How would I handle this kind of freedom – pie everyday?

 

Hmm…maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, after all. But I do seem to have my eyes closed, like a blind person in this new world

 

 Today, the last of diabetes blog week, the task is to pretend a cure has been found. We are all given a tiny little pill to swallow and *poof* our pancreases are back in working order. No side effects. No more insulin resistance. No more diabetes. Tell what your life is now like. Or take us through your first day celebrating life without the Big D. 

Blog about how you imagine you would feel if you no longer were a Person With Diabetes. 

I realize what a huge shift it is to think of what my every day would be like if diabetes were not in it: To eat without a second thought about what I’m eating and how many carbs are in it and how much insulin I have to load in my syringe. That seems the biggest technical change that would occur. Also, to not stab myself with needles – both for taking insulin and testing my blood sugar – a dozen times a day or see blood sugar trails in my kitchen and on my clothes. 

To not have lows, but get through a string of days, geez every day, without feeling my heart beat out of my chest or that I HAVE TO EAT to save my life. How I hate that. 

To not have to get up in the morning – no matter what the time  – jump out of bed (usually 6:30 AM) and test my blood sugar so I can take that first injection to blunt my early morning rise. Of course that’s followed by a bolus for breakfast and a basal shot for the day. 

Three injections before 8 AM, no more. Sleep, with nothing hanging over me. Now that’s a sweet dream. 

I seem to be caught up in what wouldn’t be. For it’s so hard to imagine what would be if I no longer had diabetes. So hard to nail after 38 years. 

While you know the score – every day is a new day you have to manage your food, exercise, insulin, emotions, time and activities, the daily ongoing chore of doing this has long been my life – it’s just what I know after all these years. To rewind to before what has been two-thirds of my life is a distant memory. To fast-forward to not having diabetes is like a sci-fi-like imagined future. 

And since, for the past seven years my work has been diabetes, thinking of life without it conjures up a multitude of feelings:

1)   Who am I? Diabetes has lived with me for almost 4 decades

2)   Yikes! What the f_ _k am I going to do for a living?!

3)   Whewwww – the sound of every short-term worry and long-term fear slipping off my shoulders

4)   I’m just like everyone else. Hmmm.. is that a good thing?

5)   I’m leaving this space blank for when it really happens. 

After all, I’ve been hearing for years it’s going to happen any minute now .