Managing Your Type 2 Insulin Dependent Diabetes

DIABETES AND YOUR BLOOD

Although slower to develop, the results of Type II diabetes are the same as Type I diabetes.  As a result, simple sugars (glucose) pool in your blood stream and in your red blood cells That is, your body is incapable of moving simple sugars, which are the body’s fuel source, from your bloodstream into the cells of your body where the sugar fuel is needed..  This leads to several bad effects upon your body. The most obvious is that the cells of your body go hungry.  It is much like being stranded in the ocean in a life raft. While you are surrounded by water, you cannot drink the water.  In a similar manner, as your blood sugar levels rise, your body cells are surrounded with essential sugar fuels but the sugars are unavailable.

Insulin, which is needed to carry the sugars pooled in your blood stream into the cells of your body, is either not available or not able to function properly. The condition is much like a train with many boxcars.  Each boxcar is like a sugar molecule and the protein molecule insulin is like the engine that hooks to the boxcars and delivers them to their proper location.  If the engine is broken the boxcars cannot reach their destination.  Likewise, if there is no engine the boxcars can not reach their destination.

The pooling of glucose or blood sugar within your blood stream and red blood cells is an indication that your sugar transport mechanism is not properly working.  Either too little insulin is being produced by the islet cells of your pancreas, or the insulin that is produced is not able to move sugars from your blood stream into the cells of your body.

DIABETES WARNING SIGNS

If your insulin transport system is not functioning properly sugar levels will increase in your blood stream and you will begin to experience many of the classic warning signs of diabetes.  Abnormally high blood sugar levels have a direct effect upon the normal water balance which should exist between your body cells and your blood stream.  When your blood sugar levels are significantly elevated above normal values, cell water flows out of your cells and into your blood stream.   This condition is like writing checks from your checking account.  If the amount of money leaving your checking account exceeds the amount flowing into your account, a serious financial condition can result.

Likewise, if the water flowing out the cells of your body exceeds the amount flowing into your cells, a serious health condition can result.  In response to the increased flow of water out of your cells into your blood stream, your body increases urine production.  The net effect is that (1) you need to pee more frequently and (2) the amount of your pee increases.  As water loss from your cells increases, your body’s cells send a signal to your brain; “Hey, we really need some water down here”.  In response, your mouth becomes very dry and you become very thirsty.  These classic “cottony” dry mouth conditions in combination with an intense thirst are two of the universal signs of elevated blood sugar levels. 

In addition, as sugar levels increase in your blood, the physical nature of your blood changes.  Normally, blood is rather watery so that it can be easily pumped by you heart to even the most remote parts of your body.  However, as your blood sugar levels increase, the relative thickness of your blood increases so that with very high blood sugar levels your blood is no longer watery but more similar to syrup or molasses.  As a result, your heart must work much harder to move your blood to the distant parts of your body.  If your blood remains too thick for too long, your body responds by reducing blood supply to distant areas. If this condition persists, it can result in death and decay of your cells in those areas of your body deprived of blood flow.  If the flow of blood to these areas is not quickly restored, severe damage and/or gangrene can result.  Prior to the current understandings about the effects of diabetes upon a diabetic’s body, amputation of fingers, toes, legs and arms due to gangrene was common.

Another body response frequently experienced by developing diabetics is extreme fatigue.  Not just being tired but being bone tired all the time.  Prior to my diabetes being diagnosed and starting insulin injections, I slept more than 20 hours a day.  I only got up to pee, and when I did get up it took all of my energy just to get from my bed to the bathroom and back to my bed.

Why are diabetics with un-managed blood sugar levels always bone tired?  Remember what occurs as sugars pool in your blood.  Your sugar transport engine, insulin, is either not running or not present.  Blood sugar, which is the fuel that keeps the cells of your body properly running, is not getting into your cells. Even though your cells are literally swimming in a sugary solution, the sugar cannot get into the cells where it is needed to produce the energy to conduct normal body functions. Muscles have insufficient fuel to properly contract and move the bones of your body and you are bone tired.  Brain cells receive insufficient amounts of fuel to properly operate and you get fuzzy minded and forgetful.