Glad I joined. But I still can’t believe it.
Thanks to everyone that responded to yesterday’s tirade. I thank God
for all of your words of encouragement but especially for the
permission to feel the way I do. If you or your child does not have
type I there is no way to understand. Again yesterday the mother of
my daughter’s friend said to me “It could be worse.” I was sitting
there crying my eyes out. She’s even a nurse. I couldn’t believe it.
How stupid does she think I am. I know. I know. I know. Next time
someone tells me that my response will be, “When your child is
diagnosed with Type 1 come tell me if you still feel that way.”
Just because you know it could be worse does not make it any easier.
I thank God for my daughter. I thank God I have her to give shots of
insulin to twice a day. I thank God I have her little fingers to
prick four times a day to test her bsl. But maybe if we all wouldn’t
let it “fit” so well into our lives. Maybe if we didn’t get “used” to
it. Maybe if we didn’t become complacent to it. Maybe if we all
died a little inside each time. Maybe if we yelled and screamed and
pitched a fit everytime we had to poke our child or loved one maybe
our voices would be a little louder to those around us too and maybe
they would understand better and maybe a cure would be found faster.
The squeeky wheel gets the oil, you know. Maybe we’ve let this become
part of our lives too easily. I hate to think that in a few months or
years time that I will find it no big deal, just a part of life. I
don’t want it to become easy. I don’t want to say today that my
daughter has type 1 diabetes, I don’t want to say it a year from now,
ten years from now or fifty years from now. What I want to say is my
daughter HAD diabetes for a very short time but now she is cured!
Ginger
mother to Matt 13
to Chelsea 10 diagnosed 7-03-03 (I hate typing that)
to DeeDee 7
and Megan 5
wife to Mike for 17 years (but I feel all alone)
November 15th, 2003 at 11:10 am
Ginger,
I know how you feel. It’s very painful. It will get easier, even if you don’t want it to at this point.
I said a prayer for you.
Benita, a Christian attachment style parenting advocate and home educator (going on 8 yrs now) to 3 children (12½g, 10½g, and 6½b, dx with diabetes- 10-02), living in upstate NY.
A mother can never be perfect BUT there are a million things she can do to be a great Mommy! ô¿ô
Say NO to routine infant circumcision because it isn’t necessary!!
AAP Circumcision Policy
November 16th, 2003 at 11:29 pm
Brenda,
Thanks. I live near Albany. Things are so different now.
Benita
Benita, where in upstate NY do you live? I just moved out of Watertown down to Syracuse. You guys have this support system so easy. 35 years ago, there was no support system here for my mother, no way for her to get in touch with other parents to vent and cry to. I wish she’d had people like you back then.
November 18th, 2003 at 11:48 am
Thanks, Brenda. My child with D is only 6 tho so that’s a long way off. Hopefully with always homeschooling him and raising him in a strict Christian home he won’t rebel so much.
Benita
I am a very brittle diabetic so that the slightest change screws me up. I’m saying all this to scare all of you. I just thought it would be good to let you know what to expect, especially when your children become teenagers. Those years are tough to begin with and peer pressure really sucks. I wish you all the best.
Brenda
November 18th, 2003 at 11:57 pm
I have been a member of this group for several months now, maybe even longer. I just wanted to be a lurker and read others stories, suggestions, website links, etc. I have created a special folder in my email to gather all emails from this group into. I decided tonight I had better check them(I belong to another group which generates a lot - tho crafting related) and get things cleaned up.
I came across Ginger’s email and everyone’s response to her. What a wonderful group you are and hopefully she will continue to be able to vent and gain info from you.
My son was diagnosed 2/19/02(isn’t strange how that is embedded as much as a birthday, etc). At the time he had just turned 15. He was diagnosed in a rather unusual way. He did not crash and end up in the hospital which he still hasn’t had a hospital visit to this day, I am very proud of that fact!! (BTW, my sister was diagnosed when she was 10, so I am familiar with the disease but also assumed it would “skip” my kids generation and affect my grandchildren.)
The end of January, 2002, I received a call from the ass’t principal at the Junior High. A teacher had requested an after school detention because Cole was lethargic, sleepy and very unresponsive in class. So I of course agreed to it as he doesn’t have good grades but we expect him to at least attempt to participate. (He doesn’t have good grades because of his choice.) As I continued to talk to the principal, it became evident there was more he wanted to talk about, such as who Cole was hanging out with at lunch time and what his behavior was a sign of. Finally, the lightbulb went on and I asked if he thought Cole was on drugs. Well that was where this conversation was going!! I asked him to call Cole to the office and I would be right in. While in the office, he talked about how he and another teacher had seen Cole slip down a couple of stairs, where the teacher turned to him and asked if that was another one on drugs?
