Sorry - this is a really long one....
I'm a type 1 and I had flu 18 years ago in my early twenties. I felt really bad coming home from work on Friday evening and went to bed early because I was completely exhausted. I didn't have dinner, because sugars were 20 something even though I'd had my insulin. Obviously something was wrong but I was too tired to care (totally unlike me).
I woke up early Sat and made it to the bathroom to be sick. Spent much of the morning in the bathroom lying on the floor too tired to go back to bed, being sick on and off. All my muscles were aching and my head was pounding. Bg still high so I took a big dose of insulin because I was worried about ketones. My housemate brought me some paracetamol and 2 cups of tea. Then she left for the rest of the weekend making me promise to call my parents for help if I didn't feel better soon. By lunchtime it had dawned on me that my bg was falling and I'd need to eat, so went downstairs. I wasn't sure I'd make it back to bed and I had nasty chills so I took my duvet. It took ages to make it to the kitchen and grab anything to eat. Then I was sick again. Spent much of the afternoon trialing things I could eat that didn't make me sick, the only answer was milk. Started to panic because I was still in a lot of pain with my head and muscles and knew I was near out of control with the diabetes, but I coped - because I was on my own and I didn't have a choice. Slept on the sofa, because I was too tired to face going upstairs.
Woke up on Sunday freezing cold. Crawled to the gas fire (which was about 3m away) and turned it on full blast. Then retreated under the duvet on the sofa. Was too tired to get the remote from the other side of the lounge so spent the day alternating shivering, staring at the fire weirdly spaced out and napping. It's hard wired in my brain that anything weird might mean a hypo so check bg. I kept checking and injecting and drinking milk (sometimes with spoonfuls of sugar in it). I had to guesstimate amounts, just rely on experience and give up any notion of calculations. Normal ratios wouldn't have worked anyway, because the amounts of insulin I was taking were insanely large to keep the bg down. Started to feel desperate in the afternoon so texted my parents for help (very unlike me), it took hours to write the short text a few letters at a time. Still freezing and shivering. They never replied, but I felt better because I was hoping help was on its way. In the late evening my housemate came back and freaked out because the house was boiling hot and I was shivering and desperately cold under the duvet. She told me I had flu. It was nice to know what it was. Was too tired to go upstairs to bed or to the toilet. Didn't pee for a day and a half because it was too far to walk.
On Monday I felt well enough to get up in the morning and go upstairs to pee. Progress! Was strong enough to gather food and the remote and settle in for a day under the duvet in front of the TV. Still very ill, but I felt more in control of the situation. By Tuesday I'd run out of food that I could keep down and decided to go to the supermarket. If I wasn't diabetic there's no way I'd have done that. But I needed a supply of drinkable carbs and I felt I didn't have a choice. Drove to the shop (usually a 5 min walk away). Was exhausted having walked from my car to the shop and had to get a trolley to lean on to keep standing. Suddenly incredibly hot and sweating profusely. Bought some juice, lemsip pills and biscuits and went home. Felt truly awful. Wed stayed in, and had my first proper meal since Friday. Thought I was cured.
Woke up with a streaming nose on Thurs. Suddenly it felt like a bad cold not flu. So I went to work. Normally I'm an energetic teacher. Was so tired by the time I got to school I spent the whole day sat at my desk and didn't move. Didn't even get up for lunch - just ate the dextrose tabs I kept in my desk instead. Used almost an entire box of tissues and looked grey. Normally me just sat down doing nothing would lead my classes to near riot. But they were so worried about me they were incredibly well behaved. Loads of the students told me I was too sick to be in school and should go home. They were right. I had Friday off and spent most of the next week (half term) recuperating. On Saturday my dad looked at his phone saw my text and called me to ask why I hadn't phoned. I had been too sick to call it was just more than I could manage at that time.
On reflection I was very sick and should have called my Dr, probably should have been in hospital considering the diabetes. But I was too sick to phone for help. As a type 1 I consider my bg and insulin / food etc maybe every 5 mins normally and although I couldn't keep up with that my mind knows how vital it is to keep an eye on it and somehow I coped. I think I am generally quite good at coping with illness because I'm used to having to keep aware and awake and deal with highs or lows even when I feel terrible. Healthy people don't have the experience of that and find it harder to adapt to being ill IME. It's more of a shock to their system.