[Diabetes-talk] FW: [acb-diabetics] Thinking positively about diabetes

[Mike Freeman]

From: acb-diabetics-bounces at acb.org [mailto:acb-diabetics-bounces at acb.org]
On Behalf Of Patricia LaFrance-Wolf
Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2012 3:58 PM
To: 'Discussion list for diabetics and/or ACB issues'
Subject: [acb-diabetics] Thinking positively about diabetes

 



Thinking Positively About Diabetes 

When people with diabetes <http://www.diabeteshealth.com/>  are successful
and happy, their situation is often viewed as having been achieved despite
the obstacle of diabetes. I am advocating for a shift in that perception.
What if instead of seeing all the good in our lives as existing despite our
disease, we begin to see everything that we are-the challenges and the
achievements-as a direct product of all that we are made up of, diabetes
included?

I remember the very moment that this realization came to me. I was talking
to a natural healer in Forest Row, England, sitting in a room filled with
late afternoon light, soft music playing in the background. The healer
looked at me and said simply, "Why do you want to be cured?"

Now, there are many valid reasons that a person with diabetes would want to
be cured, and I do not intend to minimize any of them. Diabetes is
physically, emotionally, and psychologically painful. There can be
devastating long-term consequences, and the stress stemming from the
constant planning, the minute-to-minute battles, and the associated money
worries is no small thing. But looking at the woman, I could not think of a
reply.

"Well," I began tentatively, "sometimes it hurts. When I hit a bruise, or
something like that."
She nodded slowly. "What else?" I paused and then said, "That doesn't happen
that much, though. The needles are pretty small. Most of the time you can
barely feel it."

The woman didn't say anything. "I don't want to be held back from anything.
Travel, things like that," I added. "Have you been?" she asked. I shook my
head. I hadn't. I was visiting friends in England for two weeks, after
having spent the last month in Thailand, Vietnam, and Cambodia. In three
days I would be leaving to spend five weeks in Northern Africa.\

"Anything else?" she asked. "It's not the injections, in and of themselves,
that are hard," I said. "It's the infinity: that everything is based around
it, that it will never be gone." She smiled at me, a kind, twinkling smile.
"But the truth is," I began again, "I can think of a lot more reasons as to
why it is good for me than why it is bad." "Oh yes?" She raised an eyebrow.

I began listing the reasons: It taught me how to take care of myself,
allowed me to be vulnerable and sensitive, gave me a constant reminder to be
healthy, and helped me remember how fragile and thus, how beautiful, our
mortality is. "Do you think that thinking about your diabetes the way you do
has something to do with your numbers being so good?" the woman asked me.

I nodded. My A1C <http://www.diabeteshealth.com/browse/monitoring/a1c-test/>
since my diagnosis, four years previously, had been between 5.4% and 5.6%.
With an A1C like that, I'm not going to have to worry about long-term
consequences. Doctors have been scratching their heads over my case since
the beginning, not understanding how my numbers can be so tightly
controlled.

As I left the healer's house and walked home through the dusk, a dog bounded
out of the darkness toward me. As it neared, I noticed that it had only
three legs. Reaching me, it raced around me, its panting smile making me
laugh. As the dog raced off again, I was struck by its grace, and by the
fact that it did not seem to notice that anything about it was different, or
"wrong." As I walked on, I thought about the way that we allow disease to
define us. The dog had only three legs, but it did not question its
condition. It ran with the same speed, the same joy, that it would have run
if it had all four. 

Since then a day hasn't passed that I don't think of the importance of
feeling all sides of the spectrum that is offered to us through disease.
Sometimes I'm angry or hurt, but when that is the case, I let myself feel
it. All the other days, I make sure to take the time to sit with this
"thing" that has been given to me and listen to what it is telling me. Every
day, diabetes teaches me something new about loving myself, about opening up
to others, about compassion and the value of receiving as well as giving. 

To help others who may be struggling with diabetes, I have outlined a few
simple things that I find very helpful in grounding me and helping me to
accept, live with, and, in my own way, love my disease.

Reflect on both side

As I did with the healer in England, make a list outlining the things about
diabetes that challenge you the most. Then make a list of what you have
learned and how it has changed you. If there are changes that you resent or
wish hadn't occurred, reflect on how you can best move beyond them.

Ask for help

When you have a hard day, or when an injection hurts, allow yourself to be
upset. If you need to cry, cry. If you need someone else to take care of
you, ask for it, and let them. We get so wrapped up in the fear of being a
burden that we don't let those who love us show their love to us. If you
need to talk to people who are dealing with the same issues, find a support
group in your area, or an online forum. There is support available for us if
we are willing to look for it.

Incorporate positivity into your life 

Everything in the body is connected, so it stands to reason that what the
brain is thinking affects the body as well. Positivity and awareness in your
life as a whole will help create a positivity in dealing with your diabetes.
Make sure to take time for yourself and to do the things you enjoy. Being
happy with yourself as a person will make diabetes that much easier.

Don't let it stop you

Many people with diabetes don't do what they most want to, like traveling or
athletic challenges, because they think that diabetes is stopping them.
That's not the case. With the right planning and mindset, diabetes won't
stop you from doing what you love.

Don't fight it

When I was diagnosed, I was faced with two options: fight the diagnosis by
being stubborn, angry, and in denial, or accept that the strongest thing I
could do was to give in to it. In that moment I became vulnerable, realizing
that diabetes is not a malicious or separate force. It is inside of me, it
is inherently me. If you fight your disease, there will be a battle going on
inside your body, and that will fundamentally damage you. Try to shift from
thinking of diabetes as something separate, something painful, something
evil. Instead, think of it as just another part of who you are, a mix of the
challenging and the rewarding-an important part of yourself that requires
patience, practice, and love.

I think it is safe to say that there are very few people who have not been
affected by disease in one form or another, either personally or indirectly.
It seems not only logical, but also necessary, that we begin to incorporate
positive thinking into our lives as a way to better understand and cope with
illness.

  _____  

 

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