I have early kidney disease as well and have had protein in my urine for years. To help with your questions, yes it is manageable if you follow your food program. If you keep your sugars under control and keep track of them daily you shouldn't be overly worried at this point.
As a simple form of explanation think of your blood as a circulating system on a small swimming pool. The filter is your kidneys. If you were to replace the some of the water in the pool with maple syrup you would see the pump working extra hard to do its filtering job. The higher the content of the maple syrup in the water the harder the pump has to work. The secret to a long lasting pump isn't to try to fix it when it's broken. The best thing to do is to try to keep the syrup out in the first place.
This is where your food plan, meds and exercise come in. They help move the glucose molecules into the cells where they are needed instead of letting them clog up the filtering function of your kidneys and obstructing blood flow in the tiny capillaries that supply blood to the nerves in your fingers and toes. Elevated blood glucose also affects the arterial walls and parts of our internal organs and leads to cumulative damage so ongoing control is a must. This doesn't mean you may NEVER have a square of chocolate or 1/2 cup of ice cream. It just means your food plan must be centered around good veggies, beans and lean meats along with whole grain foods like oatmeal and home made pop corn (none of that microwave butter stuff!)
It also means learning what foods are really made from and totally avoiding most pre-packaged, boxed or frozen carb laden foods and learning to cook with fresh veggies, at least two per meal. It also means looking into the fat contents of foods and learning which foods are high in "friendly" monounsaturated fats or omega 3 fats and which foods are hiding trans fats or "partially hydrogenated oils" that are not body friendly (although they do improve shelf life... if you plan on living on a shelf!
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Living with diabetes is a ongoing process of education, choices and self improvement. There is no magic pill that fixes everything. We have to be more diligent in paying attention to how we fuel our bodies than normals and the eventual pay off is that we get to be good for a very long time. Hope this helps.