I got a link to an article from ABC News today about Halle Berry. I was encouraged to see that doctors are equally concerned with her claims that she's cured herself of type 1 diabetes.
"Diabetics quickly took to the blogosphere to condemn Berry for claiming that a change in diet could cure Type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disease in which the pancreas permanently fails to produce insulin, the vital hormone that regulates sugar levels in the blood."
In the article, Dr. Francine Kaufman was quoted as saying "...type 1...means their immune system has destroyed the insulin producing part of pancreas. In that case, there is no way to wean yourself off insulin." Dr. Kaufman is a respected endocrinologist and diabetes researcher and seeing her statement, in black and white, is fantastic. She's someone we can point to as an undisputed expert when we get the inevitable "Well, Halley Berry cured herself - why can't you do the same?" comments.
I still think that someone with such a high profile as Halle Berry, someone who speaks out about diabetes regularly, owes it to the diabetes community to get an accurate diagnosis and to talk about it. I've heard comments from a lot of people that it's Ms. Berry's diabetes and she doesn't have to give details about it. Up to a point, that's true, but when she goes on television and makes such potentially dangerous statements, then I believe she does have an obligation to set the record straight and to come clean with the public.
The impression I get, and I am just going with my feelings here, is that Ms. Berry is ashamed of having type 2 and therefore says she's a type 1 to alleviate some strange sense of blame she has. Type 2 falls into that "you deserve it" category, along with lung cancer, for many people. It's an attitude that's exacerbated by the media, unfortunately, and one attitude that I think needs to change.
I completely agree with you, Julia. I hope she does come clean and set the record straight, and you might be right about her reasons. Who the hell knows? I just know that NO ONE DESERVES DIABETES! NO ONE!!
What a horrible thing to think--that type 2's "deserve" diabetes. I know you're not saying that, of course, but some people have this screwed up notion that they brought it all on themselves and deserve it.
I didn't bring my type 2 diabetes on. Eli Lilly (i know awfully funny since the produce humalog) marketed a medication that they knew to cause diabetes and didn't put a warning label on it. Within 2 weeks of going off this medication I was diagnoed with diabetes. No one in my family has any type of diabetes and I am only 30 years old. Sometimes I wonder if Eli Lilly did it on purpose to up their sales of Humalog. And yes I sued them
what medication?
My type 2 came on mysteriously, also...no genetic; no over-weight. [Was a runner for 25 yrs, until I ran out of knee joints, and started on Celebrex/etc]
I think she's actually a type 1 who is experiencing a sudden decrease in insulin needs during her pregnancy. I've heard that is a possibility w/pregnancy. I think she is extremely irresponsible or else not very intelligent to make such absurd comments to the media. I totally agree she owes the public an explanation...
Halle Berry has a moral obligation to address the public about curing herself of Type 1 diabetes. Maybe she was misdiagnosed as a T1. I have a friend who was. She really is a T2 - which was discovered from an antibodies' lab test. I was misdiagnosed with hypothyriod. When I finally found the right physician to test for thyroid anitbodies, it was discovered I had "Graves disease". An autoimmune disease that is a "Hyperthyriod" condition. I had atypical symptoms for "hyperthyriod", and looked like "hypothyroid". After treatment, I'm better now...in remission for two years - my diabetes (also Type 1 for 40 years) is back on track...6.6 recent A1C !!
I've stumbled across several online mentions of the pancreas suddenly picking up and mass producing cells on type 1 diabetics. Also several medical journal articles talk about how the pancreas, sensing immediate danger, tries to ward it off by overproducing cells which - for a short time - works. (More standard in a type 2 diabetic than a type 1 but it's been documented.) Invariable, five or six years later, the diabetes has returned. Is it possible that Berry is under a short reprieve???
That is truly interesting smithford...I would like to know more where did you find this information? I also have no one in my family that is a diabetic...I have been suffering frome the symptoms since 1986.
Therefore I have not been able to have a real life...with live births or normal hair follicles...it is a nightmare.
The doctors are stumped but keep me alive with the pump...that keeps me fat because it over medicates.
