So I posted last year about my mother’s health condition which eventually happened due to type 2 diabetes. First time, my mom showed the signs of diabetes in 1988 when she was expecting me. She was admitted at the hospital for 2 days to control her sugar levels and she got better. Then she delivered me in May 1988. Since then she didn’t show any signs of diabetes but it was an early call when it happened. Next she showed signs of diabetes in 2009. Since then she is on medications.
Mom’s health in 2017
She religiously took medicines, got her blood work done once in every three months, visited doctor, avoided eating sugar and so on so forth. Generally she followed everything what a physician told her to do. But in 2017, she got kidney stones and suffered from severe abdominal pain due to stones. With the treatment plan she was offered at the hospital, she recovered in 3-4 months. Slowly she was taken off the kidney medications and only continued with the diabetes medications. During this time, she had gone through endoscopy and installed stents laparoscopically, which was removed after her infection levels reduced.
Mom’s health in 2021
So my parents came to visit me in October 2021 and they also visited with the plan to consult doctors for mom. She was losing appetite and used to feel puckish during eating. So we started consulting doctors and nothing fruitful or nothing serious appeared. Doctor just suggested her to go on insulin. But she was doing good. Suddenly in November 2021, she got fever & was shivering like hell. So without wasting much time, we got her admitted at the hospital and doctors started the treatment quickly by getting her into the ICU. Her diabetes was in 300+ levels but her fever and shivering were big concerns to control.
The heavy doses of antibiotics continued for the next 4 days but nothing happened. Her creatinine (chemical compound to process your muscles and monitors kidney functions) was sky rocketing and reached to 6.8 which was deadly. Doctors decided to go ahead with dialysis. 3 dialysis sessions happened and her creatinine started reducing, fever was gone and she started looking healthy. But during the endoscopy we came to know that she is getting serious liver issues. But since all the parameters were coming down, she was getting better. After spending 13 days at the hospital finally she was discharged and she was happy to be home.
Mom’s health in 2022
We were pretty excited that she is doing good. She got better in 2021 and she continued the same regime in 2022. I deliberately put her on vegan diet and she showed tremendous improvement. Doctor himself was surprised to see her creatinine level at 1.7 which was 6.8 2 months ago. But once elder people get bad health, it keeps going. They never become the same what they used to be. Somedays she is better, some days she is worse. Somedays she is depressed due to health issues, Somedays she is happy seeing dad and I happy. Somedays she feels pathetic with the number of pills she is consuming, Somedays she is happy seeing the home cooked food.
The list of diseases she is presently living with
1. Chronic Kidney Disease
2. Chronic Liver Disease
3. Osteoporosis
4. Type 2 Diabetes (on insulin)
5. Anaemia
I’m trying to be intimidating to my readers. But I’m trying to say that she is living with all of these diseases and she is doing her best. When a person becomes kidney patient almost 60-70% medicines and painkillers go out of the list of her prescription. Most of the painkillers (medicines/injections) directly impact the kidneys.
Conclusion
I didn’t mention the mental trauma I had been through. Whenever we brought her to the hospital, we got to know so much about diabetes. Diabetes in women could be deadlier than men and that’s why I documented everything in this blog post. My agenda is not to scare my readers, but to share my experience that what diabetes can do. Many people consider diabetes as a simple lifestyle disease and they tend to ignore. But it could be your biggest nightmare if not treated on time and if not treated properly. On this world diabetes day, I’m sharing my experience top bring awareness among all of you. Don’t take it lightly if you are diabetic, take it seriously and keep yourself checking every now and then.