Having type II diabetes is challenging enough. 

Here are some success stories of people who did not just take the challenge but also succeeded in it! ^{(22) (23) (24) (25)}

Heather Heirbaut-Kaczmarek’s Success Story

My first incident with diabetes came when I was 14 or 15. I remember I was in a fast food restaurant on the corner, hanging out with friends. At that time I didn’t know what was happening, but I had a horrid blood sugar drop. My eyes crossed and I about passed out. I remember I got better with a soda, but I had no idea what that whole incident was when it happened. Notice no one actually called 911 during that episode, which they should have.

Family History: Many of my family members have diabetes, including both my maternal grandmother as well as my paternal grandfather. On the maternal side, 2 Aunts had it as well. One Aunt has since passed away but not from diabetes, but cancer. My other Aunt takes medication for her diabetes.

I did not show symptoms again until I was 16 and pregnant with my oldest son. I had gestational diabetes and was told that since I had it, there would be a good chance down the line I would have diabetes. I was not on insulin at this point but no one really told me what to expect, what to watch for, I was fairly clueless.

Now I really forgot about it but I did tell every doctor I went to that I could have this issue. They would test me, and I would come out fine so it wasn’t a big worry. With my second pregnancy, I failed the diabetes test the first time, but passed the second. They said they weren’t too worried, but I was fairly careful with what I ate.

After his birth I started having more serious issues with hypoglycemia, which is low blood sugar. I had to carry candy with me all the time. I started watching my blood sugar more but it was always up and down. Rising in the morning it would be super low (in the 35-40 range). More years pass with it up and down. I noticed I couldn’t tolerate the heat in July and August (85+ degrees). Little things that were being an issue.

Then I became pregnant with my third child. My body lost it with this pregnancy. I couldn’t hold down food, I couldn’t keep my blood sugar up whatsoever. I was diagnosed again with gestational diabetes. My body went downhill. I was hospitalized through most of the pregnancy and had my tubes tied after she was born.

After her birth though, my blood sugar rose. I could not keep it down. The doctor was going to put me on glucophage and I was doing whatever I could to try and not go on the meds. My blood sugar never stabilized but it stayed under 200 (not always by much) so there was no drugs. Now again, more years pass with my diabetes now unstable, no real direction from the doctor other than to eat sugar free. I feel bad, fatigued off and on and I mean FATIGUED. As in I have to take naps around dinner time because I can no longer function awake. My joints started hurting and I am only 35!!!

I had on some extra weight (about 40 lbs) and for the life of me it would not come off. Then I meet Steve on the diabetes board! I could not help but notice his awesome results!! I paid attention to what he ate and it looked yummy too! He wasn’t hungry and the results were amazing. I started following his lead with eating more low carb and more protein. I wasn’t committed 100% yet because there were some things I had a hard time giving up. My blood sugar was going down, but not as low as I would like. I was in the 120-130 range which isn’t too bad, but it still isn’t that healthy.

I did not want to die leaving behind my young children, not ever getting to see grandchildren. I have a lot of things I still want to experience while I am on this earth! I splurged and bought The Primal Blueprint so I could commit 100% …. I did commit and it was amazing! The first thing I did was go gluten free. Gluten free is not inexpensive, but it is cheaper than doctor visits and watching my health decline. It is not that expensive if you plan out your meals weekly and buy the meat and veggies for each day. Always make a little more for lunch the next day!

I will not say that I haven’t cheated. I have with a birthday or a large party, but it has it’s effect. I don’t feel good after I eat that piece of cake. My stomach hurts fairly bad for the evening and I vow to not do it again.

I no longer cheat because it’s not worth it to me. I LIKE losing the weight. I LOVE feeling awesome and being able to accomplish more every day.

I will say invest in a crockpot and a steamer. I have a real issue with food not being convenient. It does take awhile to get used to cooking from scratch daily. The crockpot and the steamer helped immensely to cook foods while I just didn’t have the time.

It takes a bit to break a bad habit and instill a new one, but you will never regret it! NEVER!!!

 Steve’s success story

'There's no reason why you can’t achieve your dreams' 

After his victory in the rowing at the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000, Sir Steve Redgrave became the only British athlete to win gold at five consecutive Olympic Games. But what many people don’t realise is that Sir Steve achieved this final triumph against all the odds. Just three years before competing in the Sydney Olympics, he discovered he had diabetes.

