I wanted to write something about National Invisible Chronic Illness Awareness Week. I tried, and nothing really sounded all that good. If you want to read some good posts about it, check Karen, Chris, and Scott, who technically wasn’t writing about Invisible Illness Week, but it’s a great example of how diabetes is invisible. My brain shut down when I tried to write something semi-intelligent, but I still want to do my part to say, hey this disease might not look so bad from the outside, but on the inside, it can erode you, both physically and mentally. I saw Landileigh had posted a meme about it a couple of evenings ago, and I enjoyed reading hers, so I’m going to give this a go…

1. The illness I live with is: Type 1 Diabetes

2. I was diagnosed with it in the year: October 1978

3. But I had symptoms since: I don’t know if my mom noticed anything suspicious in September 1978, but it might have been early October before she thought something didn’t seem right.

4. The biggest adjustment I’ve had to make is: learning to be more visible with a disease that’s inherently invisible.

5. Most people assume: diabetes care is far less taxing, time consuming, emotionally draining, and expensive than it really is.

6. The hardest part about mornings are: waking up low when I need to get ready so I can be somewhere at a certain time. I inevitably end up being late.

7. My favorite medical TV show is: Scrubs

8. A gadget I couldn’t live without is: my Animas 2020 pump.

9. The hardest part about nights are: always being afraid I’m going to have severe hypoglycemia in my sleep.

10. Each day I take 10 pills & vitamins for cholesterol, blood pressure (to protect my kidneys), water retention (kidney-related), restless leg syndrome, depression, anxiety, and rapid heart rate (autonomic neuropathy). I haven’t been very good about taking vitamins though. Edit: Oh, ya, Gina reminded me, I also take insulin!

11. Regarding alternative treatments I: there is no such a thing for type 1 diabetes. There are things you can do like exercise, see a dietitian, take natural supplements, meditate, etc. that can help keep your body healthy and your BG managed, but without insulin and a truckload of test strips, your goose is cooked. If someone tries to convince you there are “alternative treatments” to replace insulin, knee ‘em in the crotch because they’re trying to add coin to their pockets, not years to your life.

12. If I had to choose between an invisible illness or visible I would choose: an invisible illness. They both suck, and I’d rather have neither though.

13. Regarding working and career: I never imagined diabetes would have had the effect it’s had on the direction my career has taken.

14. People would be surprised to know: some of the details about the things I did to mismanage my diabetes, and some of my experiences getting treatment for depression and my eating disorder.

15. The hardest thing to accept about my reality has been: the regret and responsibility I feel for not caring enough to manage my diabetes all those years.

16. Something I never thought I could do with my illness that I did was: accept it.

17. The commercials about my illness: seem foreign to me. Maybe it’s because there were no commercials for diabetes products until relatively recently. I don’t know how to explain it, but they always seem weird and irrelevant to me.

18. Something I really miss doing since I was diagnosed is: eating Frito pie (if you don’t know what that is, you simply haven’t lived), snow cones, and candy, Fun Dip and orange slices in particular, without having to think about it. I don’t eat those things now, even though I could if I bolused the heck out of them, but those were things I have memories of really enjoying when I was little.

19. It was really hard to have to give up: my belief that I’d be dead by the time I was 30. There’s more inherent uncertainty in doing everything I can to manage diabetes to the best of my ability, hoping I’ll live for another 50 years, but knowing diabetes could take me in far less than that. With that uncertainly comes fear.

20. A new hobby I have taken up since my diagnosis is: everything I do except for art. I loved a fresh pack of crayons and drawing tablet or coloring book before I was diagnosed, and my affinity for art making just blossomed from there.

21. If I could have one day of feeling normal again I would: eat pepperoni and sausage pizza, hold the worry and extended bolus.

22. My illness has taught me: empathy, and that we should NEVER assume we understand why people do the things they do, even when the things they do don’t make sense. Just because we don’t know or understand the reason, doesn’t mean there isn’t a darn good one.

23. Want to know a secret? One thing people say that gets under my skin is: “Should you be eating that?” Maybe YOU should be less concerned with what I’m doing since I know way more about diabetes than you can even pretend to know. Argh…

24. But I love it when people: aren’t afraid to ask questions about why or how I do things.

25. My favorite motto, scripture, quote that gets me through tough times is: I don’t really have one. However, “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up,” courtesy of Pablo Picasso, has a way of distracting me in a good way.

26. When someone is diagnosed I’d like to tell them: to draw a picture of how they feel about diabetes. As Shrek always says, “Better out, than in!”

27. Something that has surprised me about living with an illness is: how it used to make me feel so isolated, but ironically enough, it now makes me feel more connected.

28. The nicest thing someone can do for me when I’m not feeling well is: not doubt, question, lose patience with me, or push me to do more than I feel I can do during moments when my BG is too low or too high.

29. I’m involved with Invisible Illness Week because: people really don’t understand what it’s like to live diabetes 24/7/365, 366 in leap year, from now until your very last breath.

30. The fact that you read this list makes me feel: like smiling