Welcome to the Diabetes Stories website

I've been doing an ongoing Thursday shot-in-the-arm of inspiration from my book "The ABCs Of Loving Yourself With Diabetes." 

Emotional strength and resilience is critical to keep on keeping' on managing our diabetes. Here's today's powerful thought for reflection.

Excerpt:

How you feel about yourself influences how well you will take care of your diabetes. Do you treat yourself with the same regard, kindness and compassion you reserve for a friend?

When you believe in yourself, you live life expecting the best. When you believe in yourself and feel confident, the world responds to you with a very special magic; things seem to just go your way.

If you have spent much of your life saying "yes" to everyone around you, leaving you little time and energy for yourself, practice saying "no." You can't truly take care of anyone else when your own energy is depleted. And if your past has not reflected your greatness or your ability to manage your diabetes, remind yourself with love, that today is a new day; today you will take a new step.

Reflection: Today write down three things you're good at and three good qualities you have. Look at the list throughout the week and allow yourself to take it in. 

Also, before you jump out of bed and when you're drifting off to sleep, take a minute and see yourself at your best. Remind yourself, you always have this fantastic person inside you.

Here's my Thursday d-lesson - a little reminder that no matter what we've been doing, we can do a little better today if we decide to do so. 

My kangaroos, by the way, were inspired by the year I lived in Sydney, Australia. Here's today's excerpt from my inspirational D-book,      

Excerpt:

Whether you've spent years ignoring your doctor's advice, or even avoiding your doctor, today you can decide to be the master of your diabetes. How? Begin by shifting your thinking.

If you've been seeing your diabetes care as something you "have" to do, see it as something you "choose" to do. You'll feel more in control. 

Then see the benefit of doing the task. For instance, "By testing my blood sugar, I can keep it in target range and reduce my risk of complications." Focusing on the benefit helps remind you why the task is important.

The truth is everything we do in life is a choice. Changing your mindset from "have to" to "choose to" gives you more energy. With all there is to be gained, isn't it time you hopped to it?

Reflection: Right now list on a post it note 3 diabetes tasks you perform and how they benefit you. Keep this somewhere you'll see often. 

The excerpt below is from my book, The ABCs Of Loving Yourself With Diabetes- 26 life-lessons to stay strong managing diabetes. I also wrote another page for the book that I never used. It's for those of us who have diabetes to parent ourselves. It's below with the title: "G is for Gently Nudging Yourself Forward." 

Excerpt: "G is for Grabbing onto Hope for You and Your Little One"

For parents, diabetes can feel like the death of your dream- a child who's happy, healthy and has every opportunity. The theft of childhood, a new family dynamic, finding the right doctors, exhaustion and worry are now fixed aspects of your life.

You may even feel guilty or like you let your child down missing the warning signs of diabetes. Know that this is not your fault; you couldn't have prevented it. Forgive yourself, you are the source of your child's strength now.

Help restore a sense of normalcy for, and around, your child. And don't neglect your other children, who are also affected. Create special days to celebrate each one of them.

Remember, children take their cue from you and every day remarkable things are happening to change the face of diabetes.

Reflection: Teach the people closest to you how to do blood sugar checks and let them take over now and then. Think who you can ask for support from and what they can do to help. Keeping yourself strong, safe  sure - and not sleep deprived - will most help your child.

NOTE: Here's one advance on the horizon for Type 1 diabetes.

G is for Gently Nudging Yourself Forward

"It's not where you start it's where you finish," If you're over 50, you might recognize this line from a show-tune. It's also a pretty good motto for life. If you want to accomplish something it doesn't really matter where you start from. What matters is putting in the effort. When you first heard you had diabetes maybe, like the ostrich who buries his head in the sand, it was too much to face and you ignored it. Forgive yourself for any past mistakes. What matters is what you do now.

Decide today you will take one step to take better care of your diabetes. One step. Not five or six or ten. You can open a book about diabetes and read one chapter. Read one internet site. Take one class in your area. If you think you should be eating less or better, exercising more, checking your blood sugar more frequently, do one of these things today. 

In other words, gently nudge yourself forward; let the parent in you provide a shoulder to lean against while you're moving forward. As you progress, pick another step to take. The finish line is the place where your diabetes is in good control and one step at a time is the best way to reach it.

"Gently" also means be kind to yourself, because changing habits takes some work at first. Don't decide to run a mile today if you haven't walked down the street lately. Don't cut your calories in half, you'll only overeat tomorrow. Don't check your blood sugar every hour, that's neither easy nor kind. But do decide on something realistic you can do from where you are right now.

Remember too, some days will be easier than others. Be extra kind to yourself on the hard days.

