Diabetes Educator

I met my Diabetes Educator (DE), Karen, yesterday. She is really, really nice & very helpful. Karen explained things in such a way that I was able to understand things straight away. She even faxed off my application form for the National Diabetes Service Scheme (NDSS). It means I will get my glucose test strips and the lances cheaper.

I can't believe that I was weighed & measured again. You would've thought that when the Practice Nurse did all that last week and faxed my info through it would've been included. Pretty much everything else was but not that. Oh well. I did like Karen's scales much better than the doctors one. It showed that I was almost 1 kg (2 lbs) lighter. So either there is a big difference in the scales or I have lost a teen bit of weight. I am hoping it's the latter. According to Karen's measurements of my height I have also grown 3cm taller since last week (back to 166cm which is what I thought I was in the first place) I like the idea of being 5ft 5 much better than being 5ft 4 


I learnt about my HbA1C test that I had done the other week. It basically gives you an overall average of what your blood glucose level is over a 3 month period because that is about how long your red blood cells live. My level was 6.9 % which seemed okay to me but Karen said we need to aim for 6.5 %
Keeping it under 7% means that it will help delay any complications that may arise from having diabetes. As I get older it will change and eventually I will need to have medication to help control things. Hopefully that will be quite a few years down the track.

I learnt more about the pancreas and why the nurse & DE measure my waist. It's to do with the level of fat that surrounds your waist & how it causes pressure on the pancreas and makes it work harder. Karen explained that its like when you rev a car all the time and your engine works harder. Eventually the rings etc will wear out and not work as effectively. A great analogy to use to explain it to the boys.

I found out why I need to keep my cholesterol down (less than 4mmol/L is best) mine was 3.5. I knew it would be good it always has been. At least that was something I knew I had under control :)

Oh no I just clicked that I will be weighed a lot. I hate scales. Not happy Jan!

We also spoke about diet, when to test my BSL and exercise. Karen said that it sounded like I knew what I was doing with my diet and that I probably didn't need to see a dietitian. I told her that I had an appointment to see one anyway and I just wanted to clarify a few things with her. Basically I need to have low fat, low carbohydrates and high fibre. In other words Low GI. It really isn't all that different to what I had been doing but just on a bigger scale now rather than the smaller changed I made months ago.

I go back in two weeks time to check how I am going but so far so good.