Exquisite Timing Leads To A Clinical Trial

Back in February (Pre-Diabetes Wake-up!), I shared with you my doctor's warning about controlling my glucose levels and my weight.  She referred me to a nutritionist, and because of the pre-diabetes, I was placed in a class for others like me -- on the edge of an unsettling diagnosis.

In the class, I learned a lot about pre-diabetes and the ways our bodies may or may not process sugars and carbohydrates as well as they used to. I also got a food plan, personalized for me. 

I started. I followed the plan. I was losing weight. My blood glucose levels were slowly dropping. But I found that I was generally more tired and not feeling quite right.

Here Comes EXQUISITE TIMING.  One of my favorite miracles of life.

You've experienced it. I know you have. It's when a chance occurrence drops into life at just the right moment to make a difference, to avoid calamity.  Like...

It's been raining all day, but just in time for a wedding ceremony, the sun pours through the stained glass windows bathing the couple in light.

I'm trying to decide if my mother should have a special brain operation to drain the rising fluid in her tissues, and on my flight to Kansas City, a neurosurgeon who does this kind of operation every day "just happens" to sit next to me and offer advice when I need it most. 

My car dies on a busy highway and a "repo man" with a tow truck appears from the nearby gas station and says, "I'm not the tow service you're calling, but I can get you out of the road and safely into that gas station. Hop in!"

There's even a race horse named Exquisite Timing. Don't know if the horse lived up to its name, but I'm sure the owners hoped that it would.

Fred Campbell, in his book Religious Integrity for Everyone: Functional Theology for Secular Society, describes Exquisite Timing as that experience we all have when events and lives and nature all converge in one point in time to create some extraordinary, inexplicable outcome. 

Theist that I am, I call these "God Moments". 

So here I am with pre-diabetes and a food plan that doesn't quite work and on the last day of my class, the instructors hand out a flyer for a clinical trial for adults with pre-diabetes run by a Duke University nutrition group. Sounds perfect. Is perfect.

I call. I'm accepted into the trial, into the experimental group. And off I go into 16 weeks of a new journey in this healthy living change I'm trying to make. 

EXQUISITE TIMING. 

I'll let you know how the trial went next week.

Blessings on your day... and keep an eye out for exquisite timing!

Pre-Diabetes - More than a Simple Phrase

From my mother's side of the family, I carry a risk of Type 2 diabetes. Since all of my aunts and uncles developed the condition, the risk is strong. Over the past three years, my fasting glucose (sugar) levels and HbA1c numbers have been slowly rising. They rose out of the normal range and into the "Pre-diabetes" range.

I knew these numbers were trouble. I knew I needed a change in diet and exercise. 

Diet-and-exercise. This phrase has such a familiar rhythm now, doesn't it? Diet-and-exercise, diet-and-exercise. We hear it from our doctors and nurses, on television, in ads. The words run together, and the reality blurs. So I settled my weight in the obesity range and kept it there, leveled off my activity, and drifted.

In October 2018, the drifting screeched to a halt. The HbA1c number (which measures the average of your blood sugar over the past 3 months) reached the bottom of the DIABETES range. Gasp!! Wake up time. One thing I do NOT want do is tell any insurance company that I have a diabetes diagnosis. My nurse practitioner gives the ultimatum. Four months. Count 'em. Four. The HbA1c needs to be back down in the pre-diabetes range in four months... or else. 

To manage this, she suggests Carbohydrate Counting so I'll lower my carbohydrate intake from starch, sugars, fruits, and milk, and a nutrition class. I'm on board. The nutrition class is also a wake up. 

Here comes the point.

I'd been strolling along in the pre-diabetes range for three years. YEARS. The nutritionist explained that during that time, my body has been floating in excess sugar, not a whole lot, mind you, but enough that at the cellular level, and especially at the nerves, damage is already beginning, causing my body to age faster. 

Oh no. Aging faster. This is not what I want to hear. Clearly I needed to hear it.

And you might need to hear it, too. If your doctor or nurse tells you that your blood glucose or HbA1c is in the pre-diabetes range, don't shrug and wait for the diabetes diagnosis. Ask for help, see a nutritionist, figure out a better food plan, move more, start monitoring your fasting glucose levels. Get motivated. Now. Your nerves, your cells, and your body will all thank you for it! 

For more information, see:
Hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) Test for Diabetes [WedMD]

Living Healthy [WebMD]

Eating Patterns and Meal Planning [American Diabetes Association]

Get busy spending your time being healthy, or get busy spending your time managing a disease. Your choice. 

I'll let you know how my choices are going. Have a great day!