Understanding Type 2 Diabetes

Typically, the hormone insulin helps move glucose from your blood to your cells, where it’s used for energy. But with type 2 diabetes, your body’s cells aren’t able to respond to insulin as well as they should. In later stages of the condition, your body may also not produce enough insulin.

Uncontrolled type 2 diabetes can lead to chronically high blood glucose levels, which can cause several symptoms and potentially lead to serious complications.

In type 2 diabetes, your body isn’t able to effectively use insulin to bring glucose into your cells. This causes your body to rely on alternative energy sources in your tissues, muscles, and organs. This is a chain reaction that can cause a variety of symptoms.

Type 2 diabetes can develop slowly. The symptoms may be mild and easy to dismiss at first. The early symptoms may include:

• constant hunger
• a lack of energy
• fatigue
• excessive thirst
• frequent urination
• blurry vision
• pain, tingling, or numbness in your hands or feet

As the disease progresses, the symptoms become more severe and can cause some potentially dangerous complications.

If your blood glucose levels have been high for a long time, the complications can include:

• eye problems (diabetic retinopathy)
• feelings of numbness in your extremities, or neuropathy
• kidney disease (nephropathy)
• gum disease
• heart attack or stroke

Insulin is a naturally occurring hormone. Your pancreas produces it and releases it when you eat. Insulin helps transport glucose from your bloodstream to cells throughout your body, where it’s used for energy.

If you have type 2 diabetes, your body becomes resistant to insulin. Your body is no longer using the hormone efficiently. This forces your pancreas to work harder to make more insulin.

Over time, this can damage cells in your pancreas. Eventually, your pancreas may not be able to produce any insulin.

If you don’t produce enough insulin or if your body doesn’t use it efficiently, glucose builds up in your bloodstream. This leaves your body’s cells starved for energy. Doctors don’t know exactly what triggers this series of events. It may have to do with cell dysfunction in the pancreas or with cell signaling and regulation.

While lifestyle choices are typically what trigger type 2 diabetes, you may be more likely to be diagnosedTrusted Source with it if:

• there’s a genetic predisposition to developing type 2 diabetes in your family
• there’s a genetic predisposition to developing obesity in your family, which can increase the risk of insulin resistance and diabetes
• you are at least 45 years old
• you are Black, Hispanic/Latino, Native American, or of Alaska Native descent

While the definitive trigger of type 2 diabetes is your body’s resistance to insulin, there’s usually a combination of factors that increase your risk of that resistance occurring.

Type 2 diabetes can be managed, and in some cases, reversed. Most treatment plans will include checking your blood glucose levels, and your doctor will tell you how often you should do it. The goal is to stay within a specific range.

Additional lifestyle changes your doctor will most likely advise to help treat your type 2 diabetes include:

• eating foods rich in fiber and healthy carbohydrates — eating fruits, vegetables, and whole grains can help keep your blood glucose levels steady
• eating at regular intervals
• learning to listen to your body and learn to stop eating when you’re full
• manage your weight and keep your heart healthy, which typically means keeping refined carbohydrates, sweets, and animal fats to a minimum
• get about half an hour of physical activity daily to help keep your heart healthy — exercise can help to control blood glucose, too.

Your doctor will explain how to recognize the early symptoms of blood sugar that’s too high or too low and what to do in each situation.

Additionally, working with a dietician can help you learn which foods can help you manage your blood sugar — and which ones might cause it to become unbalanced.

Not everyone with type 2 diabetes needs to use insulin. If you do, it’s because your pancreas isn’t making enough insulin on its own, and it’s crucial that you take insulin as directed. There are other prescription medications that may help as well.