Foot check that finally came back unremarkable

What helped was asking my nurse what she would want to see in six months, and then organising the six months around that rather than around vague improvement.

Ruthie, I have been where you are and I would rather say so than stay quiet.

I have had this for eleven years and the last two have been the most straightforward, and the difference is mostly that somebody finally explained the mechanism to me.

My retinal screening and foot check carried on exactly as before, and I mention that because I had half assumed things would change and they did not.

What I got wrong was chasing individual readings. The trend over three months was the only thing that ever meant anything.

I found that the nurse-led review was more thorough and more useful than the GP appointment, and it is the one I now prepare for.

My experience is that steady beats dramatic. The month I did everything perfectly is not visible in my results and the two boring years are.

Coming back to what Stellan wrote further up, because it is the bit I keep thinking about.

The thing that surprised me was how much sleep affected my morning numbers. Nothing to do with food at all and it took me a year to notice.

I would say that if you have been managing this a long time, your own knowledge is genuinely worth something in the appointment. Mine was welcomed once I offered it.

Adding a name to the list of people this helped.

The long game is the actual subject. Everything I have got right came from doing something small consistently rather than something large for six weeks.

Something I did not expect: the appointments got easier because I had something to bring to them. Before, I was being told; now, we are discussing.

My monitor showed the shape of my day in a way that no periodic test ever had, and that was the thing that changed what I actually did.

Nine minutes twice a year is not enough to cover this and I stopped pretending it was. I bring a printed page now and we get through four times as much.

Picking up Zeb’s point rather than starting a new one.

What I would say is get clear on what is being measured and what the target is, because I spent two years watching a figure I had misunderstood.

My numbers moved over about five months and my GP was noticeably pleased, which after years of slightly tense appointments was a strange and good experience.

What changed for me was a dietitian appointment I had turned down twice. Forty minutes, extremely practical, and it reorganised how I ate for good.

Reading this at half past six with a cup of tea and nodding at every line.