I’m probably far from qualified to be talking about this given my history with both diabetes and drinking and what happens when I combined them. But I feel like writing about it, if for no other reason than I can say what shouldn’t be done, at a minimum for me, because realistically, how each of our diabetes is and how our systems handle alcohol is different for each of us.
My history with diabetes began 15 years ago. My history with alcohol begins 10 years ago. The relationship between diabetes and alcohol developed 6 years ago and boy was it rough, they eventually had to break up 2 years ago, but then they had a passing of each other 3 weeks ago and a run in with each other 4 days ago. It was the run in that got me thinking about this whole drinking and diabetes thing. Because it was the break up 2 years ago that stopped the whole drinking with diabetes thing. And there was the whole drinking and diabetes thing that almost killed me 4 years ago. It’s no understatement when I say that drinking and diabetes and me have a history.
Where do I even begin? We can ignore the drinking in high school at the friends house where we’d go after field trips because quite frankly that doesn’t count as drinking because they wouldn’t let me have more than a sip because they were afraid of the effects it would have on my diabetes which brings us to 6 years ago when people didn’t care too much about the diabetes, me or the friends.
I was 19. I was rebelling (that’s the story of my life but it’s also a story for another day). I hated my diabetes and wanted it to go away. So, I escaped it, I started drinking, but it wasn’t like a beer here or a glass of wine there, no, it became a game, me and my friends, who could consume the most alcohol and still be standing. I remember one time I had totally drank the guys under the table, one was lying on the floor, I kicked him and told him to get up because I wasn’t done drinking yet.
As far as I was concerned, I could drink hard liquor to my hearts content. I had reasoned it out. You see, the hard liquor was on the free foods list for us diabetics. No insulin necessary. Seagrams 7, free food. Bacardi, free food. Rum, free food. Vodka, free food. And vodka is among my favorites.
But there was a catch, alcohol made my blood sugars go low. So, to counter act those free foods, I had to mix my drinks with something not so free. Vodka with orange juice, i.e. screw driver. Vodka with red bull. Seagrams with 7-up. Bacardi and coke. Rum and coke. The effects of this on me, probably perfect, I don’t know though, because my diabetes was in no kind of care. So whether or not my blood sugars would’ve been normal was beyond me because they were always high, because I wasn’t taking care of my diabetes, I was neglecting it (remember, I didn’t want it anymore).
Beer, beer was a beauty of it’s own, alcohol, but liquid carbs, so for all the years I drank it, I wasn’t too concerned. I wasn’t going to go low because of the carbs and I sure as hell wasn’t going to go high because of the alcohol. I later learned, during a period when I was checking my blood and I was taking care of my diabetes, and my blood sugars were in normal range that this theory only held true if it was a lite beer, bud light, miller lite, michelob light, etc. And the truth was, I didn’t like the light beers. I think the only one I tolerated was miller lite. There was another time with beer, in which I was, once again, when I was checking my blood and I was taking care of my diabetes, and my blood sugars were in normal range, that I handled it nicely. It was normal beer, not a light beer, and with each can, that seemed to be every hour, I would check my blood and take insulin for the carbs, but I was only taking 3/4 of the amount that I needed and that seemed to have worked well.
Now wine, wine is a beast in it’s own right, one that I don’t understand at all and one that I also don’t get along with. Wine is the one alcohol that I can say I truly got drunk off of. Wine is the one alcohol that caused me to get into a fight and a chair got broken and I remember nothing, except for the pain in my ribs and the hangover that I had the next morning. I take it back, there’s one more thing I remember, or two actually, it was boxed wine, and my friend did check my blood and give me a shot before I completely passed out. That was the only time that someone has ever made sure my blood sugar was ok when I was drunk. That was a really good friend. My heart warms just thinking about her. To this day, I can’t stand the smell of wine.
So, diabetes and I, we had some good times and some bad times when it came to alcohol. The worst time was when I was 22. Diabetes and I were in a war. One night, in the middle of the week, I went to a club with a friend (and this never happens). I had a beer and a liquid marijuana. 2 drinks, I never drank that little when I went out, usually, I was getting kicked out as the bar/club was closing and I was lucky if I could see straight enough to walk to my car, and driving, well, we’ll just thank the good Lord above that I never crashed into anything or anyone. When I left the club on this night, I was very sober and feeling fine. The next morning, I wasn’t so fine. The next morning, I was in a state of severe diabetic ketoacidosis. It probably had nothing to do with the alcohol I had been drinking and a lot to do with the fact that I hadn’t barely taken any insulin in the year leading up to this event. Actually, that’s not true, in the year I hadn’t taken insulin, I had been drinking heavily, I kindof in a way got what was coming to me: a 3 day trip to ICU with the doctors wondering what I had done to myself and telling my mom that they didn’t know if they were going to be able to bring me out of whatever it was that I had put myself into.
Yes, done in an irresponsible manner, diabetes and drinking can be deadly…but then again, done in an irresponsible manner, drinking can be deadly all by itself, the diabetes just kind of seems to magnify that danger. That was echoed to me on a recent trip to Vegas, where it was a battle of whether or not I could drink. I lost that battle, because I had friends that didn’t want to spend the night with me in the hospital. Now, at the time of this trip to Vegas, I hadn’t drank in 2 years. I hadn’t drank because mainly, I hated the way I couldn’t drink freely and had to watch what I was drinking and how much I was drinking due to my diabetes (which in retrospect, if you think about it, is what every person needs to be doing, but I digress). I also knew, that if I started drinking again, that there would be no control, it’d go back to it being a game, because that’s what always happened, it had been seen in my past. I had gone once 6 months without drinking and when I started up again it was a game, who could drink the most and still be standing. So Vegas just left me with the ache to drink. I wanted a drink and bad. I wanted a corona beer or a vodka and red bull (my favorites) but it wasn’t happening. I got a few sips. But it wasn’t enough.
Then we fast forward to this week, when I decided I needed a beer because I was frustrated at work and there was a bar down on the golf course and it was a 10 minute walk from work. This beer was a test. I was only going to have one beer. My diabetes was under control, and had been mostly so for the past 9 months. It was just one drink, I could do this, I was going to sit and enjoy it, I wasn’t going to slam it down and ask for the next one. I checked my blood before we went on our walk, I drank my beer, we walked back to work and I kept a close eye on my blood sugars. I never did find out how many carbs were in my Corona, and I didn’t take a shot for it because of not knowing the carb content, and my blood sugar did end up going low.
There’s an art to drinking and diabetes and I may never know exactly how to paint that picture exactly as it is because things are always changing, but the other day, I proved, I can drink, I need to have control when I drink, but I can drink and I can do it without destroying my life. I really don’t have to fear my diabetes while drinking as long as I drink in moderation. That there, moderation, is the trick, but with diabetes, when is moderation not the trick?
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