If you take small, steady steps forward, no matter where you start from, it's pretty sure, "You're going to finish on top!"

Reflection: Write down 1 new step you'll take today. Be very specific: what you'll do, when you'll do it, how much you'll do, how you'll do it. Then do it!

In my continuing tips to help you "develop your emotional strength" to manage diabetes, here's another excerpt from my inspirational D-book,       "The ABCs Of Loving Yourself With Diabetes."

Excerpt:

Many people think taking care of their diabetes is up to their doctor or diabetes educator. But it's not. They're not with you during the day to remind you to perform your diabetes tasks - to test your blood sugar or choose broccoli over French fries. Diabetes needs to be managed every day by the person who has it - you.

Learning all you can about diabetes is one secret to living a full and healthy life. And you can do this. Think back to a time when you learned about something new, perhaps for a project at work or while in school. At first you didn't know much and might have felt frightened, but in time you relaxed and then gained new insights, understanding and skills.

Here are a few things to chose from you can do right away: Subscribe to a diabetes magazine, join a social media site online like TuDiabetes, Diabetes Connect or Glu, read a diabetes book (any one of mine), see if your hospital offers a diabetes class, and bring your doctor questions that concern you at your next visit. Knowing all you can about diabetes is not just smart, it's powerful medicine.

Reflection: Write down something you knew little about and then learned about. Write down how you did that. Then write down two things you will do to learn more about diabetes - and how you will do it. Be specific: what you will do, when you will do it, where you will do it?

My third in my series of excerpts from my first book, "The ABCs Of Loving Yourself With Diabetes." Each can help you build the emotional strength to do better managing your diabetes.

Excerpt:

A "Can-Do" attitude is a choice. Deciding we can do something energizes and inspires us. It can help you through frustrating times, and even help you make the tough choices when confronted with a brownie a la mode or strawberries a la diet whipped cream. 

Sometimes, without realizing it, we choose to take a "vicim" attitude about our diabetes, and it stops us from taking good care of ourselves. It's natural to feel down or frustrated at times. When you do, accept your feelings. Then pick yourself up and move on again doing your best.

Keeping yourself healthy may require changing some habits you've had for a long time. But while bad habits and feeling sorry for yourself may be where you've been, they need not be where you're going. Tomorrow is created by every action you take today.

Reflection: Write down one thing you can do better in your diabetes management - and how you will do it. Maybe choose a few healthier foods, cook more meals at home, start walking after dinner. Then be specific how you will do it: what, when, where, for how long? The more specific you can be, the more likely you will be successful. 

As promised in my last post, I'm going to put portions of my first book here. I will try to do it every Thursday.  

Having the emotional strength and stamina to take care of your diabetes is as essential as understanding how diabetes works and knowing how to take care of it. (Both of which happen to be covered in my two other books.)

I write books because it's a way for me to share my knowledge and help others do better. I hope these posts provide a little inspiration and help you build your "strengths muscle."  At least you don't have to go to the gym!

Excerpt:  

"Living with diabetes is something you learn to do each and every day. On some days you hardly know it's there. On others, you can hardly forget. But appreciation is what fills our lives with love, joy and deep contentment, even when you have diabetes... 

Diabetes can motivate you to make healthier food choices and improve your fitness. You can take pride in how bravely you are managing it. And, when you've lost something, it's an opportunity to appreciate all the more what you do have... 

Diabetes can be a gift in your hands if you use it to see how many blessings you truly have: loving family and friends, a dear pet, a comfortable home, the use of your body and mind, meaningful work, a favorite hobby, all your simple pleasure, exuberant passions and just the marvel of being you."

Reflection: Think about, or write, three or more things you are appreciative for in your life right now. Remind yourself of these a few times throughout the day today.

I don't usually post recipes - scratch that,  I never post recipes, but this one is so simple, so few calories, fat and carbs and such a great way to get your chia seeds! 

Huh? Okay, if you don't know, chia seeds are an incredible source of omega 3 fatty acids. They provide health benefits on par with fish and fish oil and contain fiber, protein, antioxidants and minerals. They're the new broccoli!

The trouble with these little seeds is they have no taste and a funny texture. When put them in any liquid, they ooze a gelatinous texture. It's not really pleasant or unpleasant - just weird. But, with this recipe, you'll love them.

OK, here goes:

Chill a can of coconut milk overnight - I use Trader Joe's light coconut milk.

Blend in 4 tablespoons of chia seeds. I get my chia seeds in the health food store, any brand. For the blending I use a whisk which seems to work well to mix in all the ingredients.

