First appointment
One Tuesday at the beginning of March 2021 I was aware that I was doing very small urinations, quite frequently. Also, I was experiencing pain in the intestines and a dry mouth. This was worrisome, new and somewhat upsetting, as well as giving me anxiety. Accordingly, I sought an appointment with my GP for the following day.

She examined me and could find no problem, other than a very slightly enlarged prostate, perfectly normal at my age. As for the urinations, she advised me that this would settle, saying that relaxation and not worrying about it would help.

It continues ...
I continued like this for about six weeks. It turns out that the abdominal pain was unrelated, and was "just one of thise things." It was the dry mouth that was irksome. Some days it was quite slight; other days it was intolerable. I could barely raise enough saliva to lick a cigarette paper. I should add that there were absolutely no other symptoms. I figured it must be dehydration, and started to drink lots of fruit juice. The thing is, it was NOT dehydration, and accordingly the fluids just ran straight through me. I collect my grandson from school two days a week, and the frequent urination was a problem. I needed to stop drinking fluids in time for it to have gone through me before setting off to collect him. Similarly with shopping trips and other outings. It became a mathematical exercise. When collecting my grandson I was quite relieved if it was raining, then we could just go home and be near the toilet.

Is there a convenient bush?
I persevered. I told myself that maybe dry mouth was just something that happened in old age. But what was bothering me was the inability to go out. I'm a great walker, and try to do two or three miles a day, but this proved to be difficult. I planned my walks to places where I knew there was a convenient bush to hide behind to have a wee. But ultimately, this was no good; it was becoming intolerable.

Back to the doctor's
Finally, 21 March, I phoned the surgery to seek another appointment. It was clear that there just were not any routine appointments; presumably the doctors were all out at a vaccination centre administering the jab. The advice, via recorded message, was to use the online form on the website to describe the problem, whereupon a doctor would get back to me as soon as possible. This I did, mentioning nothing more than dry mouth, since there was nothing more to mention.

The doctor texted me the following day. She asked me to take in a urine sample, saying that she wanted first of all to exclude diabetes. I took in the sample and waited to hear. Funnily enough, my daughter and I had mentioned the possibility of diabetes.

High sugar!
She telephoned me the next morning. She said that there was a very high sugar content in my urine, and I needed to go for a blood test at the local hospital immediately. Meanwhile she passed the request for blood investigations to the hospital electronically, and off I went. She telephoned me two or three days later (the weekend intervened) and told me the tests were unequivocal: it was definitely diabetes type 2 (**). We discussed at length what I needed to do. I had to cut out all sugar and as much carbohydates as possible at once! She prescribed a medication called Metformin, of which I needed to take two tablets of 500mg per day. She advised me to just take one a day at the beginning because Metformin could cause bad side effects such as nausea, intestinal pains, even vomiting.

So it was with trepidation that I took my first tablet. Nothing; no side effects! I must be one of the lucky ones! Therefore I took two the next day and every day since. Meanwhile my daughter was the lucky recipient of a bag of sweet and carbohydrate goodness and I learnt to take unsweetened coffee and consider my diet. I was a big eater of sugar, and that had to end. And what to eat?? As regards coffee, I bought a Stevia-based sweetener. Hmmm, after-taste unpleasant, so abandoned.

I image that when I go shopping, other shoppers probably wonder "why is that man studying the back of every packet?"

Sweet potatoes?
Short on research at this point, I felt that obviously potatoes were out, so I went out and bought sweet potatoes. Never had them before; I found them much too sweet. But then a little research revealed that in fact they are just as bad as potatoes in the carbohydrate department. Ditto rice, so how would I fill my stomach?

I determined that vegetables were the way to go, and overnight became almost a Vegan. But also meats, particularly chicken and turkey were fine, as were eggs in moderation, so I've built up a diet featuring these. I was able to survive two entirely sugar and carbohydrate free days up until yesterday, and I'm so pleased to report that urination is back to normal. I'm also very pleased to say that beer in moderation and a spot of red wine seem to be just fine. Thank goodness for that, as I enjoy a drop of alcohol before dinner.

Measuring and quantifying
There are two measurement features involved in watching your diabetes: HbA1C and blood glucose. Blood glucose should ideally be between 4 and 6 pre-meal and under 7.8 after. For diabetics these figures are 4 to 7 and under 8.5, so there isn't a lot of variation between normal and diabetics. I bought a blood glucose monitoring kit from Amazon and started using it; my figures have been so far been 5.8 and 9.5 before and 7.9 to 9.9 after dinner. That 9.9 was after eating sweet potato for dinner, so the effects of the"wrong" food are quite quickly apparent. Since ditching all carbs my after-dinner reading is down to about 8.2, with around 7 before. Quite pleasing.

(In a mid-July update, I seem to have stabilised at a gross overall average of 7.1, and as low as a mid-afternoon of 4.9)

The other measurement is HbA1C. This is quite a complex measure. The sugar in your blood is called glucose. When glucose builds up in your blood, it binds to the haemoglobin in your red blood cells. The A1c test measures how much glucose is bound. Red blood cells live for about 3 months, so the test shows the average level of glucose in your blood for the past 3 months. Normal A1C is around 42 or below for non-diabetics. Over 48 would indicate the presence of diabetes; mine, at the recent blood test, was 67. Although that looks pretty high, it's not the worst I've seen online. Remember, that figure was the result of two sugars in about 4 coffees per day, plus starchy foods, and doughnuts, and lots of chocolate! In three months it will be tested again, and I would be very disappointed if it wasn't a lot lower.