what i would like them to know

I have mody 3 diabetes

when i tell doctors or nurses that its often up to me to educate them on what exactly that is as they have normally only heard of type 1 or type 2 diabetes. That is frustrating, i mean I'm the patient, i don't have a medical degree.... obviously i don't expect a surgeon to know the ins and outs of mody diabetes, but a diabetes specialist should be able to educate me about it rather than the other way round...

so what would i like them to know?

I would like doctors and nurses to remember that often the patient knows best when it comes to their condition and whats going on, after all they are the ones living with it

I would like them to know that just because two people have the same type of diabetes it doesn't mean that their treatment will be the same or that they will react to treatment in the same way... every person is different

I would like them to know that its scary going to clinic appointments, get to know the patient, chat about other stuff as well as diabetes (after all that's not our entire lives) it will help us to trust and respect you, and it will help you to understand why we had high or low numbers... lots of things affect it

i would like them to remember that a hba1c doesn't always reflect what happens day to day, sometimes you have to believe the numbers in the log book even if it doesn't look like it matches, it is only an average and doesn't reflect the effort that is or isn't going into controlling diabetes

i would like them to listen when you say you need help. its hard enough to admit that let alone having to fight to get the support you need

i would like them to know that living with diabetes is tough, its not always easy to carb count or get doses right, you aren't always going to remember every injection, we are human after all

i would like them to know about my type of diabetes and be able to tell me how its going to progress or how much it will affect my life.... even at 19 i worry about passing it on to children or the likelihood of getting complications in the future

overall i just want doctors and nurses to look beyond the textbook examples and the treatment plans that are printed on paper.

i am an individual, i need my own plan that works for me. whether that involves insulin, tablets or diet control i just need the support for what I choose to do.

I am not a number

I am not defined by my condition

just remember




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turning things around

Its hard to believe im now approaching my 3rd anniversary of being diagnosed with diabetes


my second anniversary of being put on insulin.


such a short amount of time compared to other people and yet ive almost given up already.

the amount of insulin injections ive done in the last month can be counted on one hand.

i came home from uni 2 months ago with 200 test strips, i still have over 50 left. not good.


ive gotta turn it round, ive gotta start doing this properly again and get my hba1c back down.

ive gotta start carb counting like ive been shown how to do

i need to get back my control


the fear factor has never worked with me, its never motivated me to control diabetes, but how rubbish ive felt recently has made me realise that i need to get things back to how they were.


with my levels hovering around 20mmols most of the time ive had no energy to do simple tasks, my moods have been all over the place, ive been so thirsty but for a while now ive thought its been worth it for the weight loss.

ive been thinking about it though, and ive started realising that weight loss is great, but not when its at the expense of my sight, my limbs, my heart or  my kidneys....

weight isnt really that important, ive got a boyfriend who loves me for me, ive got friends, ive got my family and im making something of my life....

weight loss will come eventually, my health is more important.

ive missed being part of the online community, ive missed feeling like i have the energy to do stuff, ive missed feeling like ive achieved something when i see a good number.

what good am i if i carry on like this and end up blind, with amputations or dead?

ive done so well before, i fought for an accurate diagnosis and won, i fought for the right treatment and won and ive fought this for 3yrs without anything bad happening

its gunna be tough, im gunna need support, im gunna need to take things one step at a time and im gunna have days when things dont work out.


ive got to do it for me and thats what im going to do

controlling sugar levels isnt the only battle

diabetes is hard

diabetes is tough to deal with

diabetes is scary

diabetes is a battle physically and mentally

diabetes is my life.

at the moment I'm finding diabetes difficult, not so much the testing and injecting, its more the effects of doing that.... 

i was doing my jabs every day

i was keeping my levels under control

i was trying my hardest to record it all and look for patterns

then it all fell apart

now, this has happened before for me, normally because the effort of it all became too much.

that's not the reason this time

this time its different, this time its a different battle going on in my head

weight

I've been battling with my weight for over half of my life, I've never been huge, but i have been what i would consider 'fat' for a long time now

it doesn't help though that the doctors and nurses are always on at me about my weight and how losing weight will help my diabetes (despite it being genetic and not linked to weight)

now, weight has always been a sensitive topic for me, I'm very conscious of it and have never had high self esteem so for a doctor to put so much emphasis on it, it just pushes it further and further to the front of my mind and means i have even less confidence.

losing weight is my biggest priority

I've had times where i have starved myself eating about 400cals a day just to lose some weight before an appointment so they don't moan at me

that's how important it is to me

so when i saw that i had lost weight when i got back from uni i was over the moon, i was so chuffed with myself and thought i had actually achieved something.

then i started injecting and controlling my diabetes.

i put on the pounds in a matter of days, not helped by the fact i had several hypos

that upset me so much

injections were dropped

it felt like i had almost been injecting liquid fat into my skin

losing weight is more of a priority than controlling diabetes and i cant believe that i think that.

why would i put how i look before my current and future health? i cant answer that, all i know is that I'm more scared of putting on weight than i am seeing a bad number on my meter

i know i will get abuse for saying that

its hard

people don't understand

there are more battles behind diabetes than people see and for me, weight is the biggest one