Type 1 Diabetes: Living With the Disease
Home Treatment
Type 1 diabetes requires daily attention to diet, exercise, and insulin. You may have times when this job feels overwhelming, but taking good care of yourself will help you will feel better, have a better quality of life, and prevent or delay complications from diabetes.
Eat well and count carbohydrate grams
Follow one of these meal-planning methods to help you eat a healthful diet and spread carbohydrate through the day. This will help prevent high blood sugar levels after meals. For more information, see:
Focusing on the type of carbohydrate as well as the amount might help you maintain your target blood sugar level. Foods with a low glycemic index (GI) may have a small but helpful role in preventing spikes in blood sugar. It is not yet known if these foods have a role in preventing complications.14 Low glycemic foods do not raise blood sugar as quickly as high glycemic foods. Foods with a low GI include high-fiber whole grains, lentils, and beans. High GI foods include potatoes and white bread.
Using fat replacers—nonfat substances that act like fat in a food—may seem like a good idea, but talk with a registered dietitian before you do. Some people may eat more food, and therefore more calories, if they know a food contains a fat replacer.
Take insulin
Make sure you know how to give yourself insulin.
If you are using an insulin pump or an insulin pen, make sure you know how to use them properly.
Exercise
Try to do at least 2½ hours a week of moderate activity. One way to do this is to be active 30 minutes a day, at least 5 days a week. Be sure to exercise safely. Drink plenty of water before, during, and after you are active. This is very important when it’s hot out and when you do intense exercise. It may help to keep track of your exercise on an activity log
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Monitor your blood sugar
Checking your blood sugar level is a major part of controlling your blood sugar level and keeping it in a target range you set with your doctor. For more information, see:
Handle high and low blood sugar levels
Be sure you:
- Recognize and treat high and low blood sugar levels. For more information, see:
- Always wear medical identification
to let medical personnel know that you have diabetes.
- Take precautions when you are driving and do not drive if your blood sugar is below 70 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL).
Control your blood pressure and cholesterol
- Blood pressure in people who have diabetes should be less than 130/80 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg). Moderate exercise, such as 30 minutes of brisk walking most days of the week, can help lower blood pressure. But you may need to take one or more medicines, such as angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors or angiotensin II receptor blockers (ARBs) to achieve your goal.7
- A low-fat diet, exercise, and weight loss can lower your cholesterol. Your body needs insulin to process fats, as it does with carbohydrate. If your diabetes is poorly controlled, the fats in your blood (especially triglycerides) can rise a lot. You should strive for a goal of less than 100 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) or aim for keeping it at 70 mg/dL, for low-density lipoprotein (LDL), or "bad," cholesterol. HDL, or "good," cholesterol should be more than 40 mg/dL for men and more than 50 mg/dL for women. Triglycerides should be less than 150 mg/dL. You may need to take lipid-lowering medicines, such as statins, to reach your goals.8
Limit alcohol
Limit your alcohol intake to no more than two drinks a day for men and one drink a day for women (none, if you are pregnant).
Take an aspirin every day
If you are age 40 or older, talk to your doctor about taking a low-dose aspirin daily to help prevent heart attack, stroke, or other large blood vessel disease. People with diabetes are 2 to 4 times more likely than people who don't have diabetes to die from heart and blood vessel diseases.6
Deal with your feelings
A chronic illness creates major change in your life. You may need to grieve the loss of your old life from time to time. Also, you may feel resentful, deprived, or angry about having to pay attention to what and how much you eat. For more information, see:
Protect your feet
Daily foot care can prevent serious problems. Foot problems caused by diabetes are the most common cause of amputations. For more information, see:
Learn more about diabetes
Diabetes is a complex disease and there is a lot to learn, such as:
- How to better care for your skin and your teeth and gums. For example, using a humidifier in your house or wearing gloves when gardening can keep your skin from becoming dry and cracking. Daily flossing and brushing can reduce the risk of gum disease.
- Precautions to take when you are sick. You need to drink more fluids than usual to prevent dehydration and test your urine for ketones when you are sick.
- How to prevent problems while traveling. You may want to take extra insulin with you and have plenty of snacks on hand in case you are in an area where you cannot get food.
- Where to find a support group for people with diabetes. Camps are also available for adolescents who have diabetes.
- How to stop smoking, or how to prevent your adolescent with diabetes from starting.
- What immunizations you need. For more information, see the topic Immunizations.
- How to deal with a rebellious adolescent who has diabetes. Ideas for helping your teen include letting him or her use an insulin pen or pump and letting your teen meet alone with his or her diabetes educator. This may help your teen feel more in control of his or her diabetes care.
- When it's a safe time to try to get pregnant. For more information, see:
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| Author: | Caroline Rea, RN, BS, MS | Last Updated: October 3, 2008 |
| Medical Review: | Caroline S. Rhoads, MD - Internal Medicine Matthew I. Kim, MD - Endocrinology & Metabolism | |
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