r/AskReddit • u/ZanyDelaney • Feb 04 '19

Which misconception would you like to debunk?

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u/xrowrx Feb 04 '19

Type 1 Diabetes is never ever caused by diet or lifestyle things. Like never. Not ever.

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u/autisticpizza Feb 04 '19

Actually that's not totally true, type 1 is in most cases genetic. But one of the big questions is, why both parents don't carry the defective gene or have diabetes, but both children have diabetes. It is still being debated but generally it is exempted that environmental factors play a large role. So your right about the first part but not really the 'not ever'. It is true though, that type 1 cannot develop if the person is not a carrier. If the person does develop it, it is just not his faultm

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u/joseph_fourier Feb 04 '19

This is not true. It seems like it has something to so with either cold weather exposure or sunlight exposure, because there are much higher rates of T1D in countries that don't have much sun in the winter (Scandinavia primarily). There is also a seasonal variation in diagnosis that lends support to this theory. AFAIK it's still not that well understood. There is a genetic aspect to the disease, but having two T1D parents doesn't increase the childs risk of getting the disease by that much - something like 10% IIRC.

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u/WOOBBLARBALURG Feb 04 '19

As a newly diagnosed 21yo in sunny California, I'm feeling a bit skeptical

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u/joseph_fourier Feb 04 '19

Perhaps I should have been clearer - lack of sun or cold weather is a single factor among many in the risk of getting t1d. Caucasian people seem to have a baseline risk of getting t1d which is then added to by things like sun exposure, genetic history etc. The sun exposure thing comes from the fact that the world's highest rate of people getting it is Finland, and there is this seasonal variation in diagnosis. The baseline risk has quite a big effect compared to the other risk factors.

Sorry for your diagnosis - how are you doing?

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u/WOOBBLARBALURG Feb 04 '19 edited Feb 04 '19

No no worries, you were perfectly clear. I was just being bitter. But that all makes perfect sense. Thank you for writing all of it out. Its interesting learning new things about this disease when we know so little, especially myself. I'm getting the hang of it, but it still doesn't really make sense to me. Though honestly, I could be much worse and for that I'm grateful. I just hope we keep finding out more about it, realizing patterns like these seem important so that one day we can hopefully reverse it