The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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So I'm not cjet but I was diagnosed with diabetes (type 2) in 2021. To be honest, I haven't been managing it particularly well because the #1 thing is lifestyle changes (diet especially, even moreso than exercise) and that shit is way harder than taking medicine. I'm not even at a point where it would be useful to work with a nutritionist to optimize my diet, I'm talking basic stuff like "stop drinking soda or at least switch to diet" and "stop eating sweets". I've tried pretty hard to make those changes but have been unable to make them stick for any length of time (best I did was 6 months).
There is a medication side to it too. My doctor prescribed me Metformin, which gave me awful diarrhea. I finally asked her for other options and she has me on glipizide, but at my appointment next week (if I can manage to fight through the shame and actually face her) I'm planning to talk to her about Ozempic. By all accounts (including our very own self_made_human), it really is effective at cutting your desire to eat things so I'm hoping that will give me the boost I need to stick to the diet changes.
Overall it isn't great but I haven't had serious consequences yet. I know they'll happen, I'm not fooling myself. It just turns out I'm a real failure as a person and I keep falling off the wagon (so to speak) because of my weakness. But I am continuing to try because... what else can I do really?
Just be careful, I had a friend in pretty much exactly the same situation as you who went on Ozempic. The nausea and reduced appetite meant they were eating almost nothing and went into ketosis. As they were diabetic and that toppled them into diabetic keto acidosis. They ended up in the ICU for 4 days after their blood sugar topped 860 and was still climbing. So just make sure to monitor your blood sugar maybe a little more tightly than you otherwise would in the initial stages. But once they were stabilized and more watchful Ozempic does seem to have helped in the medium term at least. They did also lose 40 pounds from the whole ordeal, but it doesn't seem the best option for that.
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Thank you for your response. I asked cjet because as I say a friend of mine was recently diagnosed. I was wondering to what degree lifestyle/diet changes are major part of managing the disease. My friend has also been a smoker probably the better part of the last 30 years and that would have exacerbated all sorts of issues. I don't know how he's dealing with it all. I periodically check in on him but it's hard to gauge the "Everything's good!" responses. I don't know if he has the typical diabetic symptoms of fatigue, etc. Or more pronounced symptoms. Or to what degree he has tried to make dietary adjustments. I can't imagine him suddenly eating cauliflower "rice" or the other recommended foods for people avoiding carbs. Also he lives alone so there's no one there to suggest he lay off the S'mores or whatever.
I'm sorry to hear you're finding it difficult to be as vigilant as you would like. I also cut all sugar for a while just as a personal project, but my blood glucose is fine. Six months sounds like a substantial amount of time. I wouldn't have thought backsliding as it were would be easy after a half year of abstaining (from sugar or whatever).
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