My favourite answer to give when someone asks me how I went at any diabetes-related medical appointment is ‘Nothing to report.’ I love being able to say that things are boring. If there is ever a time in my life that I want to be unexceptional and routine, it is when I am hearing or sharing news about my diabetes.

For as long as I live with diabetes, I want to forever be told ‘It’s nothing,’ or ‘There’s nothing.’ I want there to be nothing there when my eyes are screened; nothing to report when I have my kidney function checked; nothing new, nothing scary, nothing to worry about.

The thing is: to get to nothing, we put in a lot of effort. We push ourselves and do things over and over and over and over. Because we’re told if we do all the things, all the time, nothing will happen.

But sometimes, despite all that effort, it’s not nothing; it’s something.

We have done everything possible – everything we possibly can – and we walk in and expect to hear another nothing. But instead, this time we’re told there’s something and we can’t help but wonder why we didn’t do more.

That’s just how diabetes works. There is no rhyme or reason. There is nothing fair about it. But we keep doing it – whatever we can manage at that particular moment.

And we ask and hope for nothing – absolutely nothing – in return. Except our health.

Which, as it turns out, is absolutely everything.

Hoping for nothing.