Got Sugar?

Got sugar? No, not in your cupboard but in your blood! Suspect you may be a diabetic, or pre-diabetic but don't want to go to the doctor, spend mega bucks on a test and then flag your insurance company that you've got a new medical condition that they can use to increase your rates? Then get thee to a Walgreen's pronto!

Today and tomorrow from 10:00am to 6:00pm local Walgreens are offering free diabetic testing. And yup, there isn't any catch. They won't share the info with anyone but you. They're offering two tests...A Blood Glucose test which takes one prick of the finger and ten seconds to reveal the results. And a new test I just read about called the Hemoglobin A1C test which takes one prick of your finger, a little more squeezing to fill a larger vial, and then five minutes to reveal the results. The A1C test measures your average blood glucose over the previous 2 to 3 months.

Since I come from a long line of diabetics -- all my grandparents, and both of my parents -- and have some symptoms -- I'm very cognizant of the possibility of become diabetic. After I was diagnosed with RA and high cholesterol and high tri-glycerides I put myself on the Sugar Busters diet. The first two weeks I followed it to a tee but then got bored and made my own diet up. I try to not eat anything that has sugar or high fructose corn syrup, although sometimes that's just impossible. Even the crappiest cardboard-tasting "healthy" cereal has some sugar in it. So when there is I limit my intake to under 3 - 5 grams of sugar. Once in a while I will treat myself to a square of 85% dark chocolate. Two months since I've started I have lost 15 pounds, but it's not nearly my goal. Exercise is a vital component of keeping diabetes in check and I do strive to walk as much as possible. Weight lifting and aerobics have become more of a challenge since the RA and sometimes even walking hurts. To take care of that I bought walking sticks which helps my knees.

Even though I have lab work scheduled for next week, it's not to measure my sugar, only for liver (thank you Methrotrexate) and a CBC (thank you RA) and for cholesterol (thank you fatty foods) I figured I could save some bucks and go to Walgreen's to get tested. I did have breakfast so it wasn't a fasting test. The normal range for the Blood Glucose non fast should be less than 140 mg/dl. My level was 92 mg/dl. It took a struggle to get enough blood out of my finger (being anemic and all) to complete the A1C test but the tech finally got it. A normal level is under 7%. I registered 5.2%. Needless to say I am thrilled with these numbers. Looks like my lifestyle changes are working.

Diabetes is a very dangerous disease...what you don't know can kill you. A little sugar in your cupboard or coffee is okay,



a lot of sugar in your blood is dangerous, and could result in this...