could learn all the life style changes I would have to make. The first few days, I thought that I was dying. My family and I didn’t know anything about diabetes except that it was incurable. Now looking back I realize that a lot of my troubles could have been eliminated if I had known more about diabetes.

I decided that I would do my research on all the misconceptions about diabetes and try to clear them up for others who don’t know a lot about diabetes or have just been diagnosed. Here are some of those misconceptions and myths that I found about Juvenile Diabetes:
Myth 1: Taking insulin cures diabetes.
Fact 1: taking insulin enables diabetics to be able to function normally, but it still is a long way from being a cure. You still have to manually put in insulin when you eat food or hit a diabetic high. You could also hit a low and have to drink or eat something with sugar.(Jurivich, Jeanne, phone interview) We have equipment now that makes things easier for diabetics. We have inventions like a pump that can put insulin in your body through a tube inserted in your skin. It puts in a constant rate of insulin called a basil rate. We have novalog that works faster and better than humolog. The ultimate goal [for us] is to create an “artificial pancreas,” pairing such sensors with implanted pumps that would automatically dispense insulin to make a diabetic’s blood sugar better resemble a healthy person’s. (MSNBC, par 3) We are years away from finding a cure though. We still have a lot of new technology and we still are constantly coming out with new gadgets all the time.

Myth 2: Diabetes is caused by obesity
Fact 2: While obesity is identified as one of the causes for type 2 diabetes, it has no correlation to the cause of type 1 diabetes. We also know that type 1 diabetes is not a genetic disease. Right now scientists don’t know exactly what causes type 1 diabetes. The only thing the scientists know is that it is a virus, but they believe that both genetic and environmental factors are involved in producing this disease. (Jurivich, Jeanne, Phone interview)

Myth 3: People with diabetes should never eat sweets, and eating to many sweets is the cause of type 1 diabetes.
Fact 3: It is true that when diabetics limit the sweets they eat, that it will help keep their blood sugar under control, but, everybody still needs a little sugar in their diet that is why it is part of the food pyramid. Sweets can fit into a diabetic’s meal plan, just as it would for people without diabetes. There are also times when sweets are a must for a diabetic: when the blood sugar level drops too low sugar tablets, juice, or soda are the surest thing for a diabetic to eat or drink that can raise their blood sugar, and prevent the start of hypoglycemia. It is nobody’s fault if they get diabetes because eating too much sugar is not a cause of type 1 diabetes. (Larson Jamie, personal interview)
Myth 4: With strict devotion to a specific diet, exercise plan, and multiple insulin injections each day based on careful monitoring of blood sugar levels, a person with type 1 diabetes can easily gain tight control over his or her blood sugar levels.
Fact 4: While the above approach to diabetes is the most effective way to achieve and maintain tight control of blood sugar levels, blood sugar control can be very difficult for a lot of diabetics. Many aspects of blood sugar control include stress, hormone changes, periods of growth, exercise and illness. All of these aspects can easily cause blood sugars to swing out of control. Teenagers, in particular, are inclined to have this problem. When teenager’s bodies go through changes during adolescence, their blood sugars can swing up and down as fast as a rollercoaster can. Some people with type 1 find that even though they continually strive for tight control and follow a meal plan and insulin schedule, they still experience rapid fluctuations in their blood glucose. ( Karr, Lexi, personal interview) Those fluctuations do not mean the person with diabetes has done anything wrong. I know that I go low when ever I am nervous and it is not my fault. When ever I get up in front of people I get nervous, go low, and do something stupid. One experience I had with this was when three other girls and I had to sing a hymn in front of our congregation in a sacrament meeting. The first verse we sang went off with out a hitch. I started the second verse and unknowingly started the first verse again. The other three girls followed me and, nobody noticed our mistake till we got to the end. This was because when the ending came about, it happened to be slightly different from the first verse. I had hit a low during the middle of it because I was so scared. I was so embarrassed, especially when I sat down next to my class and the class tease whispered a particularly snide comment to me. (Nimmer, Vanessa)
Myth 5: People with diabetes can't engage in athletics.
Fact 5: Physical exercise is important for people with diabetes. Regular exercise for diabetics helps lower blood sugar levels, and keeps them in a target range. Because the body is working harder, the body uses more glucose to produce energy, and improves the way insulin works. Blood glucose levels are lowered and insulin requirements are reduced. I as an example played many sports for my high school. There are countless other examples of athletes who have also had great success, from Olympic Gold Medalist swimmer Gary Hall to the baseball great Ron Santo to the hockey great Bobby Clarke. (Nimmer, Vanessa)
Myth 6: Only kids get type 1 diabetes.

Fact 6: Type 1 diabetes, also known as "juvenile" or "juvenile onset" diabetes, is usually first diagnosed in children, teenagers, or young adults. However, my friend Chris didn’t get diabetes till he was 20 years old. People may develop type 1 diabetes at any age it is just more common for people to get it when they are younger.
Myth 7: Women with diabetes shouldn't get pregnant.
Fact 7: Thanks to advanced technology in diabetes research, the outlook for pregnant women with diabetes is significantly better today than it was a generation ago. However, it is still really hard for diabetics. A diabetic pregnancy requires extra effort and commitment, excellent blood sugar control, a doctor on hand at all times, education in all areas of diabetes management, and financial resources for extra laboratory and medical tests and hospitalization for tests. (Countdown, pg 1)
Myth 8: No matter what you do, a person with diabetes for years will eventually get complications.
Fact 8: Complications are not inevitable, all bodes deteriorate when they get old. Diabetes gives more wear and tear to the body so you get the complications earlier on. Whatever causes the complications are not yet fully understood, and the extent to which they can develop will vary from person to person. Tight blood sugar control is the only method known of that can reduce the risk of developing complications. The rate at which you get complications from diabetes remains unpredictable for any individual. Some individuals with type 1 diabetes may be genetically predisposed to develop complications. ( Jurivich, Jeanne, Phone interview)
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