Men's Health Stories

My name is Phil, and I’m a married man in his 40’s who happens to enjoy fine dining and even finer wines. You see, since the age of 30, I’ve eaten pretty much whatever food I have felt like. I just didn’t care about the consequences, who cares if I piled on a few extra wheelbarrows of padding along the way? Married life certainly agreed with me, or at least that was what I thought. So fast forward to 2014 and my wife and I decided to upgrade our life insurance and we chose a popular brand for this honour. They needed to run a mini health screening to ensure that we wouldn’t pop our clogs during the first year. Everything seemed fine except for my urine test sample. The nurse asked me if I had diabetes, I was shocked and replied in the negative. To cut a long and tedious story short, about 4 weeks later I discovered that I had developed type 2 diabetes somewhere between a few ice creams and my penchant for frozen wine gums!

And Then…

My biggest surprise was the lack of symptoms that I was displaying, no headaches, no midnight dashes to the toilet. But then I looked a little closer and I saw some familiar scenarios. My feet had started to itch at certain times of the day, the old eyesight had faded badly in the last 18 months, and I remembered some very ugly bruising from a light knock I received on my leg. I was wondering how long have I actually been suffering from this potentially lethal condition?

Denial

My doctor had told me to start on metformin tablets straight away, and after 4 weeks, I should be taking 4 per day, plus the Ramipril for my high blood pressure. Sorry, I forgot to add this little gem to my original diagnosis. Talk about rattling when I walk, this would be more akin to being transformed into a human tic-tac container! For about 2 weeks, I didn’t bother with these meds and drank and ate as if the world was going to end. And then I read a little more about my condition and what I found was pretty sobering to be honest. Apparently, the graveyard is full of misguided people who decided not to bother dealing with their diabetes. I looked over at my wife and son and then back at my bottle of Shiraz and stilton cheese and realised that it was time to man up.

Acceptance

Of course, it was no contests and I’ve been on the straight and narrow since then. My diet has been transformed, I won’t bore you with the details, but it is fairly grim. Let’s just say that I’ve seen rabbits with a better selection of main courses than yours truly. But, I do feel a little better and I even started up a blog. It’s called Man Vs Diabetes, an homage to my favourite TV show featuring Adam Richman. Those gorging days are gone, but I’m using the blog as an accountability tool, and if any fellow ‘diabetians’ would like to come along for the ride, the more the merrier. I believe that I can reverse this condition with the right amount of exercise, diet and a few meds. I’m fast turning into a human pin cushion with the amount of blood tests I’m carrying out on myself, but the results are worth it. I’ll be updating my blog on a regular basis and even my blood pressure readings are looking better. Thanks for reading my story and if you have any concerns about your own blood glucose readings, please pay your GP a visit, sooner rather than later!

Author Bio

Phil Hall has weaned himself off frozen wine gums and fried breakfasts and is doing his best to kick type 2 Diabetes where it hurts.