Because so much has not changed in the past 88 years very little has changed in how diabetes is treated, and that frustrates the heck out of me. Don’t get me wrong. I’m very thankful for all that has changed and improved over those years, but it has not come far enough or fast enough.
How do we treat diabetes? We take some magical liquid (insulin) and use a needle to squirt it under our skin. We used to check our urine to see if we guessed right. Now we poke our finger and bleed on something. Doesn’t it all sound very primitive? It IS very primitive! While the methods and tools we use to do these primitive things have changed a lot, not much else has happened.
Diabetes used to be a death sentence. You either starved yourself to death, or you nourished yourself and died from miserable complications. So again, I am thankful for all of the treatments we have. It allows me to live what appears to be a normal life.
But on the inside, my life is everything but normal. I am in a never-ending cage match with myself. No matter who wins the fight, I come out the loser, and am always exhausted. No matter what stresses I’m dealing with in life, I always have to balance my diabetes management.
The number of decisions I have to make on a daily basis would paralyze the average person. Heck, it paralyzes ME sometimes! Within all of those decisions are all sorts of calculations, and much of the time I don’t have all of the information needed to work it all out. I have to guess. The penalty for getting it wrong is either a minor or major interruption in my day, and the threat of major drama later in life.
Diabetes is an invisible disease. Is that why there isn’t a cure yet? Is the research funding limited because you can’t see just how hard it is trying to live with this condition? Maybe.
We are all so strong, and stubborn. We need to be strong and stubborn to survive. But in doing so we create the illusion that living with diabetes is no big deal. This is exactly why we need to speak up and raise awareness. We need to live descriptively about the challenges and struggles we deal with!
World Diabetes Day is our day. It is our chance to take our daily thoughts and emotions and share them with a huge audience. That is why World Diabetes Day is important to me.
Scott K. Johnson writes about both his failures and successes with type 1 diabetes at Diabetes Daily and dLife.
How do we treat diabetes? We take some magical liquid (insulin) and use a needle to squirt it under our skin. We used to check our urine to see if we guessed right. Now we poke our finger and bleed on something. Doesn’t it all sound very primitive? It IS very primitive! While the methods and tools we use to do these primitive things have changed a lot, not much else has happened.
Diabetes used to be a death sentence. You either starved yourself to death, or you nourished yourself and died from miserable complications. So again, I am thankful for all of the treatments we have. It allows me to live what appears to be a normal life.
But on the inside, my life is everything but normal. I am in a never-ending cage match with myself. No matter who wins the fight, I come out the loser, and am always exhausted. No matter what stresses I’m dealing with in life, I always have to balance my diabetes management.
The number of decisions I have to make on a daily basis would paralyze the average person. Heck, it paralyzes ME sometimes! Within all of those decisions are all sorts of calculations, and much of the time I don’t have all of the information needed to work it all out. I have to guess. The penalty for getting it wrong is either a minor or major interruption in my day, and the threat of major drama later in life.
Diabetes is an invisible disease. Is that why there isn’t a cure yet? Is the research funding limited because you can’t see just how hard it is trying to live with this condition? Maybe.
We are all so strong, and stubborn. We need to be strong and stubborn to survive. But in doing so we create the illusion that living with diabetes is no big deal. This is exactly why we need to speak up and raise awareness. We need to live descriptively about the challenges and struggles we deal with!
World Diabetes Day is our day. It is our chance to take our daily thoughts and emotions and share them with a huge audience. That is why World Diabetes Day is important to me.
Scott K. Johnson writes about both his failures and successes with type 1 diabetes at Diabetes Daily and dLife.
Leave a comment