“We have to amputate your legs. Today.”
That’s what the doctor told me as I lay in a hospital bed.
The blinding, florescent lights buzzed overhead, and my nostrils filled with that bleach hospital smell, overpowering me in the cramped, chilly room.
My wife squeezed my hand, tears streaming down her cheeks.
“No,” she cried. “He can’t live the rest of his life in a wheelchair.”
“Without the amputation,” the doctor told me, “you’ll be dead within a year.”
I couldn’t believe it. My passion had always been hiking, and my wife and I had dreamed of one day hiking the Appalachian Trail.
But 4 years ago, the doctors wanted to put me under anesthesia, and cut off my legs… leaving nothing but worthless stumps.
All because I was one of 115 million Americans with
prediabetes or diabetes…
…the disease that ran rampant through my body, thrashing the blood vessels in my limbs, until it practically cut off the circulation to my legs.
The doctor made it clear that if he didn’t amputate, my legs would rot like spoiled meat.
So what happened? And why am I telling you this?
I’ll answer the second question first.
My name is David Andrews, and I’m telling you this because…
“I don’t want you to go through the same horrifying experience that I did.”
Now, when all this happened, I didn’t know all that much about this debilitating and potentially deadly disease.
But now, I’ve done my homework. And in my research, I’ve uncovered some eye-opening —even shocking — facts. But I’ve also found hope for folks like me, folks who have diabetes.
Now, a lot of folks act like I did when I got diagnosed with diabetes. We let the statistics go in one ear, and out the other. But this is important. Because every single person represented in these statistics is someone like you and me. A mother, a father, a sister, a brother, a son or daughter. Grandparents. Friends. Neighbors. Coworkers. Loved ones. You. Me.
We don’t think we’re going to become a statistic. But that’s what this horrible disease does to folks like us.
Like the stat I was being faced with that day at the hospital: did you know that every day, over 200 people with diabetes have a limb amputated? That’s over 70,000 per year.
Even more distressing, 1 in 4 didn’t know they had diabetes until it was too late.
But worst of all, amputation isn’t even the most dangerous part of uncontrolled blood sugar… You may or may not know…
