What a great article. Like many commenters here, I was completely oblivious to the struggle and I appreciate it a lot more now.
The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
251–260 of 315 posts
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#252Earlier quoted context omitted.
> What if there is an earthquake and you can't get to somewhere with snacks? I’m a Type 1 diabetic (diagnosed in my 30s) and have been living with it for about a decade now. This really isn’t a “what if” situation. I know what will happen. I will die or hopefully just become incredibly ill. It’s not really scary at all. It’s just something I live with and prepare for as best I can. The one thing that I’ve learned fro…
Please forgive my ignorance, how is it possible that you lived until your thirties without knowing you have T1D?
The really interesting thing is not that T1D diagnosis has erased the label for "Juvenile onset diabetes" because it can happen at any age, it's that those previously-thought-destroyed pancreatic cells that produce insulin, are actually continuing decades after disease diagnosis and can be "reactivated" via BCG or Valter Longo's FMD:
"Identifying most people with T1D continue to secrete varying amounts of insulin and C-peptides for decades after initial diagnosis:
https://www.healthline.com/diabetesmine/dr-faustmans-controv...
See below for my deeper response on these and other issues:
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#253Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of the scariest experiences of my life was going on a walk after lunch with someone who had T1D and miscalculated their insulin dose. They went from totally fine, to saying “I don’t feel well, we need to head back”, to sweaty and sheet white and barely conscious within just a few minutes. The terror I felt as we waited for the doors of the lift to open so he could get to his emergency food is burned into my brain…
I had a “drunk” parked in the inside lane of the four lane road in front of my house one evening. He was just stopped in traffic and got out stumbling around. I was annoyed (naturally) and he handed me his phone. Whatever, dude; I don’t want to talk to your friend right now. Somehow he insisted and his friend told me he was diabetic and to call an ambulance. I did, got him some OJ, and moved his car out of traffic. H…
He needed the ride. OJ solves the problem quickly but he could crash again unless he gets some slow carbs. He knew that.
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#254Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of the scariest experiences of my life was going on a walk after lunch with someone who had T1D and miscalculated their insulin dose. They went from totally fine, to saying “I don’t feel well, we need to head back”, to sweaty and sheet white and barely conscious within just a few minutes. The terror I felt as we waited for the doors of the lift to open so he could get to his emergency food is burned into my brain…
I once took a 5 hour bike trip on an empty stomach. At some point I couldn’t even turn the pedals. I had to lay on the ground, not feeling better even after half hour. I can still remember the feeling of eating some sweets. Felt like I was reborn. Can’t imagine what it’s like for T1
You were likely short of potassium too. This is why professional cyclists pack bananas for the ride.
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#255In the inline chart "42 factors that affect blood glucose", how do I interpret the two different arrows corresponding to each entry?
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#256Earlier quoted context omitted.
I had a “drunk” parked in the inside lane of the four lane road in front of my house one evening. He was just stopped in traffic and got out stumbling around. I was annoyed (naturally) and he handed me his phone. Whatever, dude; I don’t want to talk to your friend right now. Somehow he insisted and his friend told me he was diabetic and to call an ambulance. I did, got him some OJ, and moved his car out of traffic. H…
I've had the "are you drunk" comments a few times while hypoglycemic. I once walked home from work and apperantly didn't notice it, walked a few busy intersections and finally sat down somewhere where someone noticed me and called an ambulance who game me a glucose iv and everything was back to normal in a few minutes. So everything was still somewhat working and the "go home" signal was set but everything else was b…
One of the slightly scary things about T1D is that at first you get a weird feeling when your blood sugar is too low, and you can notice when that happens. But if it happens too often, those warning signs stop, and you can get into a really serious condition without noticing for yourself.
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#257Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're right, the truth is probably actually that only a minority of T1Ds have CGMs. My post was a bit insensitive, not everyone has easy access to them.
What's even more frustrating is the disparity in who can get them and how even if they are cleared for use in your country. The author here points out that New Zealand's medical system doesn't always pay for CGMs, while the Australian system does. In Ireland, the Dexcom G6 system is available but the FreeStyle Libre 2, an updated version of the FreeStyle Libre with more frequent reads and better alarms (Libre vs Libr…
I was really surprised how difficult it is for competitors like levels to provide CGMs in the US.
Here in Europe we can simply get them from Abbot/Dexcom an ship them.
I can't make any promises, but I'm positive that I'll be able to develop a product that takes care of finding the correct insulin doses when giving activity and CGM data + meal information withing the next year's.
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#258Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Consider that there's a +/-20% margin of error on the reported carbohydrates on nutrition facts. Is this accounted for by product-to-product variation or package-to-package variation?
The 20% seems to be how much you are allowed to lie by. You get another bit for variability of the test, and a third error term for variability of "good manufacturing practice". Here is the actual rule from https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/cfr... A food with a label declaration of calories, total sugars, added sugars (when the only source of sugars in the food is added sugars), total fat, satu…
I am not a lower but the 20% do not seem to be about carbs. Only sugar. Carbs are only covered by the second paragraph and must be 'within current good manufacturing practice', whatever that means. Am I reading this wrong?
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#259Your write-up was well-constructed. Thanks! I will add a few things just to raise awareness, if it hasn't been raised already. I apologize if I missed something in my reading. I'm the kid whose diagnosis was at a time when we didn't have fingerstick glucometers, human synthetic insulin, or any of the myriad of modern medical approaches to ameliorating the effects of living with T1D. Five decades later I can offer som…
Thanks for the post! I read http://cureresearch4type1diabetes.blogspot.com from time to time and that author does not give such glimmering summaries of the work that Dr. Faustman is doing (and has been doing for a long while). I don't really know of another voice on this subject. So I'll ask if you've got the time: what do you think about the blog authors evaluation and prospects of this research path?
Re: The Unreasonable Math of Type 1 Diabetes
#260I'm a type 1 diabetic, and this was a helpful post at showing non diabetics why it is so. hard. Non diabetics typically think the difficult thing must be the shots and the finger pricks, right? Not really. The majority of diabetics get used to those things quickly (of course there are some of course that deal with a major major needle phobia that can make it even harder). The hard part is that it never ends. Almost e…
Non-zero chance you might see a cure for type-1 in your lifetime. https://www.clinicaltrialsarena.com/analysis/vertex-stem-cel... It's a stem cell therapy, in human trials (not the usual "in mice" crap). A single patient already had their diabetes disappear: https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/vertex-diabetes-cell-t... The downside of stemcell therapy is that it is essentially an organ transplant, aka requires immu…
The reason for the immunosuppressants is not the same as for a classic organ transplant. For a normal organ transplant, you need immunosuppressants because otherwise the body will recognise the new organ as being a foreign body that it doesn't recognise as self. For a stem cell transplant, the immune system has already gone around destroying every pancreatic beta cell it can find. The immune system is primed, and it absolutely recognises beta cells as something to destroy. The end goal is to encapsulate the inserted beta cells in a membrane that allows glucose in and insulin out, but keeps the immune system away.