How do you know that you have diabetes?
Diabetes is a chronic disease that occurs when your blood sugar level gets too high. The pancreas creates insulin, a hormone that converts glucose into energy. When the body doesn’t produce enough insulin or becomes resistant to insulin, the glucose does not convert into energy and increases blood sugar levels.
Prediabetes symptoms can be so mild that people don’t notice them. Some people with diabetes don’t even find out they have diabetes until they start noticing severe health issues. Type 1 diabetes symptoms begin to develop early compared to type 2 diabetes.
What are the two types of diabetes? Do you have diabetes? What are the symptoms? Let’s find out!
Types of Diabetes
Type 1 diabetes can be diagnosed in childhood, and that’s why it’s called juvenile diabetes. It’s an autoimmune disease in which body immune systems attack and destroy insulin-producing cells called the pancreas.
Type 2 diabetes occurs when cells become insensitive toward insulin resulting in high blood sugar levels. People with type 2 diabetes used multiple medications to treat the disease.
What is Prediabetes?
When a person doesn’t have diabetes yet, their glucose level goes higher than the normal range, called prediabetes. People with prediabetes are always at risk of developing heart disease or diabetes, or other health problems.
10 Warning Signs Diabetes Symptoms for Self Diagnosis
Diabetes can develop because of genes or environmental factors. If you have a family member who is a diabetic patient, then you need to get a genetic test done or check your diabetic score immediately.
So—How to identify if you have diabetes? Here are ten diabetes symptoms that can indicate that you have already developed or inherited diabetes.
1- Extreme Hunger
Your body stops producing insulin in diabetes and uses food to convert it into glucose. This makes you feel hungry and weak. Even when your body is creating energy using the food you eat, you still feel tired all the time. This can be one of the diabetes symptoms.
2- Unplanned Weight Loss
Suppose you have sudden weight loss or are experiencing a fluctuation in weight. This might not be natural and can be one of the diabetes symptoms. Undiagnosed diabetes causes your body to excess sugar in the bloodstream, damaging the body’s ability to gain nutrition from food. When you eat but still feel hungry and tired, which also causes you to lose weight, this is another warming symptom of type 1 and type 2 diabetes.
3- Yeast Infection
Another early sign of diabetes is developing a yeast infection. The high blood sugar level in the body boosts the yeast. Yeast infection mainly develops in the moistened part of the body like:
- Mouth
- Armpits
- Genitals
- Finger and toes
- Under breast
- Throat
Yeast infection can develop in both men and women.
4- Tiredness and Fatigue
Another diabetes symptom is having low energy and feeling tired all the time that drains your energy and causes severe fatigue. If you still feel hungry and tired after taking regular meals, this is your sign to get-go and get a diabetes test.
5- Excessive Urine
Type 1 and type 2 diabetes patients usually have urine double that of healthy people in 24 hours. The reason is that the body usually reabsorbs glucose when it passes through the kidney. However, with diabetes, people’s blood sugar goes up, and the kidney fails to bring it all back in. which causes excess urine, which needs fluids. hence diabetic patients will need to pee more often than others plus
6- Unquenchable Thirst
The whole process of the body making more urine due to diabetes makes you feel more thirsty. If you are feeling the same situation, you might also be facing prediabetic periods.
7- Dry skin and Mouth
When you have to pee more often than usual because of diabetes that leaves less moisture for the body, the diabetic patient feels dehydrated, which causes further health problems. Issues like dry Mouth dehydrate the body.
8- Itchiness
Excessive urine makes your body dehydrate. Dehydration causes dry skin, which causes itchiness. All of this can be symptoms of the prediabetic period. Get your heart rate, and a diabetes test is done to diagnose diabetes in an early stage.
9- Blurred vision
Diabetes can affect your eyes, and it is one of the significant reasons for adult blindness. Eye disorder caused by diabetes is called diabetic retinopathy. Excess sugar in your body damages the sensitive eye tissue and causes it to swell.
You sometimes experience blurred vision, redness, clouded vision, pain in the eyes. It will not get better even after taking care of the eyes; this might indicate diabetes. The best way is to get a diabetes checkup if you feel distorted vision.
10- Skin Darkening
If you have sudden dark soft velvety patches around your neck or armpits, it might be because of undiagnosed diabetes. Once these spots get dark, they rarely go away. So, if you spot such patches anywhere around the body, the wise thing is to see the doctor and take preventive measures to avoid such spots from growing on your skin.
But worry not! If you find out you have diabetes, you can take control of it from the early stages. Diabetes doesn’t have a proper treatment, but it can be maintained by following a healthy lifestyle routine.
Diabetic Complications
Some of the early symptoms of type 2 diabetes include:
- Yeast infection
- Weight gain
- Cut and sores that heal slow
- Tingling and numbm=ness in hand and feet
- Loss of vision
- Erectile dysfunction or Impotence
When to See a Doctor
Set an appointment with your doctor if:
- You have to experience excessive urine.
- Going through the bad ache in the belly.
- Breathing faster than normal situations.
- Sweet breath that feels like nail polish. (This one is a sign of high ketones)
FAQs: Diabetes Symptoms
1- Can I test myself for diabetes?
You can’t self-diagnose diabetes, even if your readings are unnormal. It is necessary to see the doctor for further testing. Doctors may carry glucose tolerance tests, HbA1c tests, or fasting tests. Getting your genetic testing done is a safe way to avoid any complications.
2- Can you get diabetes from eating too much sugar?
Overeating sugar can be a part of the reason you will get diabetes. Type 1 and type 2 diabetes result from genes and environmental factors such as viruses that stimulate the disease. Only overeating sugar doesn’t mean you will get diabetes. However, try to avoid too much sugar, eat more fiber and do some exercise to keep your blood sugar level under control.
3- What is the leading cause of diabetes?
Your body’s immune system attacks and destroys the pancreas, which produces insulin. Insulin to convert glucose into energy. So, when the pancreas stops making insulin, the glucose starts to accumulate in your blood instead of converting into energy, which causes diabetes.
4- Can you suddenly get diabetes?
Scientists have found that there are two main reasons behind getting diabetes: genes and Environmental factors. There are sure signs that you may experience which signify the diagnosis of disease. If your parents and siblings have diabetes, your chance of getting diabetes is higher compared to others.
5- How can you avoid getting diabetes?
To prevent getting diabetes:
- Be physical active
- Eat health diet
- Avoid sugary and junk items
- Loss extra weight
- Check your diabetes score regularly
Bottom Line
The above-mentioned early signs of diabetes only help you self-diagnose the disease. You have a high or low blood sugar level doesn’t indicate that you have diabetes. Whatever your numbers or signs say, you still need to see a doctor for further clarification. Especially if you are 45 or above, you must get it diagnosed by a professional to avoid other health risks that might be caused because of sugar. To prevent the complications beforehand, get your genetic testing done immediately.
