Diabetes and Mental Health
Written by Health Ambassador Lisa Jones
There are so many African Americans with Type 2 diabetes in Milwaukee, that it makes me wonder how much stress plays a role in the disease. Many people may associate mental health separately from physical health. In reality, they are tied together. My name is Lisa Jones and was diagnosed in 2017 with Type 2 diabetes two years after taking my brother off life support and seven months after my mother died. No one knows for sure why the onset of type 2 diabetes occurred for me at the age of 47 but I do believe stress and grief played a major role beyond diet and exercise.
So what is Diabetes? Type 1 diabetes is a lifelong disease that is typically diagnosed in children and young adults, affecting only 5% of people with diabetes. Your body cannot produce enough insulin, and people with type 1 must have insulin through injections or a pump to survive. In Type 2 diabetes the body cannot use the insulin it's producing effectively. Blood glucose levels rise higher than normal and the body cannot make enough insulin to regulate it, resulting in a cascading effect of ill-health conditions. Another form of diabetes is Gestational diabetes. Gestational diabetes is usually a temporary circumstance where high blood sugar levels develop during pregnancy and go back to normal after pregnancy. (WUWM, 2015)
After researching the impact of diabetes and mental health in Milwaukee there are some startling numbers. In Milwaukee alone, 40% of people are at high risk for developing diabetes, which is 14% higher than the state average. Some studies conclude that stress plays a role in Type 2 diabetes along with food and lack of exercise. Milwaukee is a city that is considered to be the worst place to raise a Black child with lead poisoning, poverty, lack of jobs, lack of housing and home ownership, education and so goes the list on and on. The more barriers you have to thrive, the more you are prone to mental health issues and the health epidemic of diabetes. Depression has been shown to increase the risk for progressive insulin resistance and incident type 2 diabetes, It explains to me why I need more medication to manage my diabetes after the COVID-19 pandemic.
All of these are sobering. Explaining why so many Black Milwaukeeans are at risk for diabetes. The onslaught of food deserts, working in stressful environments, and living in high-poverty areas take a literal toll on our bodies raising our stress hormones. So what can we do to make Black Milwaukee healthy?
Implement strategies outlined by the MKE Black Grassroots Network for Health Equity to improve the physical, mental, and environmental health of Black Milwaukee
Work at solving the food desserts in Milwaukee with stores that sell healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables in local communities
Resolve the medical dessert so people in the neighborhood can have access to trusted medical providers in their neighborhood
Remove the barriers of poverty, housing, and jobs, and provide community wellness care
It will take more than telling people to do self-care to solve the problems of mental health and diabetes. Through collective work, we can take Milwaukee from a diabetes epidemic to a city that came up with creative health solutions.
Additional articles are linked below:
Joseph JJ, Golden SH. Cortisol dysregulation: the bidirectional link between stress, depression, and type 2 diabetes mellitus. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2017 Mar;1391(1):20-34. doi: 10.1111/nyas.13217. Epub 2016 Oct 17. PMID: 27750377; PMCID: PMC5334212.https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5334212/
Kontoangelos K, Raptis A, Lambadiari V, Economou M, Tsiori S, Katsi V, Papageorgiou C, Martinaki S, Dimitriadis G, Papageorgiou C. Burnout Related to Diabetes Mellitus: A Critical Analysis. Clin Pract Epidemiol Ment Health. 2022 Oct 21;18:e174501792209010. doi: 10.2174/17450179-v18-e2209010. PMID: 37274843; PMCID: PMC10156041.https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10156041/
Sharma K, Akre S, Chakole S, Wanjari MB. Stress-Induced Diabetes: A Review. Cureus. 2022 Sep 13;14(9):e29142. doi: 10.7759/cureus.29142. PMID: 36258973; PMCID: PMC9561544.https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9561544/
