\u00a0<\/h3>\nPerspective<\/h3>\n
Nothing is more valuable than understanding what is a big deal and what isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
Things I used to sweat suddenly balanced out as not as big a deal. My kid didn\u2019t get the role she wanted in the middle school play? Hey, we\u2019re all healthy and she can be perfectly happy in the chorus. Miss a birthday party because of a sickness? Life picks up and goes on the next day. Because diabetes is a never-ending practice of making the best of things (high? We\u2019ll just fix it. Low? We\u2019ve got glucose tabs for that!), I learned as a mom to adopt that perspective in all my parenting moments (Okay \u2026 most of them. I am a mere human). Over the years, things like getting (perhaps unfairly) cut from the soccer team became, instead of a world crisis, a paused, readjustment and chance to move forward.<\/p>\n Diabetes also taught me to reposition my own perspective. It\u2019s easy as a diabetes mom to feel sorry for yourself, to want to sink into the grief, anxiety and sometimes overwhelming duties attached to it all. But I learned early from teens and adults with diabetes themselves to change that view. Diabetes is not mine \u2013 it is my child\u2019s. I don\u2019t live with it 24\/7, she does. And until there\u2019s a cure, she always will. I had to learn that while my child is my heart, she is her own person and I am mine. I was not going to feel sorry for myself and not going to teach my daughter to feel sorry for herself.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Living with a chronic disease in your family opens your mind and heart to others who do as well. It also opens you to the realization that everyone \u2013 even folks who don\u2019t have something like diabetes on board\u2014sometimes are sad, hurt, scared, or overwhelmed by life. Sometimes, all someone needs is for you to let them know you know that.<\/p>\n Diabetes helped me see that. In the early years, someone who simply cared and let me know they felt empathy was like a balm to my wound. As I grew stronger, I realized as a mom knowing when to offer that balm to my own kids and my friends was a wonderful skill to have.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Diabetes helped me find my voice. I\u2019ve told my story \u2013 make that my daughter\u2019s story (perspective!) to senators, congressmen, even presidents. I\u2019ve stood on stages before thousands of people and movitated them to give money to JDRF and to do raise funds themselves. I\u2019ve ridden a bike 100 miles in one day \u2013 through a desert, through three states, through a wind tunnel of marshes in northern Florida \u2013 things I never thought I\u2019d have the power to do. Diabetes has pushed me to push my limits, to become more confident, to work harder, and to never give up. That\u2019s a gift that serves me as a mother and as a human being. Diabetes helped me know I am stronger than I thought I was.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Diabetes has shown me how both my children \u2013 the one with diabetes and the one without it \u2013 can thrive in life despite it. It has introduced me to incredible friends. It has connected me to a world of true heroes. It has taken me places and taught me things I could never have learned without it.<\/p>\n So this Mother\u2019s Day, I thank diabetes for making me the mother I am today. I\u2019ll keep on working to banish diabetes from this earth, but until then, I\u2019ll continue to learn from it and soak up the very good from the very bad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":47049,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1430],"tags":[783],"yoast_head":"\n![\"Diabetes](\"https:\/\/asweetlife.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/diabetes-made-me-a-better-mother.jpeg\")
Compassion<\/h3>\n
Power<\/h3>\n
Joy<\/h3>\n