A few years ago, NSYNC’s Lance Bass was diagnosed with type 1.5 diabetes which, he says, left him terrified. “I was giving so many excuses of why I was feeling certain ways, so tired, so thirsty. Some days I would wake up and my legs wouldn’t really work,” the Mississippi born singer told TODAY. “I was just thinking, ‘Oh I’m tired. I’m older. I’m lethargic.'”It was Type 1.5 diabetes. It took Bass years, multiple doctors, and a completely wrong diagnosis before anyone figured out what was actually happening inside his body.
The wrong diagnosis first
In 2019, his doctor told him he had pre-diabetes. Bass, by his own admission, didn’t take it seriously. “Me being stubborn as I am I was like, ‘Yeah, sure right, whatever.'” Then the pandemic hit, and in February 2021, he found out he had diabetes, what his doctors initially called Type 2. He changed his diet. He adjusted his medications. He reworked his workout routine. Nothing moved the needle. “Things just weren’t adding up,” Bass said in a video posted on Instagram.Because they weren’t. He didn’t have Type 2 diabetes at all. “I recently discovered that I was misdiagnosed! I actually have type 1.5, also known as LADA or Latent Autoimmune Diabetes in Adults,” he explained on TikTok. “It has been quite the journey.”
So what is type 1.5 diabetes?
LADA is a type of diabetes that has characteristics of both Type 1 and Type 2, the Cleveland Clinic says. It happens because your body makes antibodies that attack insulin-producing cells in your pancreas. Symptoms begin in adulthood and worsen gradually, which often leads to a Type 2 diagnosis by mistake.Patients with LADA remain asymptomatic for years until there is significant loss of beta cells. That slow burn is exactly what makes it so deceptively easy to miss. Type 1.5 diabetes is when your pancreas slowly stops producing insulin in adulthood, usually around age 40 — a description that fits Bass almost exactly.
The symptoms that get ignored
The symptoms of Type 1.5 are not subtle, in hindsight. But they’re easy to explain away in real time, which is exactly what Bass did for years. People with high blood glucose levels typically experience fatigue, feeling thirsty, drinking a lot of water, and urinating more than usual. Sometimes they experience blurry vision and weight loss in severe forms.And that’s not all. Tingling in the hands or feet, itchy dry skin, weakness that doesn’t respond to sleep, these all show up too. The problem isn’t that the symptoms are invisible. It’s that they look like the symptoms of a hundred other things. Dehydration. Stress. Aging. A bad week. And so people,smart, health-conscious people like Bass,keep explaining them away until something forces a deeper look.
The misdiagnosis problem is bigger than you think
Bass is not an outlier. A recent study suggests that as many as 14 percent of people diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes may actually have LADA. The fix isn’t complicated. C-peptide levels can guide the diagnosis and treatment of LADA, and checking for autoimmune antibodies is how LADA is confirmed. But those tests don’t get ordered if nobody suspects LADA in the first place.Distinguishing between LADA and Type 2 diabetes is crucial, as treatment strategies differ and effective management helps prevent complications. Getting the wrong treatment doesn’t just delay recovery, it can actively make things worse.
What comes next
There’s no reversing LADA. Insulin is used to manage it, and it cannot be reversed. “It was a whole different ball game,” Bass says. But since his correct diagnosis, he’s been vocal about it. Bass has been raising awareness of Type 1.5 on social media, saying, “I know there are millions of people going through this with their doctor where their doctor just didn’t realize.”
