I realise that in two of my last three posts, I promoted two specific people and their fundraising efforts, as I thought their efforts are quite inspirational. At the same time though, I’ve realised there are a gazillion more people out there who are collecting pennies for my two favourite charities, as well as some smaller, new ones. Initially, I only planned to write a trilogy on how I feel inspired by others to do more (take better care of myself, be more active, raise more money, reach out to more people, …), but now I feel I need a small “Appendix” post to highlight the efforts of these two main charities and also some of the other people who are raising money for them.
The Inspired Diabetic – Part III: The Sandman
For those of you who have been following the time frame of my first two posts in this series on some recent truly inspirational events in my life, will realise that I may have told a little white lie (read more here about The Envoy and The Community). When I wrote the first post, the third and final experience hadn’t happened yet… but the anticipation and knowledge about this man and his achievements meant that I knew it would be an inspirational evening no matter what! So enough confessions for one post, and on with the matter at hand: last night we went to Inverness to go see a talk by Roddy Riddle on completing the Marathon des Sables with Type 1 Diabetes.
The Inspired Diabetic – Part II: The Community
A few days ago, I wrote about one of three inspiring things which happened to me over the last few weeks, and today, I wanted to share the second experience with you. On the weekend of May 10th to May 12th, Animas (who make insulin pumps) and LifeScan (who make blood glucose meters) organised a sports weekend for people with Type 1 Diabetes at Loughborough University. It was an amazing experience, and apart from coming away armed with the tools to juggle diabetes when exercising (I will post more on my personal learning from the weekend in a different post), it also made me realise we’re an amazing community filled with inspirational people!
The Inspired Diabetic – Part I: The Envoy
Pfew, what a busy and hectic few weeks! Work has been a whirlwind of deadlines and events, and on a personal level things have been just as manic. In the last two weeks though, I’ve been in contact with some truly inspirational people who aren’t letting life with diabetes stop them from doing extra-ordinary things, inspiring the “regular Jane of diabetes” like me to do more. I thought I’d share three experiences with you in the next week or so, and hopefully inspire some more “regular Joe’s and Jane’s”. Some of the people I met aren’t just inspiring others, they are also raising money for the two main diabetes-charities: Diabetes UK and JDRF. Rather than writing about all of these experiences in one post (and give you information overload!), I’ve decided to spit them up into three pieces. The first inspirational person I wanted to write about is Gavin Griffiths, who I met at the start of the month.
The Seasonal Diabetic
Woohoo! It looks like Spring has finally made its entrance to the North of Scotland! OK, so temperatures are only reaching the mid-teens, unlike down South, but as the weather has been warming up and more importantly drying out, my lifestyle has also been changing! Of course, with the big D, this means a transition from one equilibrium to another (I use the term equilibrium loosely here!). So at the moment, I’m in this intermediate unsettled period, and taking my time to figure out my diabetes summer-time schedule!
The Willing Diabetic
At some point, we all reach that point where things have to change… Breaking point… But making that change requires a little push of extra effort, of will power, of knowledge … A little more time and energy, that at the moment you just don’t have… I’ve reached that point, now I just have to dig in and push past it! Continue reading
The Dormant Diabetic
Happy Snooz-a-versary! Wow, it’s been a few days over 6 months since my last blog post! With a few diabetes appointments coming up, I guess it’s time to awaken from my slumber and give you all a quick update. The good news is that the world hasn’t ended (in your face, Mayans!), but the more unfortunate news is that I still live with diabetes (no magical, snap-of-the-fingers cure… yet!).
This past half year seems to have passed me by completely, and my best way to describe it is: “I’ve been lived”; surprisingly enough not just diabetes-wise, but across all aspects of my life. I would like to say that life with the big D has been easy and straightforward, and that after so many months of settling in to it, it’s all become second nature and taken a back seat. Unfortunately, that’s not the case! Sometimes, a bad run still pushes me to frustration. Bad decisions, wrong choices and the sheer randomness of diabetes: what worked before suddenly no longer does the job! These times rest heavier on my mind, the periods in between -when I’m on a good run- don’t carry the same weight in my memories. They just blend into the background of my life, probably because they don’t trigger such a strong emotion (like frustration), but instead just give a pleasant calm. The only exception was a good run of above-4-below-7 a few days ago: when I looked at the row in my diary, I did have a bit of a smug grin (don’t worry, it got quickly wiped off my face by a few random 11’s the next day!).
Often in the past 6 months, diabetes has been pushed to the background: for better or for worse. I should really learn to say “no”, but my love for helping everyone means I’m juggling a lot of things, and I have to admit that at times my health has probably suffered a bit. If I’m really honest though, I enjoy being so busy so I doubt this will change. What I have realised is that I need to allocate some time to review my diary (and DAFNE away) and to fit in some more online time: keeping in touch with other people with diabetes and getting support from those who understand most. If anything, that’s what I’ve missed most during my little hiatus.
So, that was the past 6 months, but what am I looking forward to in 2013? We’re expanding our household… not with babies, but hopefully a cute little ball of kitten fluff will join us soon! Also, I’m hoping we’ll go on a long backpacker’s holiday; it will be the first one where the big D will join us, but it will only be a small consideration in our destination choice, and may need a little more planning to avoid holiday mishaps. Finally, the most exciting event might actually come early in the year: apart from my regular check-up at the GP surgery, I also have an appointment with my clinic’s Pump Doctor in the next few weeks. The clinic isn’t very renowned for handing out pumps generously, so I’m going in with fairly low expectations. I’m going in prepared though by doing some homework to help make my case. It’s a first appointment, so in any case it will just be interesting to find out what the possibilities are.
Until next time (hopefully not 6 months from now 
),
The … Diabetic
