So you haven’t heard of D-Blog Week? Created last May by Karen from Bittersweet Diabetes, D-Blog Week is a week-long challenge to reflect and respond to a series of prompts as a whole community. This year, there are already over 100 bloggers joining in! Amy and I will be contributing our thoughts here at the ‘Mine all this week, and we’re so excited to be a part of this community effort. The DOC rocks! How many disease communities have this many active bloggers, and this much enthusiasm to share?!
Today’s prompt is all about Admiring Our Differences:
“We are all diabetes bloggers, but we come from many different perspectives – Type 1s, Type 2s, LADAs, parents of kids with diabetes, spouses of adults with diabetes and so on. Today let’s talk about how great it is to learn from the perspectives of those unlike us!… Pick a type of blogger who is different from you and tell us why they inspire you – why you admire them – why it’s great that we are all the same but different!!
Allison Admires… Type 2 Diabetics
I grew up as one of those people who routinely judged people with type 2 diabetes. That’s because I didn’t know any better. Being a part of the Diabetes Online Community, and specifically being a part of the editorial team here at DiabetesMine, has opened my eyes to the challenges of people with type 2 diabetes.
Growing up, my impression of people with type 2 diabetes was that they were old, fat people. It’s true! I am ashamed to admit this prejudice, but I really just didn’t know any better. It’s how the media portrays type 2 diabetes. It’s how doctors explain type 2 diabetes. Even my own encounters with people with T2 seemed to feed into this stereotype. But over the years, I’ve met more and more T2′s who have as unique stories as those of us with type 1 diabetes. And I’ve also come to appreciate the special challenges of living with type 2 diabetes: saying that treating type 2 diabetes is “as easy as popping some pills” is about equivalent to saying that treating type 1 diabetes requires “just taking a few injections every day.”
Clearly, there aren’t as many people with type 2 diabetes in the blogging community, but they are all over the place in the social networks and in my own personal life — like my friend, Lori, who struggles to manage her diabetes just as much as I struggle to manage mine. Bloggers like Mike, Rachel and Alan have been such troopers and have provided so much to the DOC. Seeing folks with T2 stand up for themselves and for their health is really inspiring. So many people want to shut them down, but these guys plug along despite the guilt they face and the cards decked against them. That’s really inspiring. I’m trying to lose weight myself, and I know how hard it is!
Last week, when I was in North Carolina, I had the pleasure of meeting Ann Gann (pictured right), a type 2 and diabetes advocate. During our conversation, something she said really resonated with me: “While we are different… what we have in common is our desire to help each other, to manage our diabetes well, and to help each other be the best that we can be as we seek to manage this disease.” I love that.
When I was interviewed for the now infamous Chicago Tribune article on the “Diabetes Civil War,” (T1 vs. T2) I said, and still maintain, that PWDs are not at war and hopefully we’ll never find ourselves in that position. Yes, type 1 and type 2 are different, but I have found that explaining differences, rather than lambasting each other for them, has done so much good in helping the general population understand diabetes. And it has also helped me understand diabetes. I am guilty of making the same assumptions about type 2 diabetes that people make about type 1 diabetes, and I hope that more T2 diabetics will get involved in the DOC to help set the record straight.
Amy Admires… the D-Parents
(that's SweetPea, whose mom blogs)
As you all know, I’m a parent myself, currently struggling to be the best mom I can to a new teen, a pre-teen and an eight-year-old. All girls.
Like any parent, I burst with pride at their accomplishments, swell with joy when I see them happy, and cringe with pain when they suffer. This is the roller-coaster of parenthood… and then I imagine adding in the diabetes roller-coaster of fluctuating blood sugars, hypers and hypos, guilt and skin pricks and infections and fear for their physical future. It makes my head spin. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: parents coping with their children’s diabetes are my heroes.
Back when I started the ‘Mine, there were no D-parent bloggers. None. The first I became aware of were Martha O’Connor, a fiction author whose small son had just been diagnosed, and later Sandra Miller of A Shot in the Dark. At first I was a little shocked that they would talk so openly about their children’s conditions and even post pictures (kids can’t give informed consent). But soon I began to grasp how therapeutic this was for moms and dads living in a constant state of “orange alert.” Their forthright accounts of this life always stopped me in my tracks.
