Dieting And Exercise by PattiKR

Well, if you're here, you must want to lose weight. Fact: Most Americans are overweight. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 67% of Americans are overweight or obese. They say that that figure has doubled since 1980. The cost of obesity in America is $117 Billion each year says ObesityPrevention.org. Obesity Anonymous (if there is such a thing) is not a group that I want to belong to. Obesity contributes to Diabetes, High Blood Pressure, Heart Disease and probably a whole host of maladies.

I want everyone to understand that I am not a doctor. I am not in the medical field. Everything that I am about to say is based on experience or observing friends. I am not trying to give anyone medical advice because I am not qualified. All that I am doing is telling you what I know and have seen, so that it might get you or someone else reading this to take some action to keep Diabetes at bay. You do not want anything to do with it. Trust me!

I'm not obese, but I have Type II Diabetes. I can tell you, it is no fun! For those of you who are overweight, but fortunate enough not to have Diabetes (yet), let me tell you a little about how it makes you feel. First off, if your blood sugar goes too high or too low you can be in serious trouble. It can kill you, although I would say that most of the time it kills by causing other problems. It can cause heart attacks, strokes and kidney failure. It can cause blindness! Blindness won't kill you, but it can seriously degrade your quality of life. It can also cause something called Neuropathy. Neuropathy is something that I have also. Neuropathy is, essentially, the deadening of nerves. It usually starts in the extremities. I noticed it when I started falling a lot. I would put my feet down to walk and if the ground wasn't level, I couldn't find the ground and I would fall. High blood sugar causes headaches, weakness, lack of energy and sleepiness, among other things.

Everyone's blood sugar should be in the 80 to 120 range. Going very far below 80 will cause you to tremble. All of your energy will be gone and it will take everything you have in you just to put one foot in front of the other. If it continues to go lower you can go into a coma. If you don't get help, it's a coma that you won't wake up from.

Enough said about Diabetes! It's a very depressing subject, so do everything you can to lose weight so that you don't ever get it.