November is Diabetes Awareness Month. November 14th is World Diabetes Day. I have done nothing this year and this is the first year that I have ignored everything diabetes related. I have been trying to just live our lives and not let this all-consuming disease consume me. I have always had trouble with the all or nothing thing. If I choose to do something, I can't half do it. Not possible for my personality. So, with diabetes, I made it my world. My everything. My job. My mission. My life. I have trouble separating, or balancing, or whatever.
So, I have taken a break from blogging too. Even the Chronicle blog...right after I started it. I have been on overdrive with a new job...with the girls...with my life. And then, I read an email tonight with the JDRF ad for the Artificial Pancreas and I am pissed. I am seriously pissed off. I don't want to know that 1 in 20 people with Type 1 diabetes is going to die from a low blood sugar. I already don't fucking sleep. None of us do. I am so sick of the focus being on death. I want the Artifical Pancreas JUST LIKE EVERYONE. I want the awareness. I want the FDA to approve it. I don't want to hear that my child has a 1 in 20 chance of dying from going low. I can't hear that. I can't understand that. It is too much pain to deal with...it's too much pressure, too much stress.
I want those statistics to change and that is why I support the JDRF. That's why we walked. That's why I adore my chapter here. Something needs to be done to change that statistic. It can be read in a much less scary way...like 5% of those with type 1 will die from hypoglycemia. The 1 in 20 is much more powerful. But I don't ever want to see that ad again and I want to store it away in the "too scary to think about" part of my brain storage.
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And I think that is ok to store it away in the too scary to think about area. I don't think "we" were the target audience of that ad anyway. I'm just hoping that those who didn't already know of our scary reality will stand up and take notice of it. Thanks for sharing your perspective. Missed you.
ReplyDeleteIt is a scarey statistic but I think we must be truly aware. And the general public needs to be educated because they do not know the seriousness of Type 1. Bear in mind, a lot of the deaths may occur because of alcohol, even just one drink on a social occasion. And young children, at least, do not drink. We must educate all teens to eat 30 ex carbs for even one drink and more for two or more plus reduce basals on a pump if they have one. This is a figure for over a lifetime, not each year.
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