Add 4 tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa powder and whisk. To be honest, I only use two which I find chocolatey enough.

Add half a teaspoon of vanilla extract and two packets of artificial sweetener or Stevia.

Whisk all the ingredients and put in the fridge. Overnight it will turn into a miraculous kind of pudding. Kind of like the texture of rice pudding.

You can calculate the carbs and calories, but it's not a lot, and it's an absolutely delicious way to get the benefit of these powerhouse anti-oxidants. It seems we benefit from two tablespoons of chia seeds a day so I eat a few spoonfuls of this pudding each day.

Trust me, you won't be disappointed. I can't think of a better way to enjoy these little seeds.

My husband was just cleaning out his piles of papers, and amazingly found an interesting sheet titled, "Patients Don't Remember Doctors' Instructions."

Shocking as it sounds between 40 and 80 percent of what doctors tell patients they forget - immediately! Only half the information they tell us do we remember correctly, and the more information they give us, the less we remember correctly. Well, frankly, that doesn't surprise me.

There is, however, a useful tip offered on the sheet if you need a little reminding what pills you take, when and what they're for. It's a tool called a "Pill Card." And the best thing to do is create one for yourself based on what you're taking. 

The card includes the name of each medicine you take, how much, what it does and then uses pictures to remind you of these things. You can find instructions, graphics and templates at the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

Have fun. Turns out 94% of people who were given a pill card said it helped them remember the information their doctor gave them correctly.

When I was first contacted by the Diabetes Research Institute (DRI) that they had news, I was curious. When I read the press release, I could feel the little hairs on my neck stand up. 

When I talked to Dr. Camillo Ricordi, DRI's Scientific Director and Chief Academic Officer, about how close they feel they are to creating a biological cure for type 1 diabetes, as opposed to a mechanical cure like the artificial pancreas, I could feel both his doggedness and determination; he's been working toward a cure for decades, and feels they've turned a corner. In his words, now all the needed technologies are coming together.

Anyone with type 1 diabetes, heard upon their diagnosis, that there'd be a cure within five to ten years. For me that was 41 years ago. And we've all heard lots of studies that report cures in mice. But this isn't about mice, and whether the BioHub, what DRI is hoping will house islet (insulin-producing) cells that can be fully functioning in the body without anti rejection drugs becomes the cure, we will have to see - you got it, five to ten years. 

But I for one, do sense we've taken a quantum leap forward no matter what happens. And so does DRI. 

See my complete story on The Huffington Post. 

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone, and especially to our Type 3s - partners and spouses who live with our diabetes - and yet get none of the credit. 

I can only imagine it must be like sitting in the passenger seat of a car wanting to grab the wheel when you see your mate start driving into an embankment or veer off toward the shoulder - feeling powerless and helpless to course correct - and weighing when do you hover, anticipate, plead, get upset or just stand lovingly by. 

So today I'm saluting you, our loved ones who keep loving us with diabetes and who watch over and support us. 

I also want you to know there is a group function just for male Type 3s to come together and share their feelings and frustrations, perhaps see what we live with a little more clearly and learn how to lovingly help in our disease management. 

Diabetes Sisters' annual "Weekend for Women" conference - May 3-May 5 in Raleigh, North Carolina - offers a parallel track at the conference for male Type 3s called "Partner's Perspective Program." It's for partners, spouses and significant others of we women attending the conference.Brandy Barnes, founder of Diabetes Sisters', and her very loving husband Chris, saw the need and how such a program would benefit both our men and ourselves. 

From the male viewpoint Chris says, "As partners of women with diabetes, we really do want to better understand their disease and how to best support them so that they can live full lives with diabetes for many years to come.  The success of last year’s program illustrated that this valuable program is filling a large void that has been overlooked for many years.”

The Partner’s Perspective Program kicks off on Friday night from 6-10pm with a fun, relaxing social event.  Saturday morning commences with Partners Perspective attendees walking through historic downtown Raleigh, NC in the Diabetes Awareness Walk to support their partners with diabetes publicly. 10am-5pm partners participate in separate education/breakout sessions  chock full of educational information about diabetes to help them better understand and support their partner. There will be lots of “how to” discussions from leading experts who understand the physical and mental challenges faced by women with diabetes. Then, partners join their loved ones for a celebratory lunch and watch their spouse/loved one be publicly recognized for the number of years she has lived with diabetes. Sunday, partners will join back together again for a fun social activity in downtown Raleigh, NC.  

"Weekend for Women" runs May 3-May 5 in Raleigh, North Carolina. I'll be there, among many experts, leading a workshop on how to "Ignite Your Diabetes-Power." Join us and make it an event you can go to with your partner and both go home and talk about. Register here. 

