IN THE EYE OF THE STORM...

they said "ike" was coming, so stand clear. we jokingly said it was gon' be a bad one since it was named like tina turner's ex. we didnt know it would require the national guard. folks in the galveston/waterfront area borded their homes and went to "Oz," an unknown place somewhere east of houston; a place to seek shelter and hope for the best. we would need more than ruby shoes and clicked heels to make it back. gasoline was on a shortage, and 12 oz. bottles of water were 7 dollars. traffic moved slowly, when at all. thousands tried to evacuate. many under mandatory rule. our county was not. it must have been fate, or something God is trying to tell me...

there is, for me, nothing more frightening than the wrath or "Acts of God," things no human can counter. this weekend the city i call home, houston texas, faced hurricane "ike." and for the first time, in my displacement, in my days away from home and my mom and daddy, i understood what it means to love someone so much that their circumstance becomes your flesh worn sorrow. for the first time in my life i was helpless to the ones i would give my last breathe, and even then, that was not enough. there was nothing i could do to make it better. looking back, reality and fear crept into my body mimicked the weather and wept. so, a few times during the week, during the hurricane, i wept too.

i was at home in houston the wednesday night before the storm. ike came on a friday. i was due to fly a trip that day. instead, scheduling called and "asked" if i would fly out on thursday to dallas and start my trip from dallas, not houston. still, we didnt foresee the winds the catastrophe, the angry sky. i didnt know i would walk out of that house and still, as i type, be without my parents. diabetes, the inspiration of this blog project, makes me a ready warrior though. so i packed 2 months worth of meds and tubing for my pump. batteries in case my meter failed, a second meter in case my batteries failed, my medic-alert, cash in case my medic alert broke, my iPhone, computer, three law books (about 5 pounds each!), and a rosary.   i had more weight in my bags than on my bones. but necessity will bring muscle to surface. that is how i have toned my flesh, via survival. no gyms, just living and gripping life.  injecting syringes, pulling weight, and lunging in prayer.  

as assigned, i went to dallas. that friday, i woke up in a cold hotel, went to the airport and caught a flight to san antonio then another to philly. i sat in philly for two hours, and worked a flight to providnce RI. once i got to my providence hotel late that night, i settled in. the winds in RI were calm. amazing how different my surroundings were from CNN's footage of home. when i spoke t a supervisor in dallas he besmirkingly asked, "why are you crying?" asshole. but then being an asshole is his role i supposed, so  i shrugged and said nothing.  i dared not waste what energy i had on reasoning with a fool. 

i sat in bed and watched the winds and the water poor into the city. even from a tv set in providence, the houston wind sounded like a boeing 747 prepped to take off, the palm trees were leaning, metals and debry spun through the air, the ocean was coming outside of itself. landfall. my mom and daddy were still there. we were one of few counties not under mandatory evacuation, so they stayed. panic set in. i wasnt sure that they had made the right decision. but then, how do we prepare for God's will?? the commentators spoke of rising waters 25 feet above the 17 foot shore wall. the town looked like a war zone. houses empty, looters on the prowl, streets stripped. reporters called the storm historical and brewing. it would get worse. i saw familiar buildings on the screen, one caught afire- buildings that i passed daily. i knew, in that water was my support team- my mom and dad. fear and faith fought one another and i cried uncontrollably. i was afraid for them. they lived their lives to better mine, and there was nothing i could do to save theirs. that hurt the most. the kind of hurt that makes me hiccup when i cry; the kind of hurt that blurred my vision; the kind of hurt that made me angry;   so much that it was tangible emotion. i was learning what they knew- sometimes, when you see danger infront of your loved ones, all you can do is watch. and in doing so, you can lose your mind. its a torture, literal back curling torture. my posture weakend. my appetite, gone. i wouldnt eat for 3 days, just thinking about them, and the other houstonians. in my mind i started an inevitable body count. 

