By Terry, on Virta for 3 months
Back in 2014, I was remodeling my bathroom and got a small cut on my knee. That tiny cut quickly turned into a staph infection, and I landed myself in the hospital. I basically learned that I had type 2 diabetes when the hospital staff asked me how long I had had it. I was flabbergasted because this was news to me. The nurse told me that my A1c was dangerously high at 9.6%, which puts me in the range of type 2 diabetes. That hit me out of nowhere because I didn’t have any symptoms and had considered myself just a regular guy who was happily living his life.
Following my diagnosis, my doctor sent me to diabetes education classes which focused on the food pyramid and nutritional guidelines that painted fat as the enemy. Over the next 5 years, I repeated that class 3 times because it never seemed to click for me. In addition to the classes, my provider prescribed multiple medications including 5 mg of glipizide, 25 mg of Jardiance, and a daily Tresiba injection of 45 units.
In 2020, I came across a TedTalk by Dr. Sarah Hallberg on Youtube. She was a physician who spoke about diabetes as a nutritional disease. Hearing this, something clicked in my head and it suddenly made perfect sense to hear Dr. Hallberg discuss how what you eat impacts your blood glucose. At the time, I didn’t feel like I had the resources and support needed to make the changes needed, but her words always stuck with me.
A few months later, I received an email from my employer, Baptist Health South Florida, announcing full coverage for Virta, a new treatment that could reverse type 2 diabetes. I looked more into Virta and to my amazement, I saw a post by Dr. Hallberg, the same doctor I had seen all those months earlier. I decided it was fate and immediately signed up for Virta.
The transition to Virta has been seamless. I’ve been on the treatment for 3 months now and have never felt better. Since joining Virta, I’ve made a number of simple modifications to my diet such as replacing my usual side of potatoes with spinach sauteed in butter. Because of the changes I made, my A1c is down to 6.5% and my blood sugars are within healthy ranges. My Virta doctor took me off glipizide and Jardiance and has asked me to lower my Tresiba dosage to 8 units a day. On top of all of these fantastic results, I have lost 20 pounds!
Virta is not a treatment for me—it’s a way of life. My long-term goal is to completely eliminate my Tresiba injections, and I can see that happening in the next 6 months. I’ve been stopped by my co-workers who see my weight loss and want to know my secret. I refer them to Virta and can’t say enough good things about it. Thank you to the whole team!
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