I guess I've been misinformed all my life. My great grandmother was diabetic, so it really wasn't a great shock when my father was diagnosed. After all, "it always skips a generation". As far as I know, there was no diabetes in my mother's family, so it came as a little more of a surprise when she was diagnosed. Still, her parents hadn't had it, so she wasn't "safe". Well, you could have knocked me over with a feather when I was diagnosed. I guess it just blew that theory out of the water. I don't even remember where I first heard that it skipped a generation, but somehow I'd always believed it. Has anyone else always thought that way or am I just gullible?

I have never heard that it skips a generation. That theory went right out the window in my family. Both parents and most of my siblings are diabetic. So there goes that every other generation thought. Did you ask your doctor about the generation thing? I would be interested in hearing more about it.

No, I never even brought it up to my doctor. I know I didn't hear it from a doctor, just an old wives tale I suppose. And once I was diagnosed I would have just felt silly standing there and admitting that I had believed that. That's what I get for feeling bulletproof I suppose. I should have learned a long time ago that life is just never that easy.

Type 2 diabetes may be triggered by lifestyle factors like a lack of exercise and an unhealthy diet, which lead to obesity. There is also evidence that it may run in families too. It usually develops later in life. Keeping your weight within a normal range lowers your risk of diabetes. However, I have never heard that it skips a generation.

I think that's one of the urban myths, like the usual mantra that if you like sweet foods that you'll become diabetic. With the plethora of unhealthy obese people around, it's more common than ever.

Sometimes it does skip generations. Example, my family. My grandfather was insulin dependent, my father had adult onset diabetes, with no need for injections or medication. He controlled his diabetes through diet and exercise. I was skipped (so far), but our daughter was diagnosed with diabetes when she was 3 years of age. It skipped my generation. Makes you wonder how those genes can gather together in diabetic clumps for one generation and skip the other. I know this doesn't hold true with all families, though. A friend of mine has had insulin-dependent diabetes since she was 12. She is now an adult, 42 years of age. She has four siblings. All her siblings also were diagnosed with juvenile diabetes in their early teens. BUT, neither of her parents or her aunts and uncles on either side has any form of diabetes. Tee

so... it does and doesn't - I wouldn't build my life around which generation I happened to be, tho.

I heard this a long time ago, but I think it is an old wives tale. My mother had diabetes and her father had it, so it surely didnot skip a generation with us. I don't know of anyone else who has had it who did not have chioldren with it also.

still, you should always have it checked when you go in for your annual physical - it's usually part of the same blood test and you can't be too safe!