"why are you crying?"  i should have asked him why he wasn't. but i don't argue with fools.  like jay z said, when you argue with fools, people from a distance can't tell who is who...

i tried my best to keep faith and disregard fear. i called home, just to hear their voices. nothing. i called again. my mother answered. she sounded overwhelmed. the water was filling her patience. it's amazing how in sync  one is to her mother. i knew things she wouldnt say. i wanted nothing more than to stop the hurricane. for a minute, i wondered whether my faith was strong enough to do just that. but i remembered, i'm no jesus. i can hardly get my A1Cs in order, let alone a category 4 hurricane.  there would be no walking on water that night.  all i could do was let it fall as it may. 

i watched the screen as we spoke and i cried without her knowing. but then maybe she did know. nevertheless, i dressed my tone in a performance worhty of an oscar. i could not rattle her energy. i could not let mama know i was afraid for her. that i hated ike for trying to emasculate daddy.  that alone would be too much.

i wanted to be with my parents, as they have been for me. but i was thousands of miles and days away from them. even as i type this, i am waiting to go home. the storm has been documented, the guards called in by Pres. Bush, the neighbors and family have made concerned calls. real friends have checked on our whereabouts as far as california. they called, counting among the fatalities of the storm, praying it was neither of my parents. we are inbound, away from the coastal shore, but close enough that danger loomed and lights a hopeless luxury. they have no electricity.  the heat is grave.  no flowing water.  sewage soaks the city.  what little things we take for granted have evaported in ike's furry. hot water. light. air. all thoise things my mom and dad gave me, they found ways to get what my sister and I needed. and here i was, unable to give them light. i am thirsty for them. i hope the pantry is full. 

yet, even though i have not seen my folks since last wednesday, i know that diabetes and their role in my survival is metaphorically connected to this catastrophe and our family unit. the hurricane reminds me that we have been through this before. diabetes has been my storm, my ike. it has been god's work on me, and i love my parents for choosing to ride it out with me. my bloodsugars, are the waters- some over the sea level range and some well below. and in the tumultuous tides, my mom and dad, even when there was truly nothing they could do or buy to save me, they stood with me, and embodied my fear as their own. but instead of constant weeping for me, they rubbed sticks together for electricity. they taught me to keep warm by leaning on them. they taught me to board up my fears and protect myself. water will come, god's work will always be bigger than us. but it is the aftermath that tells the story.

sometimes all you can do is protect your frame and move yourself from harms way. sometimes al you can do is watch the waters fall as they may.  the tide will settle.  but if harm follows, you have to know how to take cover, how to take prayer. how to know when you have done all you can do...and hold on; how to kneel to the heavens.   my parents, they remind me to keep faith in things unseen. be not afraid of things unknown, and to lie in the trenches.

becauase of my mom, dad, hurricanes, and diabetes, i believe in prayer. its not a matter of telling God what i want or need.  that is child's play, pestering.  God is fully aware, of what i want.  it is a matter of preparing for what God has for me.  what i need.   sometimes when i have an unexplained 400 bloodsugar, followed by that clearly explainable (overtreated highs turn to lows) 23, i HATE my circumstance. but when i get brace of myself, and a reality that it is what it is, i rememebr to lie in the trench, to take cover, and to pray. faith is knowing that things will be fine. "fine" is not necessarily how i define it, but peace in what God's definition of it is, FOR me. that takes patience and courage. that is the essence of riding out a hurricane. that is the essence of survival.  if again a fool ever asks why are you crying in the midst of a hurricane, i will know- because God is showing me who is God, and I am a witness.

in a few more days i expect to see my mom and daddy. i am en route for another trip... i will be home sunday. however houston is on mandatory curfew, so i will stay at the airport til daybreak. my dad will come and get me. i will see him and my mother differently. before the storm, i thought they worried too much about my diabetes, that they hovered over me and wouldnt let me live freely. now, i see what has been their entire life with me. they have spent the years of my life like i did in the days before and during Ike- afraid that the storm would be too big, not knowing when or whether light would come, wondering if technology was a lie, holding on to what ever pieces of "solid" that they could; all to keep our house, our lives, and our hope from caving in. 

