62 Years Of Type 1.......CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 6.

I have read about young diabetics who cheat and rebel. I was diagnosed at the tender age of 6. I loved and respected my parents and I did not question their demands involving my diabetes care. I was NEVER to eat sugar or candy or other items containing sugar unless I was having very low blood sugar. I followed that rule to the letter. Mother was so good to make me wonderful desserts sweetened with saccharin. I loved her desserts so much that I was not tempted to eat their desserts. Some of my favorites were banana cream pie, cherry vanilla custard pie, baked custard pie, chocolate pie, rhubarb pie, peach pie, and raisin pie. The pies had homemade crusts that were very thick and they were divided into five pieces for my dinners and suppers. Can you tell I liked pies??? There was also applesauce cake for my birthday and again for Christmas. The cake contained lots of nuts and raisins and and applesauce to make it stay moist. None of these desserts contained any sugar so they were OK for me, right? We thought they were. Can you imagine how many carbs were in these desserts? A typical breakfast had two kinds of meat, perhaps sausage cakes and thick ham slices which I ate with my eggs. There were homemade biscuits with lots of butter and I would dunk them in my saccharin sweetened homemade apple butter. That and a big glass of milk from our own cows completed my meal. Is it any wonder that I had terribly high blood sugar…er…urine sugar? The breakfast was so large because both of my parents were raised on a farm and they and their families worked hard and needed that food for energy as they set out to do their farming chores. I do not think my parents knew any other way to live. We had three large meals every day and I am certain I must have eaten more than 500 carbs per day. When the peaches were ripe in our orchard I would climb up on the lower branches and reach up for a mellow, juicy peach. They were as big as a grown man’s fist. I would eat two and my tummy would hurt. I was covered with juice so I would go home to wash up. Daddy always sprayed our fruit and every time I ate our fruit I was eating dangerous chemicals. We did not know any better. It never hurt any of us so far as I know. We had plums, grapes , strawberries, raspberries, apples and pears. I ate too much fruit but I loved it. I was in charge of the melon patch. I planted canteloupes and watermelons each year. They required sandy soil and lots of water. The were left on the vine until they were fully ripe. They taste so much better that way than when they are picked green and ripened afterwards. The same is true with all fruit and tomatoes. My mouth is watering terribly as I write this chapter today.

Daddy milked the cows at daybreak and cleaned their stalls. Then he ate breakfast and went back out and hoed or plowed the garden, watered and pruned trees and shrubs, and did so many other things. He would then go home for dinner and sleep on the floor for an hour afterwards. He then reported to the post office where he worked from 2pm until 11pm with a one hour break for supper. The lunch pail Mother packed for him was unbelievable. He ate some of what we had at home for our supper. Daddy would get home late and try to be in bed by midnight. I have never known a man to work so hard. On some days he made time to pick up a load of shrubbery at my uncles nursery and plant them at people’s houses. We told people that Daddy had three jobs. The farm, the post office and the nursery. Daddy had a lot of muscle and was never much overweight. None of us were ever much overweight, even though we ate food like there was no tomorrow. I was always skinny until many years later when I started using modern day insulins. We worked hard and we all loved each other so much. Good food, hard work and lots of love. That is my recipe for a successful family and growing up well.

My parents never smoked cigarettes or drank alcoholic beverages. They were my guiding light and I intended to follow in their footsteps. When I was 10 a young lad two years older than me came to our house. He was in my homeroom when I was in fifth grade. He had failed two times and had been held back. He had never ridden a horse and he wanted to ride our old work horse. So Bobby, Larry and I climbed aboard and we rode through the pasture. Bobby offered us cigarettes. Larry and I had never smoked but we did not want to be called chicken so we smoked a couple. After Bobby went home we decided we would continue smoking after school each day. Larry took a pack of Lucky Strikes out of his father’s pickup truck and we headed to his back property where no one would see us. We smoked our way through several packs in a few weeks time. Larry’s Father eventually caught on. He was missing his packs of cigarettes and his Mother had smelled the tobacco odor on Larry’s clothes. One night after dark Larry and his parents came to visit. That was most unusual and I knew something was up. Larry would not look at me and he hung his head. The jig was up. My parents were shocked to hear what I had done but they did no dicipline me at all. It was not necessary. I was so ashamed that I had disappointed my parents whom I loved so much. I think they knew I would never do anything like that again, and I didn’t. My urine sugar had been 4+ every morning all that time I had been smoking. Now we all knew why. I had not been eating well either during that time. Things improved a lot in the weeks to come. Except for abandoning my sister in the corn field, smoking was the only bad thing I ever did as a child. My parents were good examples to follow and my sister and I were good followers.

After I was grown I found that my Mother and Dr Davis had been working together for my “benefit”. Mother would phone him and tell him things that she wanted him to tell me before she drove me in for my appointments. “Now Alvin, you can’t drink or smoke. that will make your diabetes much worse.” That was after my cigarette episode. “Now Alvin, you can’t participate in gym at school, that will make your sugar go too low and you may have a hypo.” I do not know exactly how Dr Davis expressed himself on these occasions but I can still hear his voice and his advice. I always trusted him without question. I was very disappointed in my Mother and the doctor for their plotting and scheming. He also questioned my going to college but he did not sound so forceful as he had the other times. Mother admitted that she had called Dr Davis about college. I was onto their wicked ways! HA!! Never again! I never argued with Mother about this. I just told her I was disappointed in her and she apologized. Daddy did not know anything about this. Maybe he never did. I never told him.

Richard,
I’m enjoying your story very much. My son was diagnosed last year at age 19 months, and I think I’ll print these out for him to read someday when he’s old enough!
Thank you!
Tracy

just read the sixth chapter and ready for the seventh. i’m glad i don’t drink or smoke either. i get on to my son for smoking cause i tell him that he is a good candidate to donate a kidney to his son. his son is three yrs old and has kidney failure, but we at home keep him in good health but the calculations on the function of his kidneys will be around 7 or 8 when he’ll need a transplant. i’m almost most certain that he will develope type 1 diabetes but praying that won’t happen. i love this baby with all my heart, i’ve been raising him since he was 7 weeks old. his mother told a nurse at the hospital that she didn’t want to care for a sick child. when i found out about this i was outraged. but i took the oppurtunity to step up on this and knew i was the better person to care for him. sure enough, he’s beaten the odds. i’m pretty sure if i hadn’t stepped up my grandson would of been dead and believe me that would of destroyed me. your mother did all that for you cause she knew that life without you would destroy her. she rather had done all this for you than to say what if. she loved you so very much, i bet that she had stopped at nothing to make sure you were alright and all those sleepless nights worrying about you. you were blessed to have your mother care for you and love you as well. my grandson doesn’t have his mother but he has alot of family on his father’s side that does love him and his grandmother who has sleepless days and lots of motherly love just for him. continue writing and i’m sure to give this to my gson when he gets older. for him to recognise that he is so loved just like you were and i bet is still being so loved by your family and wife. patti

Thanks Patti, I appreciate your replies and I am pleased that someone on this site is getting something positive from my story. I am so sorry to hear about your grandson. You are an angel for taking him under your wing and caring for him like that. I am sure there is a very ckose bond between the two of you. YOU are the mother and grandmother too. He has brought so much into your life and you have kept him alive and well. I congratulate you!!

Richard