My Diagnosis

OK, then, what better way to start off a new diabetic blog than with the story (however simplistic it may be) of my diagnosis? Yes? Good? Who cares what you think, I'm doing it anyway.

My story IS very simplistic. I had all the classic symptoms. I was dying of thirst, could NOT keep liquid in me, and started getting blurred vision and losing a little weight. People started wondering if I had an eating disorder (they told me this after the fact). The vision was the most annoying, the thirst was the scariest.

Unfortunately, the last doctor I had gone to was a complete MORON, so I didn't really have a PCP that I liked. So what do I do, but pull up my insurance plan, pick a name, and call. Because, really, have you ever Googled "frequent thirst" and come up with anything that does NOT include diabetes? There's just nothing there. It's pretty basic.

I go in, pee in a cup, and the doc walks in with, and I quote "You're diabetic, by the way. Type I. No question." (Apparently they checked my ketones, and they weren't good.) Oooh, way to put it gently, doc. He then starts listing "leading cause of blindness...blah blah blah" while I'm just staring at him. He stops mid-rant -- "Are you OK? I just kind of threw that at you." Um, yeah. You did. And am I OK? I have no idea. The world just tilted a little. I'm not surprised, per se, I was pretty sure I did have it, after all, but thinking you have a non-curable, life-threatening illness and being told you have one are two completely different things.

Then he tells me I have to get into an endocrinologist that day or else he will check me into the hospital. Ohh, boy. The hospital. His nurse starts calling around to various endocrinologists asking if they can take "a new Type I diabetic." Oh, sure - in a few months. I stopped her. "Listen, I don't mean to be rude, but the way you're phrasing it sounds like you have a Type I patient who's been managing this for months or years and just moved here or something. You need to tell them - 'You need to see her or she goes into the hospital. Use that term - hospitalized.'"

So she did, and calls back the one who my PCP originally wanted, and they said OK - two weeks, but wants to see lab work, stat. So the next day, I get a bunch of blood work done in the morning, and by that afternoon, I am checked into the hospital, there to be tortured by a roommate who loved her TV and a student nurse who couldn't put an IV in to save my life. But that's another post.

Blood sugar on admittance: 355 - A1C-12.2