Diabetes Blog Week 2014 day 1

Let’s kick off Diabetes Blog Week by talking about the diabetes causes and issues that really get us fired up. Are you passionate about 504 plans and school safety? Do diabetes misconceptions irk you? Do you fight for CGM coverage for Medicare patients, SDP funding, or test strip accuracy? Do you work hard at creating diabetes connections and bringing support? Whether or not you “formally” advocate for any cause, share the issues that are important to you. (Thanks go out to Kim of Texting my Pancreas for inspiring this topic.)

"You don't look like you have diabetes"
"Are you sure you can eat that?"
These are just a couple of misconceptions about diabetes that we all deal with quite frequently.  Whether its people confusing type 1 with type 2, people who think that its your fault that you are diabetic, people who think your insulin pump is like a weird pager or something, or people who think you are a "bad diabetic" if you eat sugar (aka cookies).  I had a friend a few weeks ago that brought some treats to me and another friend.  She handed me a bag with a cookie in it and said "sorry they didn't have any sugar free ones so I got you an oatmeal cookie with out  frosting". Then handed my friend a delicious sugar filled chocolate treat.  I just stared at her for a few seconds thinking "are you kidding me? I want the frosting!" I knew that my friend was just trying to be nice and helpful and it was very sweet of her to bring me something, but there have been many times that something similar thing has happened with other family and friends who don't understand that it's OK for me to eat sugar.  So I guess I just have to remember that before I was diagnosed at the age of 12 I didn't really know anything about diabetes.  All I knew was that there was a girl in my class at school who had to test her blood sugar during recess.  So patience is important and I could definitely use more of it when dealing so many misconceptions of diabetes!