For most of a year, I was thirsty all the time.<\/p>\n
Not ordinary thirsty.<\/p>\n
I could drink a full glass of water and still feel like my mouth was made of sand.<\/p>\n
I was exhausted too.<\/p>\n
I’d wake up tired.<\/p>\n
Eat breakfast tired.<\/p>\n
Then sometimes I’d nap before lunch because I simply couldn’t keep my eyes open.<\/p>\n
I was seventy-three.<\/p>\n
So when I told my doctor, he barely looked concerned.<\/p>\n
“Doris, that’s seventy-three for you.”<\/p>\n
He told me to rest more.<\/p>\n
I believed him.<\/p>\n
What else was I supposed to think?<\/p>\n
I’d always been healthy.<\/p>\n
Then I started losing weight.<\/p>\n
Twelve pounds.<\/p>\n
I wasn’t dieting.<\/p>\n
I wasn’t exercising more.<\/p>\n
I was simply getting smaller.<\/p>\n
My dentures stopped fitting properly too.<\/p>\n
They rubbed against my gums and made eating uncomfortable.<\/p>\n
I mentioned it to my doctor.<\/p>\n
He told me aging could change your mouth.<\/p>\n
So I ignored it.<\/p>\n
Finally, I went to the dental office at the plaza.<\/p>\n
The cleaning cost $140.<\/p>\n
A young hygienist named Emily began examining my mouth.<\/p>\n
At first, she chatted casually.<\/p>\n
Then she became quiet.<\/p>\n
She paused several times.<\/p>\n
Finally, she asked:<\/p>\n
“Doris, how long have your gums looked like this?”<\/p>\n
I shrugged.<\/p>\n
“I don’t know.”<\/p>\n
She looked concerned.<\/p>\n
“Has anyone checked your blood sugar recently?”<\/p>\n
I laughed.<\/p>\n
“My blood sugar?”<\/p>\n
“Yes.”<\/p>\n
“Never.”<\/p>\n
She stopped what she was doing.<\/p>\n
Then she removed her gloves.<\/p>\n
“Please wait here.”<\/p>\n
She left the room.<\/p>\n
A few minutes later, she returned with the dentist.<\/p>\n
He walked in carrying my chart.<\/p>\n
But he didn’t look at my teeth.<\/p>\n
He looked at my medical history.<\/p>\n
Then he looked at me.<\/p>\n
“When was the last time you had blood work?”<\/p>\n
“About a year ago.”<\/p>\n
He frowned.<\/p>\n
“How much weight have you lost?”<\/p>\n
“Twelve pounds.”<\/p>\n
“Have you been unusually thirsty?”<\/p>\n
“All the time.”<\/p>\n
“Urinate more frequently?”<\/p>\n
I hesitated.<\/p>\n
“Yes.”<\/p>\n
His expression changed.<\/p>\n
Then he said:<\/p>\n
“I want you at the emergency room tonight.”<\/p>\n
I stared at him.<\/p>\n
“Tonight?”<\/p>\n
“Yes.”<\/p>\n
“Why?”<\/p>\n
He pulled up a chair.<\/p>\n
“Your gums are showing signs that concern me, but it’s everything you’ve told me together that’s worrying.”<\/p>\n
He explained that excessive thirst, unexplained weight loss, fatigue, changes in the mouth, and frequent urination could be signs of severely elevated blood sugar.<\/p>\n
My doctor had dismissed them as aging.<\/p>\n
The dentist hadn’t.<\/p>\n
I drove to the ER that evening.<\/p>\n
The blood tests came back quickly.<\/p>\n
The nurse returned with a doctor.<\/p>\n
“Your blood sugar is extremely high.”<\/p>\n
I stared at her.<\/p>\n
“How high?”<\/p>\n
She told me.<\/p>\n
I don’t remember the exact number.<\/p>\n
I just remember the doctor’s next sentence.<\/p>\n
“You’re in diabetic ketoacidosis.”<\/p>\n
I had never heard those words before.<\/p>\n
They explained that my body wasn’t getting the energy it needed from glucose, so it had started breaking down fat, producing acids called ketones.<\/p>\n
My blood was becoming dangerously acidic.<\/p>\n
They admitted me immediately.<\/p>\n
I spent several days in the hospital.<\/p>\n
The doctors stabilized my blood sugar and began treatment for diabetes.<\/p>\n
And then came the part that frightened me most.<\/p>\n
They told me I had likely been living with dangerously high blood sugar for quite some time.<\/p>\n
My symptoms hadn’t appeared overnight.<\/p>\n
My body had been warning me for months.<\/p>\n
Thirst.<\/p>\n
Fatigue.<\/p>\n
Weight loss.<\/p>\n
Mouth problems.<\/p>\n
Frequent urination.<\/p>\n
I had explained every one of them away.<\/p>\n
Because my doctor had told me I was simply getting old.<\/p>\n
After I was discharged, I made an appointment with a new primary-care doctor.<\/p>\n
I brought my hospital records.<\/p>\n
He looked at them carefully.<\/p>\n
Then he said something I’ll never forget.<\/p>\n
“Your dentist may have saved your life.”<\/p>\n
I nodded.<\/p>\n
“I think so.”<\/p>\n
A few weeks later, I went back to the dental office.<\/p>\n
Emily was cleaning another patient’s teeth when she saw me.<\/p>\n
She smiled.<\/p>\n
“How are you doing?”<\/p>\n
“Better.”<\/p>\n
I handed her a small thank-you card.<\/p>\n
“I wanted you to know.”<\/p>\n
She opened it.<\/p>\n
Inside, I had written:<\/p>\n
“Thank you for noticing what everyone else overlooked.”<\/em><\/p>\n She started crying.<\/p>\n “So did I,” I told her.<\/p>\n We hugged.<\/p>\n My dentures were eventually refitted.<\/p>\n My blood sugar became manageable.<\/p>\n I changed the way I ate.<\/p>\n I learned how to monitor my glucose.<\/p>\n I started taking my health seriously instead of assuming every new symptom was simply part of being seventy-three.<\/p>\n And I learned something I wish I’d known earlier:<\/p>\n Age is not a diagnosis.<\/p>\n Being tired isn’t always “just getting older.”<\/p>\n Losing weight without trying isn’t something to automatically dismiss.<\/p>\n And sometimes the person who notices something important isn’t the doctor you expected.<\/p>\n Sometimes it’s the person examining your teeth.<\/p>\n Months later, I sat in that same dental chair.<\/p>\n Emily leaned back and smiled.<\/p>\n “Your gums look much better.”<\/p>\n “So does the rest of me,” I said.<\/p>\n She laughed.<\/p>\n Before I left, I looked at myself in the mirror.<\/p>\n Seventy-three.<\/p>\n Still here.<\/p>\n Still learning.<\/p>\n Still getting older.<\/p>\n But now I knew the difference between aging and my body asking for help.<\/p>\n And I’ll never ignore that voice again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" For most of a year, I was thirsty all the time. Not ordinary thirsty. I could drink a full glass of water and still feel like my mouth was made … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":138802,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-138801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-honglay"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138801","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=138801"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138801\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":138828,"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138801\/revisions\/138828"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/138802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=138801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=138801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/honglay168.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=138801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}