the things we agree with, the things that anger us, the things that kill us- we have to respect them as God's order, and fear nothing. that takes practice. i forgot that, but Ike reminded me.
yes Lord, i will see my mom and dad come monday morning and i will know that  hurricanes and diabetes are twins. i will respect what they are made of. i will know what family is made of. i will know what life is made of- a cocktail of tears, water, sky, battles, unearthly winds and the trauma of making it. shit, diabetes is just another bridge. i learned that if it too shatters, i have a home and a family watching over me. i have a God that knows beyond  category 4 storms, before the diabetes, and after the stars lose light. i have uncategorized faith...

"i write in red ink that turns blue when the book closes"- saul williams

so this is how it started for me.  this path to learning an advocating for the disease that has been my teacher, my thorn, my rock, and my resentment.  this is how we were introduced.  it was a hot summer day in june, 1984. picture this:  

i was on  a field trip at the brookfield zoo, outside of chicago.  even if i had words to say, they would have lit fire to my throat in the delivery.  there was an unmoving film drying on my tongue.  the sun rays into my skin.  i was shedding. my shoulders peeled, intimidated from the heat.  my body weighed more than i could carry. tom compensate, i slid along the pathway mistaking blurs of heat waves for smoke.  thirst took captive of my five year old body, a dolphin flipped- contorted its body backwards, and splashed cool water aside my face. the May sky and  and clear water shared the same color of blue; one above me, the other below.  one was punishing me, the other relieving me, both antagonizing my dizziness. 

 i felt faint.  i was too young for this.  it was too big, and i was too small. i couldn't get it off of me.   my breathing deepened.  but i kept walking, following my teacher, mrs. messach, and my classmates from the same cage back to the same cage, around a pathway to the same cage, throughout the zoo.  maze like patterns seemingly without end.  this irony would become my life story.  i was tired. i needed to rest.  what saliva  i could make, i savored.  to feed off the bodily juices that would surface every now and again, i sucked my tongue.  my body, 40 pounds or so of flesh and muscle, bone and tired, molded over the emptiness of my thoughts because i was too young to articulate the crime within my body , the loudness of my baby steps.  i was captive within myself.  

"ms. messach, i don't feel good."  it was hot.  she bought me a pepsi. it was about a half liter.  the letter P-E-P-S-I written down the side.  the cup was sweating too.   i drank it within 6 nauseating gulps.  that year we learned how to count, so i remember the exact number of swallows it took to drink.  the pepsi capitalized on my grave condition.  the longer we stayed the shorter my breaths became. the sugar started the process that would later, threaten my life. by the time i made it home, i fell into a deep sleep.  i woke up and have never slept soundly since.  

later that night, doctors whispered to my mother and father.  they told my parents what the blood tests revealed. what the numbers meant.  my mother had inclinations.  she was an ex ray technician, familiar with the language, fluent in "doctor."  they learned the roller coaster that would become our lives would continually turn. good thing daddy had taught me to tie my shoes.  i would need them to run.   

i entered a turning point while my kindergarden class and i were on that fateful field trip trip to the brookfield zoo. my pancreas tired itself and i developed juvenile onset- insulin dependent diabetes. oh and the dolphin i saw earlier that day, well it may not have been a dolphin at all.  delirium os a symptom of extremely high blood glucose levels.   every time i pass a zoo, i get tremendously thirsty and privately sad. 

i missed my kindergarden graduation.  i was in pediatric intensive care unit of michael reese hospital.  presents were sent to my room.  flowers and visitors adorned me.  as i gained consciousness, i did not gain perspective.  i was five years old. five. so, i just lay there.  staring at the women dressed in nurses' uniforms- white, starched.  they were all so nice to me.  they would open the window shades in the morning.  they told me i was a pretty little girl. one told me that i was brave.  i thought that she was the prettiest.   even at that age, never having been hospitalized before, i knew the doctors from the nurses. the doctors didnt smile at me.  they didnt even look at me.  i bored them i think .  they just held on to a clip board, pressed my belly, looked into my eyes with a light pen, and held cold metal to my chest without apologizing or rubbing their hands together to warm them.  then they would write something down on their paper clip and leave. methodical. cold like the metal instruments forced onto my boney chest.  they told my parents secrets in the hallway.  it was as if i werent there.   i was as neutral as the clock on the wall, the remote to the TV, the chair near the window.  

