THE RISKS OF MISMANAGED DIABETES

I've posted this article from the Daily Mail below as a warning to the risks diabetics take if they don't take care to manage their diabetes. It's often a problem with diabetics in their teens who feel isolated and want to be part of the crowd and be able to eat when they like, they just want to be the same as any other teenager. However diabetics aren't like normal teens as much as they would like to be and they think, "It won't happen to me that happens to other diabetics!" Diabetes is a serious condition so hopefully this article will raise awareness to the risks of not taking care.

Diabetic, 30, who skipped insulin jabs to lose weight fears she has been left infertile after having to terminate her pregnancy or risk death

• Jeorgia Wood, from Hampshire, was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes aged 11 
  
• Needed several insulin injections a day to control her blood sugar levels
• But they caused her to gain 4stone in weight and she began skipping them
• Is now suffering a series of health problems as a result - including infertility
• Also faces going blind, losing a limb and undergoing a pancreas transplant
• Said she wishes she could turn back the clock as being thin 'wasn't worth it'

A diet-obsessed diabetic who stopped taking her insulin to lose weight has suffered tragic consequences after having to terminate her pregnancy - or risk death.

Jeorgia Wood, 30, spent her teenage years and twenties dieting while battling diabetes because of her obsession to be thin. 

Like a growing number of young women with diabetes, she skipped vital insulin injections because they caused her to gain weight - a condition called diabulemia. 

But she is now suffering a number of serious health problems as a result.  As well as potentially destroying her chances of being a mother, she now faces going blind, losing a limb and undergoing a pancreas transplant.

Diabetic Jeorgia Wood, 30, withheld her insulin injections for years to avoid weight gain. She is now battling several serious health problems as a result

Dangerous: As well as potentially destroying her chances of being a mother, she now faces going blind, losing a limb and undergoing a pancreas transplant. Pictured here having laser surgery to try and preserve her sight

Jeorgia, a reiki practitioner from Odiham, Hampshire, said: 'I would much rather be fat and have a baby than be skinny, blind and childless. If I could go back to being 16, I'd tell myself that being thin isn't important.

'I've realised the hard way that being thin is just not worth it.'

Jeorgia and her fiance Ross Fowler, 28, were told the devastating news that she would have to terminate her pregnancy at 10 weeks last November.

 

Her battered body had reacted so negatively to being pregnant, she developed a condition called hyperemesis gravidarum, or unrelenting morning sickness. 

Causing her to be sick every 10 to 30 minutes, doctors said she wouldn't survive the pregnancy, nor would her baby. They added that her diabulimia was to blame. 

The condition describes the process of insulin-dependent diabetics skipping injections to make themselves thinner. 

It is usually linked to type 1 diabetes, where the immune system attacks the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas, rather than type 2 diabetes, which is associated with obesity and a sedentary lifestyle.

Insulin is a hormone that promotes fat storage, so avoiding taking it, or manipulating doses, can lead to weight loss.

Jeorgia, pictured on her 12th birthday, shortly after being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.  As she began using insulin, she gained four stone in weight and began to worry about her diet 

Worried: By the time she was 17, she was a size 18 and 5ft 6in. She started skipping insulin injections to lose weight

The condition means Jeorgia may never be able to have a baby, but the couple have not completely ruled it out.

She said: 'It was incredibly distressing for us both. It's a risk and my doctors don't know for sure if I can carry a baby.'

Jeorgia, who was always a plump child, was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, also known as juvenile onset diabetes, when she was 11 after she started losing weight, developed a raging thirst and suffered constant fatigue.

She was told she would have to monitor everything she ate and regularly check her blood sugar levels and needed to inject insulin four to five times a day to mop up excess sugar from her bloodstream. 

WHAT IS DIABULEMIA? 

Diabulemia is not yet officially recognised as a medical condition but it is predicted that it affects as many as one third of young female diabetics. 

It occurs when insulin-dependent type 1 diabetics skip insulin injections as a way of losing weight.

Insulin is a hormone that promotes fat storage, so avoiding taking it, or manipulating doses, can lead to weight loss.

It can cause blood sugar levels to surge causing fatigue, dehydration and the wearing of muscle tissue.

In the longer term, the symptoms are the same as for poorly managed diabetes and include kidney disease and sight problems.

Her diet was controlled as a child by her parents Charlotte, 63, and Peter, 68.

But when her weight ballooned and she gained four stone on insulin, she started to skip her injections and began to obsess over every morsel of food. She also wouldn't eat in front of anyone.

