A few years ago, I was introduced by my endo for I talk I was about to give. I was there to do a bit about how I like to be treated by HCPs, and there was a whole bit in there about how I was more than my numbers.  We’d chatted about how I would like to be introduced and I suggested she should read my bio and then say ‘And Renza’s last A1c was…’ before I would cut her off. It was a good lead into my talk.

My endo is one of the very few people who actually does know what my A1c is. As a matter of course, I don’t share it. It’s my data. I own it. Sure, I may post a screenshot of a recent CGM trance because right there and then it contributes to how I am feeling. But it is my own and my decision to put it out there for others to see. I understand that there may be judgement from others, or they may want to share their opinion. That’s fine. I can take it.

I would never, ever ask another person with diabetes what their A1c is. Or what their blood sugar is in the moment. In fact, I deliberately look away if someone pulls out their glucose meter or checks the CGM app on their phone. Of course, if someone wants to tell me what their numbers are, I’m happy to listen.

But I would never, ever ask. And would very pissed off if someone asked me. Imagine if someone asked you your weight? How would you feel about that?

Why is it that even though there are so many different aspects to our health that are measured, it is glucose levels or A1cs that are the ones that get shared around – by ourselves and by others. Get onto any online diabetes group and you will see this happening. I have to sit on my fingers and keep them away from the keyboard when the data being shared does not belong to the person doing the sharing. Some groups have regular ‘roll call’ threads where they ask for most recent glucose results. People sharing their own numbers is one thing – sharing someone else’s is another thing altogether, especially when it is annotated with what the person ‘did wrong’ to ‘cause’ the out of range number.

How can we truly believe that people see us as more than our numbers if that is what is shared? That was the point my endo and I were making during her introduction…she read my bio outlining all the things that I do believe go towards defining me. Yet there she was at the end focusing on a number that I refuse to believe does.

Imagine participating in a ‘current weight’ thread. How comfortable would anyone feel doing that? Or would they even consider sharing someone else’s weight online? (Step down now if you’re a Kardashian and that’s just regular Insta fodder.) I know that there are weight loss groups who do online weigh-ins. While I would never do it, they’re adults making the decision to do it.

I have a number of adult friends who use CGM share apps so that their friends, HCPs or loved ones can keep an eye on what’s going on with their glucose levels. (I’ve done this in the past, but don’t do it now.)

I asked some of them if they set up rules around how this sharing works. Some do. For example, they share only at certain times; they are clear about when they want the person they’re sharing with to get in touch, (one friend said that her partner is allowed to call her if she is low and hasn’t messaged within 20 minutes to say she’s on it – if she messages, he leaves her alone); they do not want to hear any judgement calls from the person seeing their data (and that goes double, triple, quadruple if that person has a functioning pancreas), they do not want to be asked if they have bolused as their trace inches (gallops) higher.

I guess what everyone is trying to do is make sure that they don’t feel as though they are under surveillance.

I asked these friends if there had been a conversation about ‘on-sharing’ – that is, the person who had access to their CGM data sharing it with others. No one had. I never had that conversation when I was using share apps because I knew that no one would think for a moment that was okay. They knew that flashing what they could see on their app to anyone around them was not okay – the information was not theirs to share. My friends said they knew their data was safe too.

Some people may think I am making too much of a deal about nothing. That it is just sharing a number in the moment and that is it. Or it is a moment of pride, sharing a loved one’s A1c they have worked hard on or CGM graph for the day, or snapshot showing how much time they’ve been in range.

But actually, I think it is more than that. I see it as saying that in that moment, that person with diabetes is only about a number and data. That is never, ever the case.

POSTSCRIPT

I wrote this piece a while ago and have been reluctant to publish it but changed my mind after seeing a conversation about this online earlier this week (that I stayed well clear of).

Please see my musings through the lens with which I am writing: I am an adult with diabetes. I was diagnosed as an adult. My perspective is my own and I don’t for a moment claim to understand anyone who is not a woman in their mid-40s, diagnosed with T1D at 24, living near the middle of a large city, who drinks too much coffee. And is called Renza.