in all this confusion i experienced,   i never cried when they injected me. i didnt mention the field trip.   i just sat there and listened to the click clack of expensive loafers and high heeled shoes pacing the hallways.  never asked ma what was wrong with me.  i didnt know that there was anything wrong.  to pass time, i counted the the brown and speckled beige tiles that lined the walls and the bigger ones that lined the floors.  i peered out into the hall from my bed.  i watched the IV drip into the crevice of my veins.  when they asked me how i was feeling i said "fine" and closed my eyes.  i colored in a coloring book, and waited.  really, i didnt know how i felt.  i didnt know what was happening.  i didnt know where i was or why mommy looked so tired, as if she had been crying.  my kindergarden class meanwhile, marched on without me.  but i was the one that graduated.  

my sister asked me "why" i write this blog.  it has not gained any followers yet, i don't even know that it will.  besides, she said it is hard to read because she too carries memories.  i never underestimate ones reality, but with all due respect, this is a blog that is unique to the TID.  it is a life that one can witness, but the thread of the life is ours alone.  im certain seeing a seizure is hard, but having one, that is what i am writing about.  seeing the bruises hurts but combatting them is like swallowing fire.  surviving multitudes the source of those moments, that is what i am writing about. and there is no memory that can measure what it feels like versus what it looks like. 

now, "why" i am writing, well,  i want the world to know how i make it day to day.  i want TIDs with no one to talk to, to know that there are others.  and our stories are not unique among the breast of one another.  the Pessimists might say "suck it up."  they might say i was born to the tunnels of infinite darkness.  this may be true.  i have no other choice but to make it through. therefore,  sympathy is a feeling i resent.  the "awwww, it must be so hard on you" makes my stomach turn.  everyone has a "cross to bare" and to advertise mine as something more than what it is would be cynical and comical to say the least.  it is a liveable life.  but i think had i known the ways to get through, the detours, and exits, things might be different for me.  so i will give what i know, so that things might be different for someone else.  the story, the moments, that is what i use to give other people a vision of possibility and myself, a place to display the colors of my days and nights.  so i guess subconsciously, i CHOOSE happiness.  the reality is, what i have sought has often ended in opposition of what i have found. i liken this experience to ripened fruit.  the sweeteness of the best selections comes with a heightened price.  to live an organic life, we have to make great conscious steps toward that which we seek.  so if the tunnel was dark, in order to save the grace of my sanity, i went forward with my journey.  i cry in private. i pray that the lights will be on by the time i reach the tunnel's end, and if not, i teach myself to rub sticks together and ignite a light of my own.  not only then am i proud of having found my own light and energy source, but in knowing that i have found and widened my muscle mass in the process.  i write this blog for those like me seeking to widen their muscle mass. 

i write this for the kid that never got called on in class, one who could never afford to fully understand the celebration of Halloween and feasts of Christmas dinners without worry, the one who had to grow up fast, learn to run fast when her body screamed otherwise- fast enough to save her own life.  i type this for the child who was doing algebraic equations in her head, not for class, but to multiply the units of insulin subtracted by the blood sugar goal divided by the possibility of getting the dose right.  i write this for the same child who by the time she reached highschool algebra, was bored with math because she'd learned every number's relation to the next in drawing up syringes and doing advanced math without paper, pencils, calculators or help. she learned the hard way when she messed up. the child for whom only the right answer to the decimal, would suffice.  broken syringes were her abacus.  she learned to count, by sorting them, hoping the number would end.  i write this for them.  

