Diabetes Hero – Diabetes Blog Week 2012

I admire every diabetic and every parent raising a diabetic.

Though, there is a special place in my heart for parents of diabetics. I’ve been sitting here for the better part of an hour trying to decide to whom this post would be directed. After that first sentence it finally clicked…parents raising diabetics.

I honestly have no idea how you handle it all, I think each and every one of you is amazing. My parents tried to pray away my diabetes when I was diagnosed, thankfully I was 18 and only went along with it for a few months and only went one day without insulin.

Even after having diabetes for nearly eight years now, I don’t know how I’d handle raising a diabetic child. I can figure out how to deal with feeling like crap because of a roller coaster day and still function…but it kills me to think of anyone else handling it. I’m quasi-paranoid as it is about my sugars, I’m sure it’d be quadrupled if it was my kid.

Those who raise diabetic children amaze me; I am in complete awe of them. Having never been a diabetic child I’m not 100% sure what it’s like to be a kid with diabetes. Learning to inject myself and carb count while in elementary school…it truly amazes me.

And let’s not forget the kids with diabetes. Their resilience is amazing. (I need a synonym for amaze/amazing). There are a lot of days I’d just like to stay in bed all day because I feel like crap from my blood sugars (or Crohn’s) and some days I do stay in bed for most of it. Some days it’s just too hard to go out and take a hike with Moyer (the best dog in the whole world…even if he does chip your tooth and/or split your head open) – it’s frustrating on those days. If I were a kid, I’m sure I’d be even more frustrated to not be doing everything my friends do any time they do it.

Not that diabetics aren’t capable. But diabetes sometimes changes the way you do things or how you do them. Kids should just be able to be kids. Everyone says it, so I know it’s nothing new…but it’d be nice if everyone saying it could somehow magically make it true!