Disagree if you like but I think that that movie portrayed type 1 diabetes in a very uneducated way … Here goes if you remember the seen where she was getting her hair done and all of a sudden you starts acting all weird ( which was supposed to be a low ) now the only way that I would end up acting as bad as she did with a low would be if and only let’s say my bloodsugar was below 100 and dropping and I just sat around with a 50 or 40 or 30 for like more than 5 minutes ( let’s say like 20 minutes ) than I would start acting like that to … And in all these 22 years of being a diabetic I have never had to have someone pour juice down my mouth as I pushed them away …and the seen that is the worst is how right after she has a baby she gets on dialalasus and then their is a funeral scene … Basically the writer of that movie portrayed a type one diabetic like it’s a death sentence and your not