i write this for those who like me, were of a world that birthed itself backwards.  see, i was born an adult had the credence of responsibility climbing my then emaciated back. childhood evoked feelings of razors peeking between my yearnings for normalcy and the reality of what was; the teasing, the embarrassment, the shame. they all cut along my backside, engraved into my spine.  i still feel it.  the movies of the memories, what ones i remember, i resent.  so i write this for the people that can testify to those particulars.  the words engraved read, "WOUNDED. DO NOT TREAT. UNABLE TO HEAL.   those statements are not entirely true, but  in my mind at the ages of 8, 9, 10, 11, that is what i believed. i have to work to encourage myself otherwise.   when i was diagnosed at 5 years old, i had no idea what diabetes was, hell i had no idea where the bathroom was. it was not until my preteen years that diabetes became a main character in my idea of living.   it was the "other" family member.  it was at the dinner table, it was in the car on the way to school, it was in my pillow at night, it was on my ceiling in the morning.  it was always there. so i write this for the people who also live with this impostor, to tell you how i coexist with an unwanted roommate.  how we have learned to reside within one another. 

an interruption of dreams, this life has been.  i often believe it interrupted the lives of my sister and parents.  i want to tell them, it was not my plan.  so i write this to purge the guilt that i carry in my hand bag.  the baggage i cant seem to sell.  i want them and other families to know, that my  hope was always for the light and never the nightmares.  we dont want our families to have to see us like this, to have to live by a clock the way we do, to have to think about things that are too morbid to embrace.  now, as i am approaching 30 years old, and 26 of them with diabetes,i want more than light.  i want my family to know that i am ok, really.  that i am not afraid of the doors before me, that i appreciate all the years they held my hand and suffered through it all.  the doors they held open behind me.  they stayed with me, when so-called friends left.  they stayed with me when i acted ugly or took it our on them. they stayed with me because they saw the light i am only beginning to call mine.  and i will be damned if diabetes dictates otherwise.  

so realistic or not, i want to be a prism.  a prism-  the point where light touches rays of itself and reflects itself back unto its origin; the point where revolution happens and visions are coated in intangible multi-dimensional colors made of the spirals of themselves bending backward, a confusion of touchable magic and questionable reality. yeah, there are and were times when i just wanna be like everyone else, but God took the time to do something different with me- because it was apparent then, that i could handle that much. remember, i was born backwards.  i always took advocacy of diabetes as my obligation.  as my heartfelt honor. but this blog is to exemplify the times when i want/ed out. 

 i used to want to be "an astwo-not! a fiya-man! a teeeee-cherrrrrrr!" on sick days, i just wanted to sleep.  on sad days, i wanted to cry.   but in the midst of my writing and maturity, i have learned that as a prism, i can be the color for another, i can be the vision of of will and strength.i will detail the times when i reflect myself upon myself to give you the colors of what i have seen.   the words i choose omit and maybe even regret, are those that at this moment the sun caught a glimpse of so that is had to be reflected.  a prism.  these are the lasting images i want to leave in words.  words give us more power than any medicine ever could, more than any science might hope to advance.  i commemorate these words and feelings that have long aborted me but reemerge every now and again, to let that little boy on oklahoma know, to let the little girl in san diego know, to let the parents of diabetic teens know, a teacher, friend, sibling of a diabetic know, that this is  life changes minute by minute.  it is one that is often over buttered and under explained by media and research, and yet it effects millions of americans, most of whom are our children.  to say "i have type one diabetes and i may get sick or i take insulin" is an insulting understatement of what this thing truly is.  i aim to clarify though my experience, similar feelings of millions of others.  we are often misunderstood, freakish, alone, underestimated, overmedicated, frustrated and frankly pissed off.  i have to write this. i have so much to tell that in the end, it may seem that i have said nothing. but for those of you who want to or already understand, it will make sense.  you will just "get it".  i write this blog to reveal to the best of my recoiled and bittersweet nostalgia the epic, the politics, the science, the psychology of a disease.  i write this to hypnotize you to my recall, to enchant you by the prism that i will myself to create, everyday i live...so from this blog, i will begin the story.  stay tuned.    