As he is describing all of these symptoms, I said to it sounded like Cole was having a diabetic reaction as that is exactly how my sister would act. “Well, I hadn’t thought of that,” was his response, “But in my 18 years experience, and I have never been wrong yet, I don’t think it is diabetes.” He is the expert at recognizing the signs of drug use, I most certainly am not is what I thought!! Knowing that my son has made choices I didn’t agree with in friends and attitude towards school, I thought the principal is probably right. So I took the confidential drug test kit home with me by his suggestion. I WANTED TO KNOW!! A week later the test came back negative. I did happen across the principal at school and inform him that it was negative. Understanding my son’s choices in friends were part of the problem, we continued on with our lives.
About 2 weeks later on a Friday night, my son came home from the movies and ran to the bathroom, barely able to make it. Came out and drank two glasses of water. I teased him by asking how much popcorn he had eaten. He mentioned that he had been really thirsty lately or had to go to the bathroom alot. Well, the bells and whistles went off!! THOUGH!! Not for diabetes, (Can you believe I missed that?) Right away, I am thinking, due to the conversation I had had with Mr. Principal, that the teachers were assuming Cole was meeting “friends” in the bathroom to do their thing!! I was worried sick, was he doing drugs and we lucked out on the test, now he thinks he can get away with it????
We were up early the next day to take our youngest son to a basketball tourney to which Cole was suppose to accompany us. He asked my hubby if he could stay home and sleep because eh was up all night either drinking or using the bathroom. Our oldest confirmed it was pretty much on the hour he was doing one or the other. Well, folks, then the lightbulb lit this front porch!!
The earliest we could get in was Tuesday. The Dr. told me it would be 24 hours before we would get the results back. The office called me 1.5 hours later to tell me yes he was diabetic and where we needed to go that afternoon to get our education. He was 300+ something. I don’t even remember as I was so shocked it was positive.
He started out on N and H, then this January they changed him to Lente and ultra Lente and still some H. In April they put him on Lantus. He loves that as he can be a teenager and sleep in now.
He still is not getting good grades because he has a crappy attitude towards school. We are working to address this starting on Tuesday at his next check-up. I hope!! I don’t know if it is depression, related to diabetes or not, or even ADD. But I am on the brink of jumping over the edge. Not because he is diabetic, but because of his lackadaisical attitude towards everything. Yes, I sometimes wish he also would have been diagnosed at age 10 so that when teenage years hit, it wasn’t an added battle. Or better yet, wait until he was out of our home and had to deal with it himself.
Now for the positives…..Yes, he has never been in the hospital. Many a times my sister would have to be taken to the hospital because she didn’t keep track of things. The diabetes care has changed so much. It amazes me. Do I want a cure, most definitely as I have two close family members it affects. But to see the differences in just these years, amazes me. I have never had to give Cole an injection. I pretty much faint at the site of needles. In an emergency, I am hoping adrenaline takes over. He has done it for himself from day one. I guess we pretty much didn’t give him a choice.
Do I get upset when he doesn’t count his carbs carefully? OH BOY!! I really dislike that he doesn’t log his numbers into his book, I have to do that. Does it upset me when he doesn’t wear his bracelet when he goes out? OH BOY!! Or take his meter? OH BOY!! This is the deal, he is now 16.5 years old. We don’t know everything still tho he sure thinks he does. He is old enough to drive a car,(which he hasn’t earned that right yet), he is definitely old enough to keep track of things. He is so smart and has picked up on things while we are in the check up appointment that I have missed. Does he skirt around to abuse the issue? Yes.
I am sorry this is so long. I guess I needed to type this out as therapy as well. He is so like my sister who she and I are like fire and ice that life gets very difficult around here. I need to keep in mind that he is still a teenager and this is not easy to deal with. Though if planned, he can go out and eat pizza with his buddies!
I am trying hard to let go of things. Trying to deal with the issues which really matter. I want him to get thru high school with a diploma in hand. I am doing my best to guide him in his diabetes but ultimately it is his choice. With this in mind, to the families who are recently diagnosed, help to train your child to do as much by themselves as they possible can.
Well, guess I have babbled way too long, sorry again. I probably don’t have my thoughts in an order that you can all follow as I was just typing away here.
Thank you for your time and your listening(eyes).
Nanette
WI