Living a positive, sanguine life with diabetes is not impossible. And by and large, I don’t spend most of my time thinking about the scary stuff and asking myself ‘what if?’. But it’s not always easy, even for those of us with a mostly Pollyanna-ish disposition. Whether it’s hearing difficult stories or seeing a crappy diabetes health promotion campaign, I find myself frequently triggered and start to think about how that very first introduction to diabetes that so many of us receive, sets us up to believing that there is nothing more than doom and gloom ahead of us.
But with all the worry about what diabetes could bring tomorrow, how much happiness and light are we sacrificing today?
I worry about things and I know they may never happen; things that are not even hinted at today when I have my annual screening checks. But even as I breathe a deep sigh of relief after seeing my ophthalmologist, or receiving the results from my kidney check, I don’t stop worrying. The ‘All is good’ in this snapshot moment is reassuring, but somehow never enough.
Perhaps it’s because diabetes has a way of never just being about the here and now. The way it’s often spoken about means there is so much pressure to do right today in order to be right tomorrow.
The ‘What if?’ questions that I seem to have on repeat cast a constant cloud, sometimes more thunderous than at other times, over so many of my days.
Over the years, this has been one of the issues I’ve addressed with my psychologist. I have learnt to respond to ‘What if?’ questions with ‘What if it doesn’t happen?’, or to be practical rather than theoretical. This has been hugely helpful. As has saying ‘You are not at that bridge right now; you don’t need to know how to cross it.’
Just how much am I robbing myself in the here and now when I spend too much time thinking of hypotheticals of the future? How much happiness have I already lost to those hypotheticals? How much time and energy have I wasted being drawn into moments of doom, when the reality is that, in the moment – in my diabetes present – there are no clouds? No clouds at all…just blue skies.
Diabetogenic 
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March 13, 2021 at 10:46 am
Min
Spot on Renza,
I have spent most of my adult life in fright and flight for my challenged future that I live everyday with fingers crossed that I would be the one diabetic who wings it and does not develop any complications. Wishful thinking as not only is too much or too little sugar in the blood a nightmare for your poor body, synthetic insulin plays havoc too, how can it not, however try living a day without that artificial treatment. While both hypos and hyper’s have your brain in a mushed up mess of fog, moments of ‘normal’ blood sugars are achieved on the way to both disappointments of guilt and shame and private annoyance. While on the surface I laugh and live in a jovial state of positive for all around me, like many I am in a world of unavoidable lonely concern for all my organs wondering how on earth they can they take me to the end of my journey undamaged. Like most my biggest wish on earth is to experience some time while here enjoying food of any type without a medical consequence or that hovering dark cloud moment of jaded weakness adding to the gathered momentum to complications. The future comes quicker than most think with diabetes and how on earth you journey without fearful thought of it or without worrying about it is a skill I would love to have.. Just saying exactly how it is but apologies for the dark truth on the matter. Day at a time has always been my mantra.
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March 13, 2021 at 1:20 pm
Rick Phillips
I spent many years worried about my sons having diabetes. They don’t. Now of course I worry about our grand children.
One day Sheryl said why the heck are you limiting it to them? You better go big or go home. Worry about your grandchildren’s grandchildren. Worry about their grandchildren in fact why the hell dont you worry about your children’s, children’s friends. Heck worry about the kids down the street and their friends friends.
I said why woudl I worry about all of those i cant do anything about it. She said exactly.
Point taken
But…
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