you are aboard a boeing 737. should the cabin depressurize, secure your mask first...

i wanted to blog yesterday, and the day before that, and again this morning.  i couldn't.  i had to prioritize my energy.  its a choreography i have mastered.  especially in times like these.  my blood sugars have been running dangerously high, so i have been fatigued and sleeping most hours of the last days.  434, 455, 502, 378... ketones were "large" to "moderate". lost eight pounds of flesh and muscle in two days and counting.  i am only 5ft 2 inches, so that's a noticeably dangerous amount of weight.  sure, i physically felt ill.  but i have learned to work through that.  i have learned to become metaphysical, in the vein of God. 

per usual,  i smiled and tried to cover my weight loss.  i added clothes and makeup.  i added jokes and humor. when they weren't looking, i stole extra breaths.  when they turned back, there i was- the black Mona Lisa. roaming eyes, unchanged expression. master of illusion.  i told them, despite my rushed breathing, that my heart rate was not off beat, that my blood sugars were beautiful.  that is my role. the Oscar should always go to me.  inside, it is my spirit that i most worry about.  

see, the type I diabetic tests her blood sugar, or the level of energy in her blood, 3 to 6 times or more, daily.  too much sugar , aka , high blood sugars, trigger infection, organ failure, fatigue and nausea, among other things.  the type one diabetic using an insulin pump tests anywhere between 10-15 times a day, if not more.  an insulin pump is an I.V. type contraption that feeds insulin drips by tube into the body, worn by the patient. looks like a cell phone with a long tube flowing from it, to the body. depending on the situation.  

 i test about 12 times a day.  the punctures on my finger tips are true tribal scars. the pump and syringe injection sites are there too- all over my abdomen and upper thighs- purple marks and scars, bruises and blood clotted scabs.  i clean them, massage them, lubricate them in olive oil and Shea butter, but they are there. sometimes, i put makeup on them so i don't have to see the aftermath of reality. 

ketones are the spillage of sugar into the urine stream.  the blood cant support the sugar so it has to go somewhere.  in so doing, ketones eat flesh and make meals of the organs and eyes.  they induce vomiting and dehydration.   the longer one has ketones, the more damage they do to the body.  some non-diabetics induce ketones to lose weight.  that's crazy as hell. i'm trying to avoid them, and they're trying to fit into Gucci dresses and force them.   ketones kill.  i love gucci and all that, but not enough to sacrifice my life.  that's all i will say about that. anyway...

the numbers, every time i test my blood/urine, judge me.   i am often haunted by their verdict.  when they are "good," between 85-150 or so, i am glad and hopeful.  when they are lower than 70 i feel insatiably hungry. i have failed in my mind.  i failed to "catch it" before it got so low.  there is a sense of free fall.  not in a euphoric sense, but one where i know the bottom is coming.i look down and i see it.  the closer i get, the farther away it moves. illusions, again.   so i fear it. and i fear it, and wait. it's the waiting that hurts.  low blood sugars are the closest thing to instant death or coma a diabetic can face. its a drowning that never ends.  seems like when i get air, "water" fills my chest again, and i am gasping until the next pause.  some TIDs become combative when "low".  not me.  i become panicked.  so i eat.  i eat to get sugar.  i eat to get energy.  i eat to keep from feeling helpless. then i over treat the low and the cycle begins.   faster than a car accident, its quicker than deployed oxygen masks on a plane, it is faster than a light switch control of  artificial light. and there is a feeling of anxiety and panic that goes with the shaking hands and sopping perspiration. then the high blood sugars come as a result. those bitches live in a world of their own. i hate them.  i hate them.  and for me, they happen every day.  i go back in my mind and try to calculate where i went "wrong"   i always feel like there was something i  did to contribute to the high-  ate too much; took too little insulin; had that argument; or that test that i allow to stress me.  something.  