I excersise myself into a coma just about each day as well as swim steam/heat sauna's and my husband is a herbalist...so I have to drink smelly and terrible tasting stuff alot.
But I smile and drink to his delight...I' am alive. But I sure wish there was a cure...really I do.
So if Halle Berry has found something...it would be a blessing for the rest of us to know how to go about the healing process.
Even if she is incorrect...or just plain wrong it would be a learning lesson for us all to experience her relief of this dreaded disease.
I mean who wouldn't want to wake up tommorrow healed?
I did a search for Diabetes Regression and found a whole grab-bag of related articles. I think,though, that the article that has my attention right now is a Doctor in Texas who has made an injectable pancreas that: 1)can fit inside a person's vein and/or artery 2) attaches itself to the vein wall 3) Has a semi-permiable membrane which KEEPS OUT the immune system (and thus keeps the immune system from killing off cells!). This is the smallest one ever made, does not cause clotting or blockages in the vein/artery. He's been testing it a few years on cats and dogs with phenomenal success and is about 2 years away from FDA approval. I saw the article on Yahoo about 3 or 4 weeks ago and - of course - now I can't find it! *Sobs into her cup of coffee* Why??? Why???
http://www.alinfoundation.com/Medical%20Research/Pancreas.htm
Was this your article about the pancreas attached to a blood vessel?
"Doctor Kenneth Matsumura has developed a novel approach to this problem by making an "artificial" pancreas that is powered by live, insulin-secreting pancreatic cells obtained from animals. Called the bio-artificial pancreas, the short cylindrical device is connected to a blood vessel in a limb, and assumes the normal functions of a natural endocrine pancreas."
When I heard this, I thought...oh that's just the early pregnancy honeymoon. I had one too. At the beginning of my pregnancy, I didn't have to take much insulin at all. If I had been exercising, maybe close to none. By the end of my pregnancy, I was at a 3:1 ratio. I hope she is paying attention because I'm sure it will come back with abandon by the third trimester.
As far as her diagnosis, I've also had trouble getting a proper diagnosis. At first I was diagnosed with type 2, since I was 21 when I got it and my A1c was only 6. When none of the meds worked and the A1cs kept climbing, they put my on insulin. I was 24 by then. My A1c was over 9. I was tested for antibodies and they now say I'm type 1. So, Dr.s can be wrong. Latent onset type 1 is a possibility. I hope Halle shares her story and keeps checking her sugars. She owes it to her baby.
honestly, when i first heard about her little announcement. i was thinking 'magic johnson. i was so thoroughly upset that rich entertainers could afford a cure that the public doesn't know about. that was my first reaction.
i hadn't really thought about a wrong diagnosis or a pregnancy honeymoon, which are both completely possible.
but, i think ultimately, it really doesn't matter, what is actually going on with her. she was completely completely irresponsible & flat out wrong to make such an announcement as "curing herself of T1 by a healthy diet". i am still furious with her. she owes the public a HUGE explanation & dialogue about diabetes. she really should just not have opened her mouth about it, if she wasn't prepared to discuss it in full detail.
it really is very frustrating.
I'm one of those T1's that is always being mis-diagnosed by those who "see" me as a T2 because I'm very overweight due to insulin resistance. My last C-Peptide was a 0.01. This clinches the T1 diagnosis according to my doctor. I have "Dawn Phenomenon" as well.
My point is that I have exercised and dieted to the point of hysteria and have in no way come close to "curing" my diabetes. I spent 6 1/2 months in a county hospital in Arizona carrying my third (and only living) child and had I not lived in the hospital the diabetes would have surely taken my life (or at least my kidneys)
My sister was T1 and died at 40, thin like Halle - but she was in DKA frequently and her body just gave out from the complications.
There is no doubt in my mind that you can improve your life through diet and exercise but if a staff of doctors cannot control your BS when you are pregnant - then I do not see how Halle can "cure" herself with salad.
God Bless her and all of us who live with this disease. I now carry my C-Peptide results in my purse with me. I'm weary of the judgement.