There are lots of people on social media doing their bit for diabetes awareness, and this is fantastic. However, raising awareness seems to be a big buzzword these days, but what does that really mean, and how do we raise awareness of something effectively? Should I do it by sharing a random image on my Facebook feed that doesn’t tell any of my friends anything at all? Or should I use my social media to share information?
In this post, I will provide a short summary of the information revealed from parliamentary question responses on how many people in Ireland use insulin pumps, what clinics provide them as a treatment option and how many new pump starts are done each year.
My diabetes diagnosis shattered my confidence in my ability to take care of myself, and my plan quickly became to just get through the rest of the term, move home for the summer to my previous summer job and figure the rest out over the summer. Adjusting to my new normal of living with diabetes began while I was still in hospital, or did it?
I realised last year that in all the blog posts I’d done these last 13 years, I have never shared my diagnosis story, so here it goes. My diabetes diagnosis is not unique; many of my friends with diabetes share similar experiences; however, some people end up very ill and may have spent time in intensive care units in hospitals. Thankfully this was not the case for me, but I did feel like I was dying.
The purpose of the document is to provide an estimate of the number of people who are using HSE-funded Flash and CGMs in Ireland and to prompt a discussion around access equality. I believe we need to talk about how fair it is that so many are approved for HSE funding and why some people are still being made to pay.
A combination of my personal blog about living with type 1 diabetes in Ireland and sharing information I collect along the way. I feel that living with type 1 diabetes is sometimes like being on a trampoline, except you can never get off. It doesn't take long for us to get tired of all that bouncing. It's not any fun.
Here, we can bounce together, keep each other steady, and cheer each other on when we get tired and want to get off the trampoline.
I'm so lucky that I was born and live in Ireland. I can go to a chemist at any time and walk out with a month's supply of insulin, test strips and whatever else I need to live. Without paying a cent!
If I was born elsewhere that would not be the case. I would not be able to afford my insulin and I would not be here today.
Yesterday, I donated money that I had set aside to Spare A Rose and give a child with diabetes a chance at life for a year.
Spare a Rose, Save a Child is the brainchild of the Diabetes Online Community in North America. The idea being to take the typical “dozen roses,” so popular on Valentine’s Day, and just buy 11, save just one rose and donate to spare the life of a child.
The idea was to take the typical “dozen roses,” so popular on Valentine’s Day, and save just one rose to spare the life of a child. “Spare a Rose, Save a Child” is simple: buy one less rose this Valentine’s Day and share the value of that flower with a child with diabetes in the developing world. Your loved one at home still gets flowers and you both show some love to someone across the world who needs it. From Kerri Sparling, Sixuntilme
Please join me! Donate here.
Some of you may have come across the Hashtag #IWishPeopleKnewThatDiabetes..... over the last year, which is the brainchild of Diabetesaliciouness blogger, Kelly Kunik.
I met the superwoman herself last July at the MasterLab Diabetes Advocates conference. On that first morning, as I took a deep breath and joined a table of strangers. I know, I'm a very grown-up woman but I still have to force strongly encourage myself to do these things because I know I'll regret it if I don't.
Anyway, I did not recognise anyone but as soon as the ladies started conversing and using their first names, I started to connect the "who" to the "blog" and figured out that the girl sitting right beside me was Kelly.
Kelly has lived with type 1 since she was 8 years old (that's 38 years), and comes from a long line of direct relatives with type 1 diabetes, including her sister who died in 1991 from complications at the age of 33. Kelly gave an indept interview in August to Diabetes Mine in which you can read lots more about her and why she does what she does.
The #IWishPeopleKnewThatDiabetes hashtag and the #IWishPeopleKnewThatDiabetes Day, (22nd April 2015), were inspired by 3rd grade teacher, Kyle Schwartz and her #Iwishmyteacherknewthat hashtag, which was heartbreaking.
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| Photo cortesy of DiabetesMine.com |
Kelly says that "This day is about people living with diabetes taking to twitter and using the hashtag in unison for a 24 hours period to express the good, the bad and the diabetesalicious of it all."