 but still, the scars on my body are no match to the emotional scars on my mind. I'm almost proud of the markings on my skin, but no one is proud of a scarred mind.   

its the constant judgement that you cant help.  every time you test your blood sugar or test for ketones, you are being equated with that number.  10 to fifteen time a day or more.  people often say, "well, you need to take better care of yourself."  that's a bullshit and uneducated statement.  i say this because TID (type I diabetes), is a trick.  it is a balance that wot balance. you can do everything you are "supposed to", measure your carb counts, modulate insulin doses, and test your blood every hour on the hour, and still, you may or may not win. sure there are diabetics that do whatever the hell they want.  but shit,  maybe they are on to something.  i would rather die with a record of life, than live a daily doom.  the unpredictability of this disease is, what i think, triggers  self hatred, the psychological slumps, the images of Grim Reapers, and sometimes the seduction of letting go. 

in all this, i have learned that this shit is what happens. period.  i could monitor every point of my life, and still the margin of error would go against my will.  so with that, i do what i can and move on.  i see my sharpness fading, but i also see that i am still on my feet.  i see myself tired more hours of the day than not, but i still see hours of the day.  on my "sick days" i lay in my bed and watch cartoons.  i think of how my life has developed my character.  i wonder how lame might be with nothing to stand for.  i think of all the articles and scholarly writings and studies diabetes has introduced me to.  i think of my purpose.  sometimes we get so busy when life is in our hands that God shuts us down with sickness.  but its the sickness, the silence that teaches us to grow, to be still and listen.   although, my thinking is often clouded i stay away from playing checkers with my dad.  but when he sits with me i study his features, i learn his ways  it is my time set aside by God to get to know my mom and dad.  a time that i might otherwise schedule for work or school.  i learn his frown his humor, his heart. when my dad sits with me when i am sick, i learn from where my strength came.  when my mom brings me hot water to sip or sits with me, i memorize her scent.  i hold her hand.  i learn the pattern of her steps, i learn her values.  it is in those moments that  i don't resent diabetes, but i thank it.  i thank God for the moments that i have no choice but to listen to the life around me.  it is those lives that feed mine.  

also, i sleep and dream.  when my blood sugar is higher than 300, i can sleep for 20 hours or so.  even dream themes change when the blood sugar varies.    but i wake with  new sight of where i am going .  sure, every time i test i am judged i weigh my value on those numbers.  i think all TIDs do that.  but on the flip side, i get a "do over"  i reinvent myself every time, with every dream i recalibrate my goals, my journey.  i learn to grow discontent with imperfection and seek always to plan, to idealize, to testify that there is a God. i learn to secure myself first, before helping out others.  this is not selfishness, no.  this is living. 

in the beginning there was light... but for a diabetic there is no beginning.

strokes of fate and intrigue inspire this blog. im not much of a writer, but i am a survivor. the way i see it, people need something, if not someone to hold onto. not always some more pc shit to read- but the gritty ironed out truth. the day to day how to survive in the belly of disease and life. i dont want to read anymore magazines or "how to" books- i cant stand talk shows' tips that rarely amount to anything. i dont want the promises of a cure. or the details of a new diet or injection modifier. i just want somebody to "tell it like it T-I-is." if i can get a confirming "amen" for people who understand my language, well that's all the better. nad if i dont, the rush of typing, the exhauset of my frustartion the pennicle of my words is enough for me to believe that i am being proactive in my frustration. so i will tell it. the daydreams, the nightmares, pity parties testimony, encouragement, and miracles. all that.

its summer olympics season. 2008. this evening after i saw that fine david oliver run in the olympic games, i got on the net looking for his race stats, aka, how old he is and whether he is married!! i found his blog. he's too young, too fast, and apparently well established. maybe by fate or chance, there was an option on his blog that viewers could click - to start ones own blog. i always thought blogging was interesting and nerdy in a cute way, but i didnt really know how to do it, and whether i had anything relevant to say. but then my leg started hurting again. an excruciating and private pain. i dared not cry again. im tired of that. i dared not complain, because i wasnt going to fall to the hurt- not today. so i started writing. rubbing my temple, praying over my pain and writing. my leg aches and cripples from the years of type I diabetes that have resided in my body. beginning stages of neuropathy. this blog is about my life with type I insulin dependent diabetes. the kind you dont hear about in the media as often as type II adult onset, the kind people mistake for the diabetes their great aunt bertha has to take pills for, the kind that is a bitch and has puppies, day after day...that one.

