Remember the emotions at diagnosis? New fears and expectations crowded your thoughts, but sometimes they stick with you. Finding ways to confront the changes in our life since that day hasn’t always been easy, but now more days are “sweet” than sour. Together we can explore how to help that happen for your family, too!
Since diabetes first entered our lives, learning about diabetic life transformed the ways we looked at everything: food, exercise, sleep, stress, work, school, organization, grocery shopping, meal prep. The daily motions for habits we took for granted veered off into new directions.
However, not only those formerly “normal” things, but also the totally new aspects of life introduced things never considered. Insulin and all the things it involves like obtaining it, long-acting and short-acting types, basal and correction factors, transporting insulin in the heat of a southern summer, alcohol wipes, injections and finger pokes and CGM…
This blog also exists to help us to remember our victories and our struggles. We created a place to document and share our journey, so that together we can tackle diabetic life and celebrate the sweet moments in our journey.
How do we plan to help?
Table of Contents
1. Provide easy to follow guides and suggestions for gradual changes
Little decisions influence the course of our day. So what happens when we take small steps forward? We eventually get close to our destination! The old mantra “the only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time” definitely rings true for dealing with major life changes.
The only way for us to process major differences in our lives involves taking those small steps. So, we recreated the systems we needed to get out the door and be on time with diabetic supplies in hand. We analyzed the way we bought and prepared food and kept the family favorites while tossing them up a bit. Our hall closet? You must mean the new spot for supplies arranged in a way that prevented the struggle of regularly sorting through everything to find the box of pin needles.
Whether you are action-oriented people or folks who need a push to initiate change, we want to share the tips that make our life easier. And, believe it or not, it does get easier! We plan to post check-lists and suggestions that work for us in the hope that you find some simplicity, too!
2. Help parents instill confidence in their children and themselves through understanding
In the early days, I read everything I could search and find online or in books or on social media. Assimilating information grew into a part-time job. I just couldn’t find simplicity in words that I actually understood. I distinctly remember sitting in the pediatric ICU and searching the meaning of the word “basal.” I had an idea, but in the information overload, my mind could not remember it.
Those midnight searches are the inspiration for our series of posts entitled “Answers for Kids” and “Diabetes 101” for adults. While Michelle writes the posts geared for adults with all the new vocabulary and some basic information on what it means to your life, Milly creates similar posts for your kids. Understanding builds confidence, and we all deserve both!
3. Recommend the best tips that worked for us
Social media groups, influencers, people who who said something would work while totally clueless, and the well-meaning friend who suggested apple cider vinegar…the world is full of tips. But, the most certain thing about diabetes is that no two people experience it the same way. The acronym YDMD (Your Diabetes May Differ) should really show up more in posts.
The tips we adapted to allow our family to function better can be a starting place for your own discoveries. Identifying tried-and-true, specific strategies that work simplifies the research and information overload. Use what worked for us! If it doesn’t work for your family (YDMD) use it as a place to jump off into your own adaptations and find your own solutions!
4. Write a weekly blog post to help parents on their journey
Through our weekly blog, we share the good, the bad, and the in between. But hopefully, you can see the joy and the promise that exists through all of it. Walk with us as we seek out new strategies and deal with new things as they pop up.
Things like birthday parties and holidays don’t have to add stress. We’ll share the ideas that help us take the emphasis off of food and put it back on the fun! Creativity can solve so many problems, so use our hacks and tips to spur on your own ideas or provide an alternative way of looking at the situation.
And, when you have one of those bad days, look through some of our bad days and know you are not alone. Will we try to turn lemons into lemonade? Sure. But first we have to accept we are holding lemons. Finding good in difficult circumstances changes our attitudes, but with a diabetic diagnosis, the circumstance doesn’t change.
Finally…
We hope our experience can lighten the load you carry with diabetes. Life consists of sweet moments as well as those that are sour, hard, and difficult. That’s true for everyone. The simple truth is that diabetes is hard. It is unfair in how it changes day to day and in how diabetics are forced to act as a pancreas in order to live. However, diabetes is not an end. It just begins a new trajectory in a life that is as special and full of meaning as it ever was.
We pray that you find some inspiration for your journey as you walk with us through ours!
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