The #hashtag and day took on a life of their own with over 16 countries participating and generating over 17 million twitter impressions to date.
The IWishPeopleKnewThatDiabetes hashtag has now become an initiative, a movement and a call to action where people can express themselves past the 140 character limit and in various multimedia formats. Kelly launched the "Iwishpeopleknewthatdiabetes.org" website last November. She (and I) encourages everybody to visit the website and submit your own "what you wished people knew about diabetes". You can also read some guest posts from rock stars in the Diabetes Community and some totally-not-a-rock-star-or-even-close people's guest posts (i.e. yours truly. I was so honoured that she asked!!!)
IWishPeopleKnewThatDiabetes.org is well worth a visit.
No, I swear I'm not crazy... or easily entertained!!!
I only began watching the programme a number of years ago, when the creators partnered with Diabetes Ireland to create more awareness about type 2 diabetes. It was only then that I realised this show is about so much more than getting five people to lose weight.
And I got hooked! Unlike any reality TV show that I have seen, it's not about putting people down or pitting them against each other.
The show motivates and inspires people and communities to come together to become healthier. They are partnered with Sports Ireland who help organise nationwide walks in over fifty locations all around Ireland.
It encourages everyone to take back control of their lives, no matter what your demons are.
Five leaders are selected and are supported and guided by a panel of experts in the fields of fitness, nutrition and psychology in order to reach their individual goals. The show broadcasts over a period of seven weeks but most leaders continue on their journey sucessfully.
The leaders are chosen on the basis that there is someone for everyone to relate to. The meal and exercise plans which have been created for each leader are published online so that viewers can follow the plans also.
And this programme is educational; I was happy with my weight but the truth is that when I go clothes shopping I am definately not.
The show has teams up with Sport Ireland, who organise nationwide walks in over fifty locations all around Ireland. The highest number to date who took part is over 19,000 people. Every year this numbers climbs and climbs.
The complications of diabetes are real and people are living with them. People are also living in fear of them. Myself included. I am actively trying to overcome this fear because if I do end up with complications I don't want to feel like it is the end of my life. Or that I failed to manage my diabetes well enough. And I certainly don't want to be made to feel that it's my fault.
I don't believe just because I am doing everything in my power to manage my diabetes that I will be spared. I believe that if I have type 1 diabetes I still have the risk of developing complications. I strive to keep that percentage of risk low but it will never be zero.
I will not stop trying!
Image from http://www.coolnsmart.com/failure_quotes/
So, when a friend of mine, who has lived more than 50 years with type 1 diabetes and who lives with a number of the complications of diabetes, comes to our T1D meet ups and people imply she didn't take of herself, I get a little "upset"!
My friend has survived taking care of her diabetes when there was no such thing as a glucose meter! Imagine never know what your blood sugar was?!?
She has survived during a time when the phrase "carb counting" might as well have been a foreign language in Ireland. It didn't exist!
We also did not have Rapid Acting Insulins until the late 1990's. So, even if we did practice carb counting, it wouldn't have been much good to us. Sure, we could do a certain amount of carb counting on the insulins we took only twice a day but we couldn't fine tune it like we can today.
We also did not know that the tighter your diabetes control, the less likely you were to be at risk of getting diabetes complications. This research was only published in 1993 as the DCCT Trials.
93 years ago we died! Today, we have so many tools, technology and instant access to research that people with type 1 diabetes, who have been told for decades what they can't do are breaking all of those barriers.
So I ask you? Is surviving 50 years with type 1 diabetes and living with complications really not taking care of yourself?
My friends who live with diabetes complications may even say themselves, that they didn't do as much as they should have to take care of their diabetes. And I say you did the very best that you, and everybody else, knew how.
I am so lucky and proud to have friends like Deniabetic, who are helping me overcome my fears.
I'm itching to get out for that first regular walk of 2016, to have a routine again and reclaim familiar BG patterns so I can make adjustments.
I think I just found my new years resolution! And I think I'm finding my way back.
