When I was diagnosed
I was in grade 8. This is a time right before I was about to attend high
school, and at that time I was choosing a high school that 4 of my friends were
attending and the rest were attending a catholic high school so it was going to be a new environment where
I did not know that many people. My world was already turned upside down with
diabetes and it was going to be turned upside down with attending a new school
and being around 99% of people that I had no interactions with previously. This
was a big moment for myself.
I cannot remember
why or how I started to stigmatize myself for having diabetes but it happened
nonetheless. I was insecure and shy of injecting around the people who I did
not know, afraid of exposing myself as a diabetic, and afraid of answering any
questions or being seen any differently if they were to find out I was a
diabetic.
Stigmatizing myself
for having diabetes was not good for my health. There were numerous times when
I would simply not inject if I were out eating with friends, causing the blood
sugar to rise dramatically and stay there until I got home or got alone and injected
at that. I didn't even do that well at caring for myself when I was in high
school - like I realize now that I could have simply gone into the bathroom and
injected there and saved myself a lot of ridiculous highs and saved myself from
feeling like crap until this insulin kicked in and brought the blood sugar
down. For the most part I went home to have lunch, luckily I lived pretty close
so I could monitor myself and inject for what I needed there. At school I would
resist as much as I could to not bring any attention to myself for being a
diabetic. I remember one time I was sitting in class and I definitely could
feel a low coming on. I had no form of sugar on my person at that moment and
all I did was wait for the class to end so that I could walk home and go get
something to eat. That was a very dangerous situation to place myself in and it
was all because I was afraid to be seen as a diabetic, I was afraid to be seen
as different or needing special attention.
Look, I am not
saying that this is going to happen or exist within all diabetics. My
circumstances were specific towards who I was within myself. In high school I
was afraid to be pin-pointed for being anything, I wanted to stay within the
background and keep to myself, due to fears of my peers, fears of the
judgements that may exist, fear of my `world` collapsing by being seen as weird
by my peers, and that was the largest factor involved within my diabetic
negligence, so as I said it was specific towards who I was at the time. With
that being said though I did see diabetes as something that was stigmatized.
Those fears attached themselves onto the fact that I was a diabetic and it made
that fear much worse than what it actually was/is. The stigma of being a
diabetic can exist within many degrees and varieties though and it most likely
will exist in some form or manner that is similar to what I put myself through
I cannot place blame
onto other people even if they did stigmatize me, the problem was myself and
how I saw diabetes within myself. I saw it as an illness or a disease that
should be stigmatized or seen as needing help or assistance or special
treatments. So the problem wasn't with other people, the problem was how I saw
myself within diabetes. I wasn't aware of that at the time, but in
retrospection I can see this as being true,
So the problem was
how I saw myself within diabetes. Over time this became much better once I
started to understand what I could do or what some of the limitations were
within diabetes, or like what I needed to prepare for when going out or
travelling or while working or studying, I started to become more comfortable
with myself with having diabetes, started to understand that it really wasn't a
limitation or something that I needed special treatment for having, it is
something in which I was able to understand myself, something that I could
support myself within, something that allowed me to take responsibility for
myself on a different level than I previously have. Once that realization came
through I have not worried about injecting in front of people, I do not fear
people seeing or knowing that I have diabetes because I understand it a hell of
a lot more now, I understand that it is not something to fear or to see myself
as less than for having - it is simply something that I must work with and work
my life with/around. The only limitation that exists about diabetes only exists
within my ideas or beliefs about diabetes and/or what it will restrict me
within. Taking a look back it would not restrict me from being friends with
people it would actually most likely be a cool ice breaker and something in
which I could share and open up about.
There was one
example that I can bring up - and this was when I was in a hospital getting
checked out for a knee injury that I was having and the nurse at the time asked
if I was type 1 or type 2 - and I said type 1 - he said that he was sorry to
hear that - I replied that I was actually quite grateful to have it because it
has taught me a lot about myself that I would have not otherwise seen, and have
been able to be responsible for myself in another dimension that I previously
have - he said that is a pretty cool outlook on it. So the reason why I share
this example is that many people already do see diabetes as something that is
detrimental to our livelihoods, or something that we should burden ourselves
with, and this is also how I saw it for those years when I really did not
understand diabetes nor understood how to practically and effectively support
myself within it.
So if anyone who is
reading this is going through something similar the one thing that I can see is
that I took longer than I needed to to find out what/how to support myself
effectively within diabetes by trying to hide it from other people. I wasted quite
a bit of time that I could have used to understand what to inject when I am out
to eat or what I need to bring to support myself. So push yourself to inject
around people, push yourself to lift up your shirt and stick a needle into your
stomach regardless of anyone being able to see you - it's simply what you need
to do, never mind if someone takes offense to that - it is their own problem if
they do. Understand that what you have to do is out of support for yourself,
diabetes isn't something that should be looked down upon or be seen as
something less than other people for having - it simply is something that we
need to take care of and factor into our lives. It is not a burden at all, and
if you see it as a burden I highly suggest to research and investigate that
line of thinking because that line of thinking is certainly going to affect the
relationship with yourself and diabetes .
It is out
responsibility to correct our relationship to diabetes and if we fear our self
definition in relation to having diabetes then we need to re-assess those fears
and embrace having diabetes, not see it as a burden or see it as a stigma, but
rather see it as an opportunity for ourselves to understand ourselves on
another level, be responsible for ourselves on another level, and provide care
for ourselves on another level. It is our own journey to walk and we cannot
allow fears of what others may think of us within the disease to dictate what
or who we will be within diabetes. So if this fear exists within you as it did
within me, learn from my mistakes, take that step to push beyond that fear and
embrace yourself being a diabetic and do what you need to do within public or
not. As the saying goes - life is too short - so do not place these ideas
within your head of diabetes being a stigma - embrace diabetes and become the
master of yourself within diabetes - letting nothing within yourself get in the
way of your own support.
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