She said: 'From the age of about 13, I felt very unattractive. I hated the way I looked. I hated being different. If I dropped out of PE my classmates would say I was using it as an excuse, but I'd have done anything to be normal.

'By the time I was 17, I was a size 18 and 5ft 6in. If someone walked past me while I was eating a sandwich I would throw it in the nearest bin and pretend I was done with it. I thought people would judge me for my size.

'I started skipping my injections, losing weight very quickly, sometimes half a stone in a few days.'

Jeorgia shrunk to a size 10-12 and started to enjoy her new slimmer frame and relished on the compliments people would give her.

But cutting her insulin injections down to one a day left her constantly teetering on the brink of collapse. 

She had to drink copious amounts of water to combat her unquenchable thirst while trying to hide her problems from her family and friends.

Then, when she was 18, she collapsed on a night out with friends and was rushed to hospital, where she was diagnosed with ketoacidosis, a condition where the body's insulin levels are too low to convert blood glucose into energy. Left untreated, it can cause a coma and even death.

Stark implications: Even aged 25 (left), Jeorgia was still restricting her insulin injections. The damage she has caused herself meant she had to have part of her foot amputated last year (right)

 

But even then, she did not stop obsessing and instead was even more careful to hide her diabulimia from doctors.

'No one noticed what I was doing for ages,' she said. 'I was missing three or four injections a day and just doing one before bed to tide me over.

'I felt like I had flu every day of the week. But the more compliments I got the more paranoid I became about putting the weight back on.'

By the time she was 20, having noticed her monthly blood sugar tests were extremely high, Jeorgia's doctor warned her she would be blind and in a wheelchair by the time she was 30. But she still didn't start using insulin properly.

'I know it sounds crazy, but being thin mattered more. I told myself I'd only do it for a few more months but I just carried on and on and on,' she continued.

The turning point eventually came when she was 27 when, suffering from a stabbing pain in her hands and feet, she finally decided to seek help.

Warning: Jeorgia, who now weighs 13st and is a size 14, hopes her poor health will be a warning to other diabetics

'I went into rehab and it was there that it hit home how much I was hurting my family,' said Jeorgia. 'I was so wrapped up in my diabulimia that I'd failed to see anything outside myself. I knew I needed help.'

But the damage had been done and Jeorgia needed morphine to manage the pain and has since had to have an operation to remove dead flesh from her heel after catching an infection.

She's also been diagnosed with gastroparesis, paralysis of the stomach, and has had to have two vitrectomies to remove fluid from the inside of her eyeballs. Jeorgia also underwent a round of laser treatment to try to preserve her sight.

Furthermore, she has had to endure injections in her eyes for macular edema caused by protein which has been deposited on the eye and doctors are still not sure they will be able to save what is left of her sight.

The dangerous dieting has left her with permanent problems and Jeorgia now doesn't drive and needs Ross for even the simplest of tasks. 

A condition called autonomic neuropathy causes her heart to race at random and affects her blood pressure.

Now, aged 29 and weighing 13st and a size 14, Jeorgia is finally working to put her life right.

Together with Ross, a businessman, she has decided to delay a pancreas transplant to give her more time to try and start a family and find out what her options would be for an IVF surrogate to help them.

The transplant won't cure Jeorgia's diabetes, but will give her body a rest from the condition for eight to 10 years.

She added: 'After the transplant, my body will have been through a massive trauma and the chances of carrying a baby would be incredibly slim, as well as dangerous. So we want to see what our options are before we go down that road.

'I want to have a baby. I only hope I can hang on to the eyesight I have left in order to do that.

'There have been times where I've tried to push Ross away because I don't think I deserve his love.

'But he's asked me to marry him and all we can do is hope that one day we will have a child of our own.

Looking back, Jeorgia said that her need to feel loved and accepted was a major driving force behind her diabulimia.

'I felt worthless because I was overweight but I wasn't enormous, I should have seen that. Even when I tried to stop, the temptation to do it to lose a few pounds for the weekend was too strong.'

She hopes her experience is a warning to other young diabetes sufferers not to go down the same path she did.

Although not yet an officially recognised medical condition in the UK, diabulimia is a serious emerging problem that experts predict around a third of young female diabetics could be suffering from.

Deepa Khatri, a clinical advisor at Diabetes UK, said: 'People need to know that abusing insulin out of a fear of weight gain is very dangerous.

'Skipping insulin can lead to high blood glucose levels and devastating health complications like blindness, amputations and in some cases strokes.'