Reflecting

I am still here, in case you were wondering.

I can't believe it's been over 10 days (I literally accidentally just typed in 10 years) since I last posted. I have just been super busy with starting sixth form and getting into the swing of things. Everything is all still up in the air and homework is being piled on us like bricks, dragging heavy text books home from school, forcing ourselves to sit up till 10pm writing up essays on the computer, stressing over homework deadlines...but apart from all the "education" side of things; sixth form is actually pretty fun and we have so much more freedom that I'm not even sure what to do with it.

Seeing as this is a diabetes blog I suppose I will go ahead and update you on what is happening with my diabetes life. Not much interesting stuff is going on at the moment. Although I am struggling to get on top of things right now- I really have to force myself to test my blood sugar and even bolus. Everyone has their rough patches and I seem to hit a bump in the road more than once, a month. I have this thing about feeling "motivated" to do what I'm supposed to but I don't understand why good hba1c isn't motivation enough.

I had a hospital appointment on...August 28th I think it was? It might have been the 27th actually; oh well it was around that date. It wasn't a hba1c appointment- as I think I explained in a different post actually...If you click here you can see why although the reason really isn't all that interesting at all. Anyway the appointment was with the DSN and we had a chat and I got my annual review done.

My blood test results were ok but they found protein in my urine and so last night I had to do a 24 hour urine collection (ew) and today while I was at school my dad had to take it up to the hospital. They said they should have the results by my next appointment which is in five days on October 1st, but there are no guarantees it will be done. I'm not stressing over it though, the nurse said sometimes it can be an error but they just have to double-check that my kidneys aren't damaged (which I doubt they are- it's more than likely an error) and if they are then I'll have to take some sort of medication but I'm not sure what. Anyway I'm certainly sure that I will be fine.

My mum was talking to me this morning and she told me that one of her clients (my mum is a personal trainer) just had her retinopathy test and it came back with bleeding behind the eye- my mum's client who I shall refer to as N because I won't name any names- has been Type one diabetic for five years and she is 25 years old. Mum said N was in tears when she told her last night because she is really freaked out by the whole thing- which then my mum said she was also nearly in tears because she felt so sorry for her. I suppose it's hard for my mum to hear things like that because I'm type one and it probably freaks her out. Anyway N's eye test has been sent off for expert checking and then I suppose she will find out if it's anything to do with her diabetes or not.

If it is because of diabetes I will be overly shocked because N has always had very good hba1c's and for her to get eye disease after just five years is pretty unnerving. Ah, diabetes- you're so unpredictable.

Earlier today I was sitting in school with my friend, Eleanor and we were talking about the first time that we met and she said to me "Oh yeah! I remember that and that was when you had just had your blood test for your diabetes and everything was all up in the air and you didn't know if you had it!" I was like, wow. Yeah, it was around that time. Strange because I always denied it, and I said to my friends that day "I don't think I have diabetes though" ...and here I am today sitting here writing my diabetes blog. Crazy to think I was diagnosed over four years ago- where did the time go? I remember being so laid back about my impending diagnosis though because one side of me knew I probably had it but another side of me was saying "No. You're not diabetic" I suppose it was another one of the "Things like diabetes don't happen to people like me, I'm just a regular girl going about her life" ...exactly; just regular. Diabetes does not pick and choose.

When I think about life before and after diabetes sometimes it feels like change for the better...as in I'm a better person because of it.

-Ellie
[Peace&Insulin]