The first time I thought of getting a tattoo, I was 19. I thought I would get a scorpion with roses wrapped around it since I am a Scorpio. Good thing I didn't because that really doesn't mean much to me. Several times throughout my adult life, I considered a tattoo. I never could come up with something that meant enough for me to have it put on my body in permanent ink. I am pretty OCD and I like things as quickly as I don't like them anymore. So, the thought of putting...say...an elephant ( yes, I had an elephant phase) on my body, was not appealing enough since I knew I would get over that little obsession. And I did.
When I got divorced, I started to rethink the tattoo. I wanted to get one. I had spent years saying I would never mark up my body because there was nothing I wanted bad enough to put on me. Well, things changed. I racked my brain trying to come up with something. Spent a couple of months scouring the Internet looking at tattoos. Nothing. Then, Hope Day came around. The entire DOC hosted a Hope Day for diabetes and everyone wrote Hope on their hands. It was this day that I knew I wanted a hope tattoo. The only thing that I want bad enough to print on me for life is a cure for my daughter...and everyone that lives with diabetes daily. I decided to make the "o" in hope the universal symbol for diabetes, a blue "O."
The word hope also means more to me . I hope for a bright future for my girls. I hope their health stays at least as healthy as it is now. I hope Abby doesn't get diabetes. I hope to have my dream come true of spending my days educating the public on the signs of type 1 so no more kids die from DKA and being misdiagnosed. I hope to be happy in this life.
This blog took a strange turn for a while as my life took a strange turn. I have chosen to keep my private life just that...private. I still blog about my hurdles, my life after the two D's (diabetes and divorce) and my love, Matt, but...I now do that in a private place.
This is a place for me to educate...and to help...and to cope...and to hope that one day Lily, along with all of the other PWD's, can live a life free of diabetes. I hope they learn to know what a night with no fear and no checks is. I hope they can freely give birth to babies without fear of numbers...or worse, the fear of passing it on somehow. I hope that diabetes goes away. I really do. I want that for my child. I want that for all of the children and everyone who lives with this. As much as I love reading everyone's blogs, I hope to one day log in and not find them anymore.
So, this is all what led me to a tattoo. On a Sunday night, after dinner, by myself...I got in my car and drove into the heart of the artsy part of Houston, Montrose, and went on my own to get a tattoo. There was no hand to hold and there was no one there to support me. I wanted to do this for myself...by myself. That was important to me for some reason.
i have a few tattoos, but all pale in comparison to our current D struggles. i love yours.
ReplyDeleteGood for you. I've been looking for one for my foot. I want it to have a D meaning also.
ReplyDeleteWOW, that is cool Kim. I don't sport any ink. If I ever did, "HOPE" would be at the top of the list.
ReplyDeleteVERY cool. I do believe a therapy will be available that will make living with Type 1 far easier and more manageable than it is today, such as Smart Insulin. And that a cure will eventually be found.
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