Ben Update

This is identical to the e-mail I sent several of you, but thought I would repeat it for anyone else who might be interested...

I talked to the endocrinologist's nurse yesterday about Ben's recent blood tests, and they are very encouraging. The doctor is stopping short of saying Ben is cured and no longer diabetic, but he did write 'good report!' on the lab documentation.

Ben's blood glucose at that time was 82. They look for a normal reading to be in the range of 70-99.

Yesterday, Ben's glucose level was 159, which was a bit high for him, and we're not sure why. He's running several miles each day, 4 to 5 days a week for practice, and then has meets. He had one last Saturday, right before Homecoming, and is at another one right now, somewhere in the suburbs. We hope they're home soon. [Update: the girls team won!]

Ben's appetite is still off, although I did get a smallish steak in him yesterday. He needs to gain weight. Also, he is being a bit of a toad about testing his blood sugar (a.k.a. non-compliant), but we are putting our foot/feet down!!! Ben forgets how sick he was.

We next go to the endocrinologist in December, at which time the dr. is looking for several weeks of blood sugar readings, along with some documentation of what his reading are within two hours of eating (before and after).

The other lab report was on Ben's A1C level, which is a measure of hemoglobin and somehow gives a retrospective indication of what his blood glucose and insulin output have been over the last three months or so. The normal range is 3.9 - 6.0. Ben's reading was 5.2 percent which, honestly, was unexpected. So technically, Ben does not now meet the lab criteria for a Type 1 diabetic. Things can change, but we are encouraged. When the dr. gave us the diagnosis in January, he assured us it would most likely be a lifelong condition and that a recovery was improbable. We had not been bold enough to pray for such results as these.

But, we are very thankful!