Diabetes Begins

Well, past adventures were requested. I have more that I shall write about, but I had already written most of this post in an essay for English I. This is the story of my Diagnosis with Diabetes, which was a bit of an adventure.

“Got the news today, doctor said I had to stay/ A little bit longer and I’ll be fine… /And you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone/ And you don’t know what it’s like to feel so low/ And every time you smile, you laugh, you glow/ You don’t even know.”

            These lyrics are to a song Nick Jonas wrote about his life with Type 1 Diabetes called “A Little Bit Longer.” This song was a source of comfort in my life when I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. I was sixteen years old. As my life turned down a path I never expected to take, God was there with me every step of the way.

            It was a Saturday morning in August of 2008 and my family and I had all piled into our van to drive six hours for a family reunion. However, we had to make one stop at our Children’s Hospital on our way out of town. My mom and I checked in and waited in the sea-themed and dimly lit lobby for our pager to vibrate. When it did, a nurse took us back to the examination room. We settled into the vinyl bench to await the special kind of doctor I was there to see: an endocrinologist. The seconds ticked by at half their usual speed. The wait seemed to take forever, and we were beginning to wonder when we would arrive at the family reunion. I was really hungry. When the doctor finally came in, we talked about the slightly high blood sugar count that had shown up in my most recent blood-work. He tested my blood sugar and decided to check me into the hospital. Our family trip was canceled, and I was going to stay overnight in the hospital for the first time since I was born.

            The nurse assigned to my room was a sweet, tall, blonde in her twenties named Amanda. The hospital smelled like rubbing alcohol and latex gloves. The sheets were scratchy, and the pillow was so flat that I had my dad bring mine from home. The sound of doctors walking up and down the hall and phones ringing at the reception desk fell into the background as I sank into the blankets and turned on the television. With the knowledge that a nurse was going to check my blood sugar in the middle of the night, I slowly drifted off to sleep.

            Around 3 am, a few nurses proceeded to poke my finger and check my blood sugar. I heard my mom get up from the spare bed and ask a question. I don’t remember what my blood sugar was or what else was said except for these words spoken by the nurse: “Yes, she has Diabetes.”

            The next morning, I was informed that I would be staying in the hospital for at least another 24 hours. They needed to keep me there to monitor me and teach me about how to live with my newly diagnosed disease. Then Amanda, who was still on duty, came to explain the basics of Diabetes and give me my first dose of insulin.  

“I get that through shots right?” I asked.

            “Yes,” Amanda answered.

            “How did you know that?” my mom asked me.

            I shrugged. “I dunno, I just knew it from somewhere. Why?”

            “Because I wasn’t going to tell you,” she said. I remember feeling slightly annoyed at this. I knew it was out of love on my mom’s part, but I was sixteen years old. Couldn’t I handle a few shots? It turns out that my mom was more right than I realized. After leaving the hospital, I was unable to give myself shots. I had a mental block that stopped me from getting closer than a few centimeters to my skin with that needle. Eventually, my mom threatened to take away my chocolate. The very next time, I gave the shot myself, and I have not had to have anyone do it for me again. Chocolate is a brilliant motivator for me. :)

            In the hospital that morning, I was unable keep my breakfast down, perhaps because of all the stress my body had experienced since the diagnosis. Since the insulin the nurse had just injected into my body no longer had any food to process, I experienced my first low blood sugar. The next several hours were a bit hazy because I was shaking, my eyes were not focusing well, and my brain was having trouble stringing coherent thoughts together. I sat in a small, sterile room with my family, a young couple with a newly diagnosed four-year-old daughter, and our Diabetes educator, Barb. She was a middle-aged woman with long dark hair that had streaks of white in it. I slowly sipped juice to bring my blood sugar back up while listening to Barb talk about managing Diabetes, living with Diabetes, and her own life as a Diabetic. My parents practiced giving each other saline shots and we all gave a pad of fake skin a stab with the syringe. She informed us that a woman with Diabetes was three percent more likely to pass it on to her child than a non-diabetic and that a man with Diabetes was five percent more likely to pass it on.

            “So I am less likely to pass Diabetes on to my k-kids?” I said with a slight blood-sugar-induced stutter.

            Everyone stared at me. My poor family probably feared for my sanity in that moment, and my mom was probably wondering about my math skills. She patted my arm and said with a worried voice, “No sweetie, you are more likely to pass it on.”

            I shook my head slowly and said, “No, I am less likely to than if I was a boy with Diabetes.”The thought had made sense in my head, but it took a second to get it conveyed in words. :)

            Eventually my sister and father left to go home for the night. My mom and I stayed up figuring out how to determine the amount of insulin I needed, and before bed, she gave me a shot. I kept my arm limp and did not show pain because I did not want to make this harder on my mom than it already was. As I lay wrapped up in the rough sheets that night I listened to “A Little Bit Longer.” Somehow, it was comforting to know that someone else in the world had gone through this process and had written a song of encouragement that I felt was directly aimed at me. A year later, when I was at the Jonas Brothers Concert with my sister, we both cried as Nick Jonas told his story about Diabetes and performed this song live. It has been a special song in my life ever since.

            After another training session the next morning, I was discharged from the hospital and given an appointment to see an endocrinologist very soon to help me start my life with Diabetes. I climbed into our van and hugged my pillow. My brain was still processing everything that had happened. I wondered how my friends from church would take the news. The whole congregation already knew because my dad, the pastor, had announced it in church that morning. On the ride home, I realized that my life would never be the same. However, I had something that has kept me going to this day: my faith in Jesus. 

            This August will mark the four year anniversary of my Diabetes diagnosis. It seems strange, but I can't imagine my life without Diabetes. My life with this disease has had its ups and downs, but I rest in the confidence that God allowed me to have this for a reason. He knows I can handle it. I know that I will look back one day and see how Diabetes has worked in my life in a mysterious and God-driven way. I already count myself blessed that I didn't get Diabetes when I was a child. I was old enough to take responsibility for my own treatment. I can't imagine the hardships that a family goes through when their young child is diagnosed with this. I suppose I might find out, if I am ever blessed with children, since there is a chance that they could have Diabetes as well.

 “So I’ll wait till kingdom come/ All the highs and lows are gone/ A little bit longer and I’ll be fine/ I’ll be fine” In heaven, where there is no more sorrow, pain, or Diabetes, I will finally be able to speak to my Lord face to face. Then I can truly thank Him for everything, including taking care of me as I lived with my Diabetes here on earth. For now, I will rest in His arms and trust Him to carry me through every trial.