When I told my husband, now of 11 years, shortly before the wedding, "Maybe you want to think twice about this. You know life with a diabetic will be uncertain…" he didn't miss a beat. "I'm with you and you're with me," he said, and he's been saying it ever since.

For those of you who use a Continuous Glucose Monitor, or think you'd like to, here's an excerpt from Dr. Anne Peter's review of Dexcom's newly available fourth generation, the G4, and MiniMed's CGM, Enlite, which will be available in the Spring. Dr. Peters is an extremely respected endocrinologist, well known in the diabetes community, who practices at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

I love that Peters wears the sensors, although she doesn't have diabetes, to understand what it's like for patients. With all their advantages, one thing she finds burdens patients is the devices many alarms. Funny, we think of the benefit, alerting us to low and high blood sugar, but not the annoyance factor - I guess unless you wear one, I do not. 

Excerpt: With Dexcom G4 continuous glucose monitoring, the patient can easily insert the sensor under the skin -- ...on the abdomen or the back of the arm. A small transmitter is then placed on top of the sensor. The transmitter sends the interstitial glucose value to the device so the patient can see the blood sugar level. It transmits this information wirelessly every 5 minutes, so a patient can get a sense of whether their blood sugars are going up, going down, or staying the same.

…the new Dexcom G4 is somewhat smaller [than the earlier-generation device]. It is not as wide, similar to an iPhone, and is easy to put in your pocket. It has a pretty good range so that you can be moving around in your house and the signal will still reach the device. A blood sugar level that is 100 mg/dL and is going up may require much different treatment from a blood sugar level of 100 mg/dL that is flat and the patient might be just fine. Or, if a blood sugar level is falling fast, it may mean that the patient needs to ingest carbohydrate to avoid a low. The patient can get a lot of information in real time from this device. Then, in my office, I download the device and interpret the data for the patient so I can help the patient analyze the data retrospectively, so that in real time patients can make more reasonable choices.

…we also have the new MiniMed continuous glucose monitor, the Enlite™ sensor, which is supposed to be available in the spring. This is similarly inserted under the skin and taped down. In most cases, this device is talking to the patient's insulin pump. The insulin pump has the tubing necessary to give the patient insulin, but now this pump also becomes the receiver for the signals from the sensor. The patient can look at the pump and see what the blood sugar levels are doing.

A lot of patients want the pump to automatically give insulin based on their blood sugar levels, but that is not what happens. This is truly a sensor, and the patient then needs to use the Bolus Wizard [calculator] to interact with the pump to calculate the insulin dose. That coupling of the sensor and pump is part of the development of the artificial pancreas. Substantial research is being done to make pumps that can use continuous glucose monitoring data so that the patient does not have to think as much about diabetes management. [Those advances] are in the future. 

For now we have sensors that sense interstitial fluid, giving continuous real-time data, and we have pumps that patients interact with to give themselves insulin. You can couple the MiniMed sensor with the MiniMed pump. The Dexcom device does not interact with a pump, although the manufacturer is working on collaborations with some pump manufacturers.

Peter's full review appeared in Medscape Diabetes & Endocrinology Jan 25, 2013, "Continuous Glucose Monitoring: Practical Uses in Diabetes."

It's kind of a double-edged sword when we get to see something just for us. Nice, and an unfortunate reminder. But I was glad to see this syringe disposal nestled in the bathroom of the Phoenix airport. I didn't bother to think, whose syringes are they targeting? I just enjoyed the fact that maybe there's some recognition for those of us using insulin.

I try to take my insulin discretely, meaning I don't flaunt it in front of anyone. After all, I don't particularly love watching others inject. But I never try to hide when I need to give myself a shot. And, I often wonder - where are all my fellow insulin users? I never seem to see anyone else "shooting up." 

But I do it in the open as I like to think of it as a 'teachable moment.' So while seated on the plane, waiting for the last few passengers to take their seats, I took out my Lantus Solo star pen trying to inject before the last passenger arrived to take his seat next to me. And there I was, pen in stomach, when my husband leaned over and said, "Are you OK?" I looked up and there was my seat mate standing at our row waiting to take his seat. I finished, extracted pen from body, and in he came without a word, as if he hadn't just watched this woman take a needle out of her body.

Later, my husband told me he had asked the gentleman if he could just wait a moment while I finished giving myself my insulin injection. The gentleman politely nodded. My husband also remarked that, the stewardess standing not far away, caught my husband's eye and smiled. Comraderie? Knowingness? Compassion? 

I will never know, but maybe one or two more people were reminded that diabetes exists in the world, as so do those of us who live with it.