Anyone else having trouble with this? There are two different types of diabetic neuropathy, peripheral and autonomic. Peripheral is the burning or tingling sensation in the hands and feet and autonomic is where it affects your body functions and abilities as well as the organs. This is the one that I want to ask others about. For myself, I’ve had type one diabetes for 35 years and it’s definitely taking its toll on my body. In my teens I started having the intolerance to cold weather and gradually started to have symptoms in my stomach and bowels. I have acid reflux, diabetic gastroperesis which slowed my stomach down to a crawl. I also have problems with my bowels, I can be either constipated or have diarrhea on a regular basis and just have issues with going to the bathroom on a daily basis. A few times in the past I have tried to pass gas when I’m outside or in private and actually had an accident in my underwear. I'm also struggling now with diabetic bladder and my bladder is having lots of issues with emptying when I sit down and try to urinate. I either don’t get the urge to urinate, or a get the desperate final urge only meaning that I have a very short time to get myself to the toilet. Also having with incomplete emptying where my bladder actually forgets that he’s supposed to be emptying himself completely. He’ll stop about halfway through and not start again unless I try to get him going again. If I can actually get my bladder started again, the stream will be very weak and after a couple of seconds he’ll just dribble, stop completely and give up. At that point nothing will get any more urine out of him unless I sit on the toilet for a few minutes and maybe he’ll dribble a little more for me. It can literally take me at least a good five minutes or more to try and urinate and if I go on my way then I’ll have a sudden strong urge to go and urinate again and maybe get a little more urine out. I can’t blame my poor bladder for this, I know he’s trying his best, it’s the nerves and muscles that are failing. Anyone else having trouble like this? Is there a forum on here where we can all talk about problems like this and share our thoughts and struggles?
Sorry that you're going through this. This seems to be an adequate forum for a thread like this. There may not be enough people with diabetes on SF to maintain regular input on a thread though. You might want to try looking for a diabetes-specific forum, or maybe have a broader thread for chronic health problems on SF. I often recommend traditional Chinese medicine for chronic health problems, and now is no exception: Alternative Treatments for Physical and Mental Illness I hope something can help.
