Diabetes and the Flu, a Dangerous Duo! Part 2

Diabetes is never easy is it? In my last article I wrote about the dangerous duo of flu symptoms combined with diabetes. As I said there, the first thing that you should always do is get in touch with your doctor and let him know what’s going on. Hopefully you have a diabetes specialist that you see regularly. I’m in the market for a new one as I write this actually.

So, as promised I’m going to tell you how I got myself through a rough holiday weekend without ending up in the hospital.

First off, I can’t say that I did it alone. I had help from two important aspects of my life. My wife Tina was a great nurse over the weekend and probably was the one who made it possible for me to get through the ordeal at home. Due to the fact that she was sick as well with the flu, I have to thank her even more so.

The other hero of the weekend was somebody that I don’t even know personally. If you remember at the end of my last post I said that I would tell you about the one book that I think should be mandatory reading for all diabetics.

The book that has helped me so much in the few months that I’ve owned it is by the great Dr. Richard K. Bernstein. The title is suitably The Diabetic Solution: The Complete Guide To Achieving Normal Blood Sugars. I can’t recommend this book enough.

Here’s just a little background on Dr. Bernstein. At the age of 12, in 1946 Dr. Bernstein was diagnosed as what is known now as a Type 1 diabetic. One thing to remember is that in 1946 very little was actually known about diabetes. Glass syringes and needles had to be boiled for sterilization. Needles had to be sharpened with a stone. Also, there was no luxury of the blood sugar testers that we take for granted today. However, the fact is that Dr. Bernstein is one of the reasons we know as much as we do today about diabetes, and one of the reasons we have the luxuries that we have today for treating the disease.

In his late twenties and early thirties Dr. Bernstein was suffering from many of the complications that diabetes face, including kidney stones, frozen shoulder, impaired sensation, a deformity in his feet, and then some. The problem was that the doctors those days knew so little about diabetes that they didn’t even recognize these as complications of diabetes. They were trying to treat the complications but not the cause of the complications.

Dr. Bernstein didn’t take this lying down, and being an engineer took an engineers approach to dealing with the disease, and began to learn so much more about diabetes than the doctors treating him, that he eventually became a doctor himself just to be taken more seriously and get the word out about what he discovered about treating diabetes.

This is definitely the short version of Dr. Bernstein’s story, and certainly doesn’t do the man justice, but you just should know that the book is basically a Bible of sorts for diabetics. In fact you can find out more about the book and read Dr. Bernstein’s story along with some articles at: www.diabetes-book.com .

Okay, so there’s the book recommendation of the century if you’re a diabetic. There will be more recommendations but this one is paramount.

Now back to me.

As I began to experience flu symptoms I knew that I was in trouble if I didn’t act quickly. I didn’t want my kids to have to deal with their daddy being in the hospital again. It’s a strain on them, and also on my wife who would then have to deal with everything herself.

I began to vomit and went straight to Dr. Bernstein’s book.

Following his recommendations I immediately stopped eating. I couldn’t hold down anything anyways but sometimes you start feeling a little better and try to eat much too soon. The old dry toast, crackers, and ginger ale traditions that I usually fall for never work. That comes right out as well. So, I stopped trying for a while. Good idea.

The next thing I had to worry about was my blood sugar. As you hopefully read in part 1 of these articles, keeping your blood sugar from going too north is essential. I didn’t want the viscous cycle of dehydration and escalating blood sugars to start.

I skipped the fast acting insulin that I usually take to cover meals obviously, since there was nothing to cover. However, being that vomiting, and a stomach infection alone can cause your sugar to increase, I checked it often and took small doses of insulin to cover any increase. There were some increases in fact. 2 to 3 units seemed to be doing the trick in keeping everything fairly normal though.

My next battle was the one against dehydration. I started introducing some fluids and electrolytes into my system. For this I used bouillon cubes in a mug of water. I also added a teaspoon of salt to this, which provides sodium and chloride. What I didn’t do that Dr. Bernstein recommends was to also add a teaspoon of salt substitute (these provide potassium and chloride). He provides a list of these in his book. I didn’t have any of these at the time.

I also slowly sipped on some diet soda as I could hold it down. Nothing with carbs that would raise my blood sugar. This means no Gatorade like your mother would want you to drink.

So eventually after about 3 long days I nursed myself back to health. Well again, with the help of the beautiful Wife/nurse Tina, but no hospital employees at least. I eventually started to slowly get stuff into my belly and keep it down. It was a long haul but my main goal was achieved.

All of this may seem like common sense to some, but the point is that it’s very easy to slip past the point of no return as I’ve learned the hard way. It actually takes a lot to keep up with blood sugars and such when you don’t feel like doing anything but crawl in a hole and sleep. You have to do it though. You have to keep yourself hydrated so you don’t go into ketoacidosis, and even more importantly, you have to stay out of the darn hospital. Actually, if you even feel that things might be getting out of control you should go ahead and go. You don’t want to wait too long because then it becomes an ultra miserable experience.

Dr. Bernstein gives much more advice than I have given here, or that I even followed. However, in a desperate little time his book helped me considerably. You should grab this book.