Diabetes Awareness Month

We talk all the time about the building blocks for a healthier lifestyle: eating right, getting plenty of exercise, scheduling regular checkups.

Think of the snowball rolling slowly down a hill. By the time it reaches bottom you’ve got a snow boulder the size of a pickup truck. When your snowball consists of healthy habits, you build a momentum that will carry through life.

Of course, the opposite is also true. Let’s say your snowball consists of a diet rich in fatty foods and high sugars, a sedentary lifestyle and an aversion to doctors’ offices. You’re still building momentum, but not in a good way.

And it all starts with diabetes.

Nationwide more than 30 million Americans have been diagnosed with diabetes, yet another 84 million have prediabetes – blood glucose levels that are above normal but don’t quite meet the threshold for a diabetes diagnosis. Naturally, these people are at greater risk to developing diabetes. The treasure trove of risk factors for developing diabetes include:

• Being overweight or obese
• Family history
• High blood pressure
• Low HDL cholesterol
• High triglycerides level
• Are not physically active

That’s bad enough, but the snowball is only halfway down the hill at this point, with more trouble still to come.

Thanks to the risk factors above, diabetics are more likely to develop heart disease. They are at greater risk of suffering from heart attack and stroke. This is not only because you are likely overweight, have high blood pressure, etc. Diabetics struggle with high blood glucose levels. This can damage blood vessels and the nerves that control your heart and blood vessels, which contributes to heart disease.

Once that snowball is rolling, the prospects of slowing its momentum can feel overwhelming. It doesn’t have to.

November is Diabetes Awareness Month, and if you are struggling with diabetes, AtlantiCare’s TEAM Diabetes Education program is here to help you. Through group classes, support groups and more, our diabetic educators can help you make lifestyle changes to slow that snowball’s roll.

To learn more about AtlantiCare’s TEAM Diabetes Education program, click here.

To learn more about AtlantiCare’s Heart & Vascular Education & Support, click here.