{"id":26799,"date":"2012-04-26T09:01:32","date_gmt":"2012-04-26T13:01:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/asweetlife.org\/?p=26799"},"modified":"2016-01-08T05:48:58","modified_gmt":"2016-01-08T10:48:58","slug":"celebrating-my-ten-year-anniversary-of-life-with-type-1-diabetes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asweetlife.org\/?p=26799","title":{"rendered":"Celebrating My Ten Year Anniversary of Life with Type 1 Diabetes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n

Have you ever wondered why people with type 1 diabetes talk about the anniversary of their diabetes diagnosis as if it\u2019s a birthday or a wedding anniversary? \u00a0A type 1 diabetes diagnosis is so life-altering, almost no one can forget the day of diagnosis \u00a0There\u2019s even a slang word for it: diaversary.<\/p>\n

I bring this up now because I\u2019m about to celebrate my ten-year diabetes diagnosis anniversary. It\u2019s a little hard for me to believe I\u2019ve been living with diabetes for an entire decade. But instead of being sad or upset like I\u2019d expect, I feel strangely happy about it. I feel good and I feel like celebrating.<\/p>\n

Since I was diagnosed as an adult, my perspective is different than it would be if I had been diagnosed as a child, or if I were the parent of a child with diabetes.\u00a0 According to Barbara Anderson<\/a> clinical psychologist and professor of pediatrics at the Baylor College of Medicine, \u201cMany parents remember the day their child was diagnosed with great feeling, certainly not happy, but not depressed either.\u00a0 I hear\u00a0parents say “how far we have come”\u00a0and \u201cif only I\u2019d known then what I know now\u201d.\u00a0I hear parents reflecting on their growth and development as a family living with diabetes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grow and develop.\u00a0 This is true for me, too. I hardly recognize the person I was ten years ago, refusing to go to the doctor, unable to face my failing body.\u00a0 I knew something was wrong, but I ignored it.\u00a0 Now I\u2019m in touch with my body by the minute, correcting even the slightest high blood sugar, getting blood tests four times a year, making tri-annual trips to the diabetes clinic.<\/p>\n

When I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes on April 28th<\/sup> 2002, I had had symptoms for months but didn\u2019t go to a doctor until I\u2019d lost 25 pounds, lost feeling in some toes, had blurry vision and couldn\u2019t get out of bed except to go pee every few minutes.\u00a0 At diagnosis my fasting blood sugar was 420 and my A1c was 15.7. \u00a0Once I learned what those numbers meant, I knew I couldn’t ignore my body any longer.<\/p>\n

The news that I had type 1 diabetes was a relief in one sense, knowing I wasn\u2019t really on the brink of death.\u00a0 But at the same time it was a huge devastating blow. My terrible physical condition became real to me.\u00a0 It had a name. \u00a0I wasn\u2019t just tired from lack of sleep or too much exercise. I was sick, and I wasn\u2019t going to be cured.\u00a0 All I could do was manage the condition.\u00a0 It would always be there. \u00a0Life was now life with type 1 diabetes.<\/p>\n

My self-esteem was shattered. I\u2019d been a strong 32-year-old guy. I believed my body could take any kind of beating and always come out on top.\u00a0 That was something I\u2019d put to the test many times. And now I was the sick person, the one that needed to stop and check his blood sugar, take insulin and consider every piece of food he put into his mouth.\u00a0 I was the one who got sweaty and confused several times a week.<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t say exactly when things changed, when I stopped feeling like the sick person.\u00a0 Somehow diabetes went from something I had to something I am.\u00a0 When that happened, I was different. \u00a0I hadn\u2019t been cured, but I was better. \u00a0I had promised myself when I was diagnosed that diabetes wouldn\u2019t change me, but it did, and despite the hardship, I\u2019m happy it did.<\/p>\n

Having diabetes has changed the way I eat and exercise. \u00a0It has motivated me to do things I never thought I could do (and continues to do so). \u00a0I\u2019ve run six marathaons, and I\u2019ve signed up for my seventh.\u00a0 Diabetes has also made me reevaluate my life.\u00a0 I look at things in a different way. I don\u2019t measure success by a job position or a salary.\u00a0 I have an entirely new sense of what\u2019s important. Diabetes helped me put family first and made me appreciate life, not just as a whole, but in the minute by minute.\u00a0 It\u2019s a kind of appreciation that may only come when you know the chance of death is, if I may quote the Rolling Stones, \u201cjust a shot away.\u201d<\/p>\n

I also discovered a parallel world of diabetes that I didn\u2019t know existed ten years ago.\u00a0 Then, I felt totally alone.\u00a0 Now I know there is a world full of inspiring people with diabetes, people I am lucky to work with, people I haven\u2019t met, but who inspire me to do better and to be stronger.\u00a0 I am part of a community based around a disease which somehow seems to be a healthier community than most.\u00a0 Our community transcends borders, age, race and gender (maybe John Lennon was writing about this world).<\/p>\n

After ten years of life with type 1 diabetes I no longer remember what life was like without diabetes. After a decade of insulin, glucose meters, highs and lows, constantly thinking about diabetes in some way or another, I don\u2019t feel like I know otherwise .<\/p>\n

I still can\u2019t say that I\u2019m happy to have type 1 diabetes but I can see the good in it.\u00a0 I can see the good in me. \u00a0Maybe, what I really meant when I said that I would not let diabetes change me was that I wouldn\u2019t use it as an excuse not to do things, or hold me back from being the best person possible.\u00a0 If anything, I do so much more because I have diabetes. \u00a0I give more, too.<\/p>\n

So this year on April 28th<\/sup> I\u2019ll be celebrating a decade of life with type 1 diabetes.\u00a0 It\u2019s not going to be a day of sadness or regrets or wondering how I would have been without the disease.\u00a0 This is an occasion celebrating\u00a0 me and my life with diabetes.\u00a0 The numbers I\u2019ll be thinking about are not only the ones on the glucometer, but the ones on the clock when I finish a marathon, and the 3,650 days I’ve already gained thanks to insulin. \u00a0And I’ll be feeling grateful, and looking forward to the next decade of life with type 1 diabetes, unless of course there’s a cure.<\/p>\n

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Somehow diabetes went from something I had to something I am. 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