{"id":47787,"date":"2017-10-25T08:28:14","date_gmt":"2017-10-25T12:28:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asweetlife.org\/?p=47787"},"modified":"2017-10-25T08:28:14","modified_gmt":"2017-10-25T12:28:14","slug":"prick-or-treat-halloween-and-diabetes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asweetlife.org\/?p=47787","title":{"rendered":"Prick-or-Treat: Halloween and Diabetes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Have you ever dressed up in a diabetes-themed Halloween costume? Dug through the trash to find a discarded candy wrapper, hunting for the carb count? Or maybe not even spared a thought about diabetes on Halloween?\u00a0<\/p>\n

I talked with members of the diabetes online community to see how diabetes has played into their Halloween celebrations.\u00a0 Between people dressing up as diabetes devices, bartering and trading their candy haul, and even being diagnosed with diabetes on Halloween, the answers were as varied as the candy in a plastic pumpkin bucket.<\/p>\n

For many, Halloween is a great time to stock up on low blood sugar treatments.\u00a0\u00a0 Brianna Wolin said, \u201cWe all know Halloween is just the more known name for \u201cbest time of year to buy low treatments at good prices in bulk.\u201d\u00a0 Zoe Heineman<\/a>, also living with type 1 diabetes, added, \u201cI buy half price candy after Halloween and use it for lows, especially the little candy corns and pumpkins.\u201d<\/p>\n

Halloween as a diagnosis date came up a few times.\u00a0 \u201cI was diagnosed on Halloween,\u201d said Kelly Kunik<\/a>.\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cA nurse dressed like a clown actually confirmed to me that I had diabetes.\u00a0I was trying to convince her to let me go trick-or-treating \u2013 I promised her that my parents and I would come back the next day to find out if\u00a0if I had diabetes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was all like, \u2018Honey you have diabetes!\u2019\u00a0 That would be the day I started to dislike clowns.\u201d<\/p>\n

Diabetes-centric costumes<\/a> were clearly a theme. (And here\u2019s where I\u2019ll admit that when I was a kid, I dressed up as a lancing device, the complement to my PWD friend\u2019s glucose meter costume.\u00a0 Photo buried somewhere in my mom\u2019s basement.)\u00a0 My friend Brooke, who I met at diabetes camp, said, \u201cWhen I worked at camp years ago there was a Halloween weekend and I was a bottle of NPH and my friend was a bottle of regular – yes, I know old school diabetes! Shower curtain liners, sharpies, foam circles, silver and orange hunting hats.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Prick-or-Treat:<\/p>\n

Heather\u2019s costume idea took a slightly more cryptic tone.\u00a0 \u201cThere was the year I went to a pumpkin carving party and everyone was told to dress as their greatest fear. My costume was of a denied health insurance claim. Not visually interesting, but very real.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hannah McDonald doesn\u2019t limit her diabetes dressing-up to Halloween.\u00a0 \u201cI’ve never had a diabetes themed costume, but a few years back I dressed up my insulin for Halloween out of sheer boredom and silliness.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n

And of course, who can resist dressing up as an insulin pump itself?\u00a0 Not Amanda.\u00a0 Her mom pitched in and actually made her costume.\u00a0 \u201cPeople thought I was a beeper, or a candy bar.\u201d \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

But what about all that candy?\u00a0 Trading candy for a toy or money isn\u2019t unique to the diabetes community \u2013 ever heard of the Switch Witch<\/a>? \u2013 but kids with diabetes may have been on the cutting edge when it came to candy swaps.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a kid, my mom used to buy my Halloween candy from me after I had picked out a few pieces,\u201d shared Laura Dunn (T1D).\u00a0 \u201cShe’d then use it as a birthday present for my grandfather whose birthday was in early November. I remember loving the tradition…especially when we visited my grandparents for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and he\u2019d sneak me a few pieces of Halloween candy from his stash.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth my brother and I have type 1 and our parents didn’t want us to miss out on the Halloween experience,\u201d said Cait Murphy.\u00a0 \u201cSo we got to go trick-or-treating, but when we came home after our parents let us pick out 20 pieces of candy then they’d take the rest and give us money to go to the toy store.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Prick-or-Treat:<\/p>\n

Juliet Marie agreed.\u00a0 \u201cMy mom did the same – I always got a new toy for the candy.\u201d\u00a0 And she added, \u201cI still feel like I should get something that day since it’s my diagnosis day!\u201d<\/p>\n

Way back in the day, my first Halloween experience after being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes came barely a month later, sending me out trick-or-treating with my family and subsequently having my breath sniffed for evidence of having sneaked a Twix bar (or three).\u00a0 But what I remember most is how consistently diabetes took a back seat to having fun, and how carbs took a backseat to costumes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However you celebrate Halloween, stay safe!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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