I'm 56 years old, married with two kids and three grandkids. By all accounts I've led a so-far successful life. I have a wife that loves me, two kids that adore me (along with their spouses,) and three granddaughters that worship their Poppa.
I'm also 360lbs, and an uncontrolled type II diabetic. This blog is the story of an event that has changed my outlook on the world and my health. It's mostly for me to get my thoughts out, but if it ends up helping anyone else, so much the better.
On the weekend of December 3-4, 2022, I was barefoot in my backyard and stepped on something. A day or two later, my foot was painfully swollen and it was excruciating to bear weight. I had my wife take a picture of my foot because I'm just not that bendy right now. It showed a pus pocket that needed to be lanced and drained. When I saw the picture, I felt my heart drop: As a former paramedic, I knew how important diabetic foot care is. I also knew that this was a Big Deal.
I got myself to same-day-care and they lanced it and dressed it and sent me home with some Augmentin. A few days later, I called my primary care doctor to have some Bactrim DS added, because the cultures weren't back yet and I was worried about MRSA. (A good friend of mine is an ER doc, and we had many discussions via text about the proper approach.)
A few days after that, I started running a temperature. My wife and I decided to go back to same-day-care, but they were All Full Up and said if I wanted to be seen that day, I should go to the ER. So we did, starting a four-day adventure that has completely upended my life -- for the better.
The first 24 hours in the ER were..chaotic. They took one look at my foot and said I had to be admitted for repeated administration of IV wide-spectrum antibiotics. I had developed cellulitis and it needed to be landed on, hard. Untreated/uncontrolled cellulitis in the feet in a diabetic can be...problematic to say the least.
During the course of my treatment, they took my blood sugar readings about every six hours for four days. They also gave me something new: Insulin. Previously, I'd used Metformin in an attempt to keep my blood sugar under control. It failed, of course, because I failed.
I was supposed to be monitoring my own blood sugar for at least the last 3-4 years. They got me the little dohickey and the things to stick myself with to get a blood drop. 120 was the target and I hovered around 200 for YEARS. My A1C (5.6 is the goal) was always between 7 and 12.
As I mentioned, I weight almost 360lbs on a six-foot-two very broad frame. Think NFL linebacker. I've always been healthy. I rarely get colds. I've had only two real bad physical issues in my life, both of them dealing with my right knee. About six or seven years ago, a regular physical revealed I had something called "metabolic syndrome." Others call it "pre-diabetes." It was early, I was told, it can be controlled via diet and exercise.
...let's just say when it comes to those two words, we're not on speaking terms. Garfield the cat used to say in his strips that diet was "DIE" with a "T" added. And I've never liked exercise. I liked playing sports, like baseball, hockey and soccer. Softball and racquetball, too -- but the idea of taking a chunk of time and dedicating it to moving in specified, repetitious ways...I know this is wrong, but "exercise" seemed like a waste of time to me.
And dieting -- as I will explore in this blog, to say I have a complicated relationship with food is like saying the Pacific Ocean is "damp." Duh.
So long story short, I paid lip-service to my "metabolic syndrome" and mentally stuck my fingers in my ears and said "la la la la!" when it came to certain dietary issues.
Specifically my addiction to fast food. I'm really not into sweets and candy and cookies and stuff life that; we have a bunch of stuff for the grandkids like that in the house and I never touch it. I have about three or four trigger foods: Pizza, peanut butter, McDonald's. (In the McD's, you can just mentally add Wendy's and Burger King. The Big 3.)
If I had gotten control of my diet six, seven years ago, I wouldn't be where I am right now: Freaked out that I almost lost my left foot, being forced to take insulin injections five times a day, and having to completely revamp my diet in a very short period of time.
Right now, as I write this, I'm eager and excited to make these changes. To change my diet, to add meaningful exercise to my life, to really embrace my health possibly for the first time.
The issue I generally have with situations like this is maintaining that excitement.
So, we shall see, Dear Reader.
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