Monday, January 17, 2011

An entire bag of chips and a Coke....wow

During my adventures today, I had a conversation with a Type 2 diabetic woman. I won't go into the boring details of why I was at her house in the first place...instead I will focus on what occured as I was trying to leave her house. She stopped me at the door to ask me what I feed my daughter...because she is having trouble finding things to eat that don't affect her blood sugars too much and still are satisfying to her. Well, I flipped the switch on my internal broken record and told her that Emma is allowed to eat absolutely anything she wants...I just have to count the carbs and give her insulin accordingly. Well, she proceeded to tell me that she is the only person she knows who since being diagnosed with diabetes has gained weight instead of losing weight. I tried to help her out with some low carb meal ideas that I could pull out of the mental recipe book section in my head. She then told me that every Friday she lets herself splurge and eat whatever she wants just so she can keep her sanity. For example, last Fridays lunch consisted of an entire bag of chips and a Coke....that's all...woah. I really did not know what to say to that one. I agree with the whole idea of splurging every once and awhile...just to treat yourself...maybe birthdays or holidays....but every single Friday? I got the impression that she was looking to me for some sort of miracle solution to her food problem simply because my daughter is diabetic. Don't get me wrong, I am always one to step up to the plate and help out...but I was really at a loss here. Towards the end of our conversation she also mentioned to me that she would rather live life happy and do what she wants and eat what she wants and possibly die next week....instead of making a few life changes and just prolonging the inevitable. I really don't understand people sometimes. I mean here I sit...fighting day in and day out, battling this relentless disease...struggling to keep my daughters blood sugars in range...trying to keep her healthy...praying and fundraising for a cure. And this woman just shrugs her diabetes off like it is nothing more than a papercut? Shrugs her life and health off like it is all pointless anyway? Ugh...people are exhausting sometimes.
On a side note, I played a nice game of "worse-case scenario" this afternoon. My daughters school had a practice lock-down just before lunch. I sat there after I dropped her back off at school...envisioning all of the horrible things that could happen if an actual lock-down ever occured. Picturing my daughter's blood sugar dropping...seizures....her 1st grade teacher panicking and not knowing what to do...etc. Good stuff...what the hell is the matter with me sometimes? I really wish i could stop playing that game. I'm sure if there was a scoring system for it...I would definitely have the #1 high score spot....you would see my initials up there for sure. Here's to hoping for less excitement tomorrow...diabetes has definitely made me a fan of the boring life!

1 comment:

  1. the boring life rocks! I know it sounds very unkind to say but type 2's piss me off a lot! Both my parents are type 2's and complain constantly because they are supposed to take pills and check their blood sugar 1 time each day. My dad won't even do it everyday. Needless to say, I make sure I let Riley talk to them on occasion and give them a BIG guilt trip for being such babies when she has ALL the REAL diabetic stuff to deal with!lol

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