1 Year Diaversary

750 shots of insulin.
800 pills of oral medication.
3000 finger pricks.

1 year with Type One Diabetes.

I deal with my blood all day long.  Either I'm making myself bleed to see if I'm doing okay,  or I'm thinking about my blood and if I'm doing everything I need to do to stay in safe range.

Does that sound depressing?

Maybe kind of.

But for me - it's reality.

Type 1 Diabetics don't get a vacation,  even while they sleep.

Many nights I am woken up by the reality that I have an incurable disease and if I don't do something about it I might be in trouble.

I've spent a fair amount of 4:00 AMs eating away low blood sugar and wishing I was sleeping like all the healthy people in the world get to.

Type 1 Diabetes requires ongoing management.

I always hesitate sharing anything about my diabetes, because diabetes is a joke in society. (I can name several people who are laughing at the "hesitating sharing" statement,  cause I know they think I over share).

In the year I've had Type 1, I think the biggest thing I've learned is that nobody understands diabetes unless they have it,  or have a very close relationship with a person who has it.

Because of that realization, I've had a hard time coming to grips with the social side of diabetes.

When in reality I'm in the 10% of diabetics who did nothing to cause their condition,  I always am confused with the 90% that suffer majorly from a completely different lifestyle disease that in many cases can be prevented.

I can't count the number of confused and unbelieving faces I've gotten over the past year when I explain that MY diabetes doesn't have anything to do with poor diet or lack of exercise.  Nor will it be cured by a good diet and enough exercise.

MY diabetes is in it for the long haul.

The rest of my life,  no matter what.

Type 1 Diabetes is an autoimmune disease.

But you know what?

I look back at where I was a year ago today and I'm SO happy that I can say I'M ALIVE!

Because exactly a year ago today,  I almost wasn't.

Exactly a year ago today I was in a hospital bed with four IV's pumping me with what I needed to live.

I didn't know my body was broken.

I never could have predicted it or done anything to correct it.

I had a vital organ that shutdown on me simply because it did.

And no mattered what I would or could do,  there was no undoing it.

I can say a year later, through everything I have learned, that I am so glad I got a second chance.

That I didn't have to leave my family all too suddenly and at no fault of my own.

I can't imagine not being here for Jeff and Grace.

I can't imagine it at all.

And the difficult part is, I have to advocate for myself and maintain my health everyday so I can stay here with them.

It's hard.

I've never wanted to make myself a spectacle.

I've never wanted to get in the way and put myself first.

But now I have to.

It's been a year of learning how to speak up for myself, and you know what?

I still suck at it.

Majorly.

I don't know how to tell people I need to eat or they might need to call 911.

I don't know how to make endless phone calls to doctors offices and insurance to ask for the proper care that I need.

I don't know how to explain to people around me that shooting medicine into myself several times a day is necessary and not just a convenient solution in my life.

I have to do those things and explain those things now, no matter how much I dislike it.

Somehow I'm still figuring out how to make it work.

And at the end of the day I wouldn't be able to do any of it without Jeff.

I get SO frustrated that I have to count literally EVERY single carb that goes in my body.

(Spoiler Alert: everything has carbs.  At least a little bit.)

So I spend a good amount of time asking Jeff how many carbs he thinks is in the food I'm about to eat.

On my weakest days I ask him if he'll just count my meal for me so I don't have to.

And he does.

And never complains.

He never complains about me waking him up in the night when I'm too shaky to get my own food.

Or if I'm just so tired of maintaining my health and don't want to do something as easy as go in the other room and get my meter.

He knows the consequences, so he very willingly helps me.

I know he never wants to see me struggling for life in the hospital again.

His unconditional love for me has grown a million fold this year.

If he's simply asking me what my blood sugar number is,  or if I've taken insulin for something,  he cares.

He cares all the time.  And I'm glad he asks.

Type 1 Diabetes is such a lonely journey,  the emotional side of it is just as hard as the physical.

And he gets that.

More than anyone in my life,  he totally gets it.

He knows the depth and breadth of my everyday life with diabetes.

What would I do without that support?

This year,  amidst the hard social things and the learning curve that is this disease,  I think I've learned more than ever that without faith I have nothing.

That without gratitude I wouldn't be where I am.

That I need to be humble and realize who I can depend on.

I can't do this alone and I probably never was supposed to.

This year I have learned that I can do anything as long as I keep a positive attitude and maintain my faith.

So here's to another year and many more after that of the monitoring and maintaining and administering and learning.


"I have observed that life,  every life, has its shares of up and downs.  Indeed,  we see many joys and sorrows in the world, many changed plans and new directions, many blessings that may not look or feel like blessings, and much that humbles us and improves our patience and our faith.  We have all had those experiences from time to time, and I suppose we always will.  Being human we would expel from our lives physical pain and mental anguish, and assure ourselves of continual ease and comfort, but if we were to close the doors on sorrow or distress,  we might be excluding our greatest friends and benefactors.  Suffering can make saints of people as they learn patience,  long-suffering,  and self-mastery."

-President Spencer W. Kimball <3 p="">