For example, waaaaaay back in 2005, Sandra wrote:
“Nighttime blood sugar checks and a teething two-year old are a deadly combination. Under these circumstances diabetes management becomes diabetes overload real fast. I try to make it look easy to Joseph. I tell him ‘we’re getting there. It’s just gonna take some time to get this pump thing down. Remember how it was adjusting to shots?’ I don’t want him to fear the future when he will have to manage this himself.”
All I could think was, if I were a new D-mom, I’d be ready to hug Sandra for her willingness to tell it exactly like it is/was.
Today, I’m amazed and delighted to see such a huge and thriving community of D-parents (not just moms! lots of dads too!) chronicling their families’ lives and struggles with diabetes. Anything that effects your children’s well-being takes on a kind of crusade nature, don’t I know it. I may get sloppy about my own diabetes sometimes, but I’d never get sloppy about my kids’ health.
Striving to be the best parent possible is already difficult. We all have our own styles (hat tip to Moira’s controversial post last week). I admire these D-parents bloggers on so many levels — for sharing, for advocating, for “putting themselves out there” when their lives are already so complicated…
♥ Much D-Love, My Parent Friends!! ♥
Some fave D-Parent blogs include:
The Princess and The Pump (her daughter Sweetpea is pictured)
What a nice post! There are many T2 people who are close to my heart, and I’d hate to be “at war” with them. Thank you, Allison.
And thank you, Amy, for the encouragement…it’s funny to read about something from WAAAAAAAY back in 2005!!!! The DOC has opened my eyes to SO MUCH!
I love how so many members of the DOC are blogging about acceptance, friendship, and love today. That’s what makes this whole community go ’round.
fabulous post Amy.
blessings to you from Angela (D-mom Twice)
My eyes were opened to the T2 plight when my mother was diagnosed a few years ago. The standard of care she was given broke my heart. She was swept under the rug for so long…standing up for yourself can be hard. Especially when you have doctors downplaying your numbers. I also have a new found admiration fo the type 2 community/bloggers. The media slams them constantly, and it just isn’t right!
Thanks for the love dear Amy! You are so inspiring! I wrote about all that the PWD bloggers do for me in my post today. You and Allison and all are amazing on so many levels!
Love the insight and perceptions of PWDs. It helps the parents of type 1 kiddos parent and pancreate to the best of our abilities. Thank you for that.
And…what a wonderful list of some of my favorite D Mama’s up there.
Exactly! Great two-part post, ladies. You both make great points. One thing that I find most interesting about this whole dynamic of the DOC is that so many of us are searching for those voices who are “like us” and “get it,” but end up finding not only that but SO MUCH MORE. We may not have even realized that we needed to know or understand these other perspectives from other Types, D-Parents, or so on… that is, until we found them and became a part of this Community. Now, it’s impossible to even describe how much those perspectives and voices are a part of our lives.
Thank you for listing other blogs you like! I like finding new blogs to start reading. This is such a great post too.
I had to laugh at the “informed consent” comment by Amy. I tried to keep my D-kid anonymous in the beginning, but she literally wants to take center stage! It’s definitely a balancing act to share without over sharing.
As I said in my D-Blog Week post today (which just happens to mention both Allison and Diabetes Mine), writing about it is cathartic. It helps me to get it out and sometimes even let it go.
I can’t say enough how much I appreciate the varied perspectives of the DOC: the PWD’s, whether T1 or T2, and the D-Moms and D-Dads. I have learned so much!
Great post. And thanks for the shout out!
Wow!! I pop over to read your D blog post and who do I see but my Sweetpea?!? Awww! Thanks for including us in your list! I’m honored!
I find that I have learned so much from the other D bloggers – whatever “kind” they are! I learned stuff I didnt even know I NEEDED to know! I especially love reading the adult T1 blogs because it’s like a little glimpse into the future. I only hope that Sweets will grow up to be as strong and AWESOME as the bloggers here are! You truly inspire us and give us such hope for the future!
Hi Ann! Speak it, honey!
I’m so excited that I get to see Ann later this week to work together on advocating for pwd’s in a program that that I learned about on this very site: DiabetesMine. I love how everything comes around.
I love all of the d-love this week!
All the best,
Kate
Sandra is one of my biggest inspirations. She is an amazing person and an awesome mom.
I just recently found your blog and love it….feeling connected!
Just recently found your blog! Love feeling connected!