This morning at a hideous hour, at 9 am...I had to go to the hospital for my diabetic eye screening test at the Diabetes Center. I mean, I was surprised we even found it to be honest. So my mum drove into the hospital and there we are all scanning the massive blue signs for 'Diabetes center' but it was nowhere to be seen...Mum did a big circle of the hospital grounds and we could not see one sign directing us to the Diabetes Center; bearing in mind we had not been to this 'Diabetes center' before, for the past two times we went to the regular opticians to have it done but they don't do the Retinopathy screening anymore.
We got really fed up after about 10 minutes of driving around so my mum asked the two men guarding the car park or whatever they were doing at that point in their lives. Mum said "excuse me? You don't happen to know where the Diabetes Center is, do you?" - "Oh! That is on the other side of the hospital grounds" OH REALLY. Is it? You'd think they would've told us where it was in the letter, but clearly certain individuals do not find that necessary. Anyway, my mum parked in the car park and we made the trek to the other side of the grounds.
Me and my twin sister found this trek rather hilarious and we were in fits of laughter the whole walk there. Don't ask why. We get in a mood that means we find everything absolutely hilarious. Seeing as our mum is really fit because she is a personal trainer the walk was a piece of cake for her. Then there is me and Lauren...It's safe to say we were rather tired once we actually found it. Then we started joking about how we were going to pass out and then I think we had only been walking for about a minute and we started laughing and pretending we were exhausted and we were like "oh! Mother! How long have we been walking?!" and it was pretty funny. My mum probably thought we were drunk or something!
So we get to the place and we walked in and my mum just said how hard the place is to find and the woman was all "it is sign posted..." WHERE. WHERE is it sign posted? Please do tell me. My mum just didn't even bother fighting the case because well...we were right and we had a struggle finding it. Oh well! The point is, is we made it there in the end and I went into my appointment. Thank goodness I didn't have to have those drops that sting my eyeballs. The guy said that normally young people's eyes are dilated enough to take the picture with out drops. So I was happy I didn't have to suffer the even more blurred vision than I have already and the sensitivity to light. Thought I was going to have to roll out in my sunglasses on a very cloudy and rainy day.
I sat on the chair and I had to put my chin on the chin rest which makes you extend your neck out about three foot in front of you so you can actually reach it. Then there was some sort of disconnection with the machine and he was searching around for this mysterious issue and I saw some sort of stray lead and I informed him that it was disconnected which sped up the process slightly. The eye doctor guy, or whatever he is called was really nice though. You have to stare at this green dot inside the lens before they flash that huge light in your eyes. Honestly, if people think the flash from a regular camera is blinding they haven't seen anything yet...
Then there it was! The image of the back of my eye was presented on the screen. It was so cool to see all the vessels and things. He had a quick look at the screen and he said everything looks absolutely fine! Woo! There were no signs of diabetic eye disease. Even though I know I probably won't get any complications (If I do get them) until many years with diabetes; I have only had it for nearly four years. Even so, waiting for him to tell you the results is still so nerve-wracking. You just think "please don't find anything! Please don't find anything!" and it is highly unlikely there would be anything wrong at this stage but still...You still worry because there is always the threat of complications looming over my head and everyone's head that live with diabetes.
But, we carry on and just try to control our blood sugars the best we can so hopefully we have a chance of maybe not experiencing a time that they do find something.
Anyway, for now. I have no signs of diabetic eye disease and it all looks good. He said someone else will take a look at the results but it should all still be fine and we will get a concluding letter through in the post and then we can book another appointment for next year.
After we left the appointment we went to my auntie's house because today was my little cousin Ruby's third birthday and all the family came over in the evening to have dinner and some tea and cake. I cannot believe she is three already! Time goes by so fast. She got a lovely little Hello Kitty bike and lots of other presents and when we bought it from the shop a couple of days ago my mum and my auntie didn't actually tell her that it was for her birthday; they said it was for next year. Anyway she unwrapped the bike and the first thing she said was "we bought this in the shop the other day" Then my auntie had her cake hidden away in the bedroom as it was a surprise pink butterfly cake and after she had blown out the candles my mum said to her "It was a pretty butterfly, Ruby!" and she goes "I know. I noticed it in the bedroom!" It was so funny! It has proved very hard to surprise little Ruby. She is too smart for us. Ha ha!
I am going to bed on a blood sugar of 6.8 mmol. Woo! I also got a really exciting e-mail today from the local MP's office assistant person, saying that the local MP is going to inform the relevant government minister of my campaign for Diabetes Awareness and that it will all be done in writing; and once he gets a reply he will forward it on to me in the post! Sounds so official! But I may not get a reply until next month or something but he said he will stress to the government the importance of the issue and hopefully that will speed up the reply. I am so happy! Yay for Diabetes Awareness and for the local MP being so supportive!
Goodnight!
-Ellie
[Peace&Insulin]
No comments:
Post a Comment