still, this wont be a sad " poor me" kinda thing, nah. thats never been my style. but i will be honest. i will be explicit. editing wont be done. all freestyle, from the heart. literally off the top of my head. this blog will be "a dear john letter" to the 25 years that i did not complain, to the years i injected myself, seized in my sleep, prayed it away, made myself throw up to keep my blood sugars in tact, woke my family in fear and drenched night spells, to the people who laughed at me in school, to the ones who said dumb shit and didnt know better, to the Granny that taught me to hold my head up, and to the angels in spirit and flesh that created a fence around me, and to the fence that never failed- God. this blog is a letter to the impostering demons that competed for my attention.

i am an everyday young woman, just trying to get through law school, work hard, and see where positivity gets me. although it was the olympics that brought me to the computer this night, im no athlete. not in the nearest sense of the word. i don't run at speeds worthy of international applause, unless it involves some jimmy choos on sale for more than half off. i don't swim as fast as michael phelps. heck, i don't even know how to stay afloat- in water, at least. but i do know how to a play a game that millions of americans confront. i been holding my breath for its cure for the last 2 decades. i have been diligent; up early,in bed late, tinkering with the meds and how much to take or not, working out, trying to keep a happy face, hoping they wont see the fear or smell the prozac on my breath. so maybe i am an athlete. maybe i am a magician. maybe i am a fool.

questions i often pose internally, and probably the subconscious reasons for my words herein are, 'how far will i run, how long can i last, and what is my honest incentive?' just being in the game, is sometimes more than i can ask for. im grateful. they say, "[i] look good," considering. i have not had long bouts in the hospital or reno failure. so statistically, i am doing ok.

but there are the days in between the tests, moments when i am tired of living, times when i want all things diabetes to end even if that includes me. but then there are times when i am proud, there are trumphs that call me to raise my fists in pride, days when i am certain that this disease is a figment of my imagination and a challenge to which i owe my character.

still, every morning i wake up, i make a list of the things i plan to do that day. oh yeah, i got notebooks full of random lists. "buy shampoo", "call tiff", "work on the brief for class"...i go on, as if i know that not waking is not an option. i dont know if it was faith in God or a challenge to God, but that conflict of sorts, is the only confidence i have. it is a precursor to my DNA, it is what my mother expects of me, it is why my father worked so hard so many nights and into countless days.

yet, the thing that most haunts my thinking and encourages my need to write, in this moment, are mixed emotions for a disease that taught me to swim without water and hurdle over bridges that only i could see, that sought to tear me under, and sometimes tried to suffocate me in my sleep. my personal olympics brought me to this night, to this website.

maybe someone else will read these words and know that there are others in the perpetual race called diabetes. the lighting may be different, the crowds may be more or less supportive, for you it may be a sprint, a hurdle or a relay from yourself back to yourself- but the race is on. the gun is still smoking, so its never too late to run your ass off.

there are days when i have to "pump myself up" just to keep moving even at a glacial pace. there are days when the ketones are ravishing, when i literally must sleep the entire day, when the perspiration and dizziness bathe me. but always, i tell myself that i will run, i will swim. i will breathe and pace myself through the course just like michael phelps. i hold on to the most uneven bars, just like mary lou retton. i stride along wind and float into my metaphysical self, just like carl lewis. and when i physically have exhausted myself, i pray that what i have already done will be enough to keep me in the race. i glide through time like that fine brian oliver. i am the american athlete- i compete with myself for a space within myself; i time myself and measure my worth against the numbers that only God can change. i am an athlete. no medal exists, other than gold.