“It was November 1997 and I had this tremendous thirst coming back from training one day,” he says. “After drinking three or four pints of fluids, I knew something was not quite right.”

Sir Steve’s grandfather was also diabetic, so the athlete wasn’t totally ignorant of the condition. While training abroad, he and his team mates were given ‘dip-sticks’ to test their dehydration levels and Sir Steve knew that he could also test his urine for sugar levels.

“For some reason, I decided to do my own test and it came back positive,” he says. “I called my wife, who's a doctor, and she suggested going to see my GP. My blood sugar level was 32 [the norm is somewhere between 4 and 7] and I was sent to see a specialist. From that day on I’ve been taking insulin.”

The Olympic champion was 35 years old when he was diagnosed with type 2 or ‘adult-onset’ diabetes, in which the body doesn't make enough insulin or the cells in the body don't use insulin properly. He thought it was the end of his career.

“The little I knew about diabetes was that there were few sportspeople with the condition competing at the level I wanted to be at. I thought it was impossible to be diabetic and do what I did, so obviously I was a little depressed. I took it in my stride to some extent because I’d already achieved four Olympic gold medals. But after a consultation, my specialist said he didn’t see any reason why I couldn’t achieve my dreams in Sydney. He said it wouldn’t be straightforward, and he was certainly right about that.”

Initially, Sir Steve was put on a low-sugar diet, but he soon found he didn’t have the energy to carry out the physically enduring training needed to compete at the highest level. His specialist decided that, as he had performed well on his previous diet (of 6,000 calories a day and which included a high sugar content), he should go back on that diet and adjust his insulin dose accordingly.

“After I won in Sydney, my specialist and I did a press conference and another diabetes specialist stood up and said, ‘You’re a very lucky man,’” Sir Steve recalls. “He said if I’d come to the clinics of any of the specialists in that room, they would have said I couldn’t do it. They were amazed.”

In theory, he could have been given tablets to control his blood sugar level, but Sir Steve says they wouldn’t have given him enough insulin in his system for the amount of training he was doing.

“I was testing my blood sugar levels, using a pin prick to draw a spot of blood 10 times a day. Normally, people with diabetes do it just once. If you’re not diabetic, your body naturally adjusts your insulin levels, so I was just trying to mimic as closely as possible what the body does naturally.”

For the past six months, Sir Steve has used an insulin pump. Instead of injecting several times a day, the pump is attached all day, every day, feeding a small amount of the drug into the body all the time. The pump is about the size of a pack of playing cards and is attached to the side of the abdomen. The infusion unit only needs changing every three days.

“It’s a lot more convenient,” he says. “Particularly when you’re out and about. And you can take it off to shower or exercise. The down side is I sometimes wake up during the night with it wrapped around me.

“There are fundamental changes you have to make when you discover you have diabetes, but there is no reason why you can’t achieve your dreams. I made the decision that diabetes was going to live with me; I wasn’t going to live with diabetes.”

I was recently diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes, but according to my annual HBA1C test, it was assumed by my medical practise that it could be controlled by diet alone. However, my actual fasting blood glucose results (from both the local hospital laboratory tests and my own blood glucose meter results) were consistently high. My GP already had my complete medical history, including that I have been a sufferer of Hereditory Spherocytosis (a form of heamolytic anaemia) all my life. I was bemused as to why my fasting blood glucose results of 9-10 were consistently not thought by my GP or practise nurses to be a worry. They were arguing with me that so long as the HBA1C result was 6 or less, then I was okay. However, I didn't believe them, and eventually made the point that as I have a form of anaemia, my blood cells don't last for 100 days, and so the HBA1C result is misleadingly low in my case. They were eventually persuaded by me that my blood glucose was in fact NOT under control with diet, and reluctantly agreed to allow me to go onto Metformin, to get my glucose down to a safe level. They organised a supplementary blood test with the local hospital for Fructosamine, which confirmed that my long-term blood glucose was indeed 50% higher than normal (9-10, rather than a maximum of 6). I would like to urge anyone with diabetes who is also anaemic to ask their GP for this Frucosamine test, otherwise their Diabetes is NOT being controlled without drugs. 

 © Apurva Atak