[thomasb]

went and saw my doctor/specialist today. He asked me some about my family, and esp my dad, who got type 1 when he was 40. he said that it was a bit strange that i had never had any antibodies in my blood, or something like that. Meaning that they suspected that i was not an "ordinary" type 1. and also that they nowadays know that it's sometimes not easy to say that one is either type 1 or 2.
Im due back in a year to test for c peptides(i think it was) and to see if im still producing insulin then.

eh, anyone got thoughts on this? i'm not really clear on what it all means.

[dbc]

In one sense it doesn't really matter - you have insulin dependent diabetes and you're doing the stuff and getting on with life.

But in another sense we have this "need" to have everything sorted, labelled and catagorised......

When I first went to my endo he pronounced me "unusual" because I was diagnosed as T1/LADA/T1.5 at the age of 52, with no history of diabetes of any type in my family. He did however confirm the diagnosis by the GAD antibody test.

The C-peptide test will indicate how much (if any) insulin your pancreas is still producing, but it won't really tell you anything you don't already know in terms of how to manage your D

[nono87]

[quote=thomasb;281544] Meaning that they suspected that i was not an "ordinary" type 1. and also that they nowadays know that it's sometimes not easy to say that one is either type 1 or 2.
Im due back in a year to test for c peptides(i think it was) and to see if im still producing insulin then.
QUOTE]

i went throught the same problem and it took them almost a year to sort it out and by that time i was a definate Type 1 because they could not get me onto the right treatment as they did not know whether i needed tablets or insulin. i was very receptive to insulin and i never took no more than 6 units a day! now its something else that i don't even want to think of

but yes it does happen to some people in my family diabetes skipped a generation and landed on me!

[shiftzor]

Can Skip Generations? everyone i know in my family is not diabetic (not type1 or 2). So diabetes must have skipped many generations in the hope that one day i might show up .Im an ordinary type 1 im afraid, not special like your self. Hope you can keep off insulin for as long as possible (although inevitable). gl

[shabbie6247]

Originally Posted by shiftzor

Can Skip Generations? everyone i know in my family is not diabetic (not type1 or 2). So diabetes must have skipped many generations in the hope that one day i might show up .Im an ordinary type 1 im afraid, not special like your self. Hope you can keep off insulin for as long as possible (although inevitable). gl

my maternal great-granny was type 1....diagnosed one week after a mini-bus accident, although she didnt sustain abdominal injury, the docs said that the shock of the accident probably brought it on. she was aged 70 when diagnosed.

her brother was type 1 from child-hood, he died aged 55 years from heart complications.

(my mum has been researching our family tree and i only found all of this out the other week!)

no other member of the family has had diabetes since.

[Mich]

The only diabetic relative we know for sure was my great-grandmother on my mother's side. My grandpa's mom.

Many times in the past, people died of complications before they were diagnosed. Their death would be attributed to heart problems or atherosclerosis, or some other such complication. That could be why many people don't know another diabetic in their family. And then there's always the fact that we don't yet know all of the reasons and associations for becoming diabetic.

Pretty much, we all treat it the same. We find a way to metabolize our food and get on with life.

[notme]

My family has type 2 diabetes, but I am the only type one. My grandfathers both died in their thirties so there is the chance that they may have developed type one in their thirties like I did, had they lived. I will never know. When I was diagnosed the doctor assumed without tests that I was type two because of my age and gave me a prescription of glucophage to start taking the next morning. He almost killed me. Within three days I was in the hospital with ketoacidocis. They finally did the C-peptide tests and discovered I was actually type one.

I guess I don't have a strange type one either. Just the plain old fashioned kind.

[thomasb]

and the doc also said that if the father had diabetes type 1, the chance of his kid to get it was 5%. i read that somewhere else too. is that correct? yet i read about so many families where almost everyone has it. strange.

[palefacegirl03]

Diabetes is strange not you.

I have/had two cousins with type 1, my first cousin was diagnosed at 4 years old, in the early 70's, she passed away( went into a diabetic coma) at age 11. Her brother was diagnosed type 1 when he was teenager/early twenties and is in his 50's now. I was diagnosed at 21 almost 22 years of age, no one else in the family is type 1 , that I know of, but we have alot of type 2, someone is getting diagnosed it seems , like everytime I turn around.

[NoraWI]

Antibodies disappear when beta cells are all gone. How long since your diagnosis?