‘I'm never going back!'
Woman's Own Lifestyle Special|Issue 4 2020
Carolyn Jarrett, 60, from Port Talbot wasn’t going to let her diabetes diagnosis get the better of her
GEORGINA MARIC/FRANCES LEATE
‘I'm never going back!'
Today, happy and healthy and meds-free Waking in the night as my husband Hugh, then 50, slept soundly beside me, I reached for my bedside glass of water. After glugging it down, I still felt thirsty, so I crept out of bed and downstairs to the kitchen, where I poured myself another pint.

It was November 2004 and, for months, I’d felt constantly thirsty, often getting up in the night several times. I felt tired, too, only I put that down to having a busy job as a training manager at a careers company and looking after my two daughters, Laura, then 16, and Sadie, 11.

But then a routine check-up at the doctor a few weeks later revealed something surprising. My blood -glucose levels were abnormally high, and the doctor diagnosed type 2 diabetes.

‘I’d always had a sweet tooth’

I sat there, stunned, as he handed me a diet sheet and told me I needed to cut sugar out of my diet completely – even from cups of tea – and instead eat a low-carb diet with plenty of vegetables. I’d always had a sweet tooth, loved chocolate, sugary tea and biscuits, and I’d often cook up big, stodgy meals of meat pies and home-made chips.

In my 30s, I’d been 26st and a dress size 32 – and, at only 5ft 4ins, I’d been considered morbidly obese. But, although I’d joined a slimming group and managed to shed 6st, at 20st and a dress size 26-28, deep down I knew I was still overweight.

The doctor didn’t say diabetes had anything to do with my weight, but he stressed that the change in my diet would make all the difference.

Diese Geschichte stammt aus der Issue 4 2020-Ausgabe von Woman's Own Lifestyle Special.

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Diese Geschichte stammt aus der Issue 4 2020-Ausgabe von Woman's Own Lifestyle Special.

Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.

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