Red lights....or green? Diabetes365 day 30

I was diagnosed with diabetes 35 year ago, at the end of a summer spent on the west coast of Ireland. It's hard to describe just how magical that summer was. I had taken lessons scuba diving and a large group of friends spent almost every day in the water.

In the afternoons we'd head back to my house and devour a huge chocolate pound cake that my Mum made. (We took to calling these tombstones because of their size and shape.)

Back home in Dublin after a week of getting sicker, I was sent to hospital and given the official diagnosis of diabetes. I can't really describe how this felt.

I think it's as if I was sailing along on beautiful country roads with blue skies and no delays. Then I turned a corner and I was on a highway, in a rainstorm, with horrible traffic and nothing but red tail lights stretching ahead of me.



Anyone watching wouldn't have seen changes in me, but inside I always expected the inevitable onset of diabetes complications. I sort of expected the worst.

It was almost 20 years before those tail lights went away. Thanks to a wonderful and patient endocrinologist at the Joslin Clinic, a lot of those clouds were lifted.

Now most days are easier. And I've mentioned elsewhere all I've been able to do despite (or because of) diabetes.

It's still a lousy disease, that requires constant work every day of my life. But I've learned about acceptance and endurance and blessings from God.

There is no cure for diabetes.

Yet.

Learn more about what living with diabetes is really like at the diabetes365 project.

Labels: acceptance, blessings, diabetes365, endurance, nablopomo

posted by Bernard @ 8:52 PM