The Dark Side

There's a place that I knowit's not pretty there, and few have ever gone.If I show it to you nowwill it make you run away?Or will you stay? Even if it hurts,even if I try to push you out,will you return?And remind me who i really am...Please remind me who i really am.Everybody's got a dark side. Do you love me?Can you love mine?Nobody's a picture perfect,but we're worth it..you know that we're worth it.Will you love me?Even with my dark side?~Kelly ClarksonI'm a pretty strong person.  I haven't always been that way.  But trials and just plain life has molded me into who I am.  Lately, sometimes, I get told how strong...

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The Diabetes Detour... Where am I, again?

One of life's many reminders that I am not alone, with diabetes."Who are you?," I asked, as strange and odd faces peered over me, picked me up and placed me on a stretcher. "What am I doing here?"No one answered.The world felt really odd, and weird. My head, compressed and pained, while my vision was at odds with my mind... as if I had put on a pair of someone's prescription glasses many times more powerful than my own vision, and making everything in sight oddly concave."She keeps saying that!" said the voice of a red headed woman with too much eye make up, in an exasperated tone, and incredulous that I could not remember who any of them...

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Let it be.

Let it be.Let it happen. Let it alone.Just BE.My husband and had the rare opportunity to have dinner with some friends in the city.  On the way home the sun was setting and the Bay Area glowed in yellow haze, carpeted by reflective pools of water.  Almost intuitively the radio began to play "Let it Be" by the Beatles.The words pierced my heart.  I tried to internalize exactly what they meant to me.  To us.Let it be.Let it be...as in, Let it happen?   Life doesn't stop for anything.  It is a crazy ride and when something big shakes up our world my first instinct is to think, when will this end?  How long...

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When numbers take over the night.

Deep in the nighttime when children are dreaming, When parents are snoring and resting their minds.The numbers march into our homes never failing,And dictate the peace that our bodies will find.A wave of emotion they bring with each blinking,The numbers they know how to hurt and be kind.They bounce up and down like a young child flailing,And soothe us to sleep with their one hundred and nine.When we dose we are hopeful that we are securingA strong healthy number to keep the calm night.But that number will turn when we're least expecting,No choice but give up our sleep for the fight. Some numbers are brutal, they'll fight until morningtaking...

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Holding on by a bracelet...

Yesterday was a big day.  14 hours from beginning to end at the hospital for Ryan's Gamma Knife Radiation.  As thankful as I am for the technology that will surely help my husband, I am so glad that yesterday is over.It's hard to explain what feeling helpless is like.  It mentally hurts so much that your body viscerally responds to it.  It is an aching anger that comes from the gut, and a quiet hurt that haunts your heart.  Needless to say, feeling helpless is not my favorite.One would think I would be used to it.  When it comes to diabetes I often feel helpless.  But when you see someone in front of you miserable...that...

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Raising Hell... One Ice Cream Scoop at a Time

Last year, a certain man writing for his local newspaper, took advantage of the health struggles faced by people with type 2 diabetes to push his OWN agenda: Food Alarmism. In it, he claimed folks with type 2 diabetes were like alcoholics, who needed to be kept away from all sugar, and be on a fruits, vegetables, and grains only diet. It was a very hurtful column, not just for type 2 diabetics -- who get BULLIED constantly because of the massive amount of assumptions and misinformation in the news and media, but it also hurt type 1 diabetics as well. In his post, the man became indignant because the local type 1 diabetes organization...

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Have diabetes, will travel

Four oversized swollen suitcases.Four backpacks, one for each boy.One large tote bag for me.One carry on that looked like this.We were ready.As we made our way to the security lines at the airport I searched for the "family and medical assistance line."  When I found it I explained that I had three boys wearing insulin pumps and they couldn't go through the metal detector/scanner."Don't tell me...tell the next guy."The next guy checked our ID's and waved us through.  He didn't want to hear it either.  "Tell the next guy."As we arranged all our bags on the x ray conveyor belt, I explained to the gentleman standing there that...

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Learning what it means to be a Friend for Life.

Sometimes life has a way of throwing us curve balls. Things happen that we don't expect and it takes the will of a thousand prayers to keep us walking upright.Last week I was taken to the edge of my will. I pushed the envelope so hard I almost lost my ability to think in the process. Worry has a funny way of making you feel vulnerable and alone. Its easy to shut out the rest of the world and wallow in our own cave of misery.I tried to do that on Saturday at the Friends For Life Conference. I failed.But first, a little back story...We left for the Children With Diabetes Friends for Life Conference on Tuesday evening. We got...

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The Stepford Diabetic: The Most Frustrating Type of Diabetic

September 29th, 1985.I remember I was with my dad, out in the country. My dad was a real estate appraiser, and often would go appraise homes or farms 2-3 hours away, deep in the Puerto Rican country side. I loved it. I put on my 'Tinkerbell' brand make up, and dressed up... and dad would let me take pictures of the properties. You got to see a different way life; farm animals up close, and the people were always so kind. Sometimes they'd pay you in fruit, giant bunches of plantains or bananas, or even legumes. Sometimes in animals, like rabbits.  (I came by a pet rabbit that I adored, this way.)I don't remember the town we had gone to (it...

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WE ARE GOING TO FFL!

You all have no idea how hard it was to keep all this in.  Secrets are HARD to keep!Last year I entered the Once Upon a Time Contest sponsored by Lilly and Disney.  To enter, I wrote a short essay about our life with diabetes.  (Not easy.  It's no secret that short is not my forte.)I found out in January that I won!  I won a trip for our family to attend the Children With Diabetes Friends for Life Conference in Orlando.  (This was before we found out about Ryan's cancer...so it wasn't a pity win.  Or maybe it was. I do have three boys with Type 1, right?)When we got the news in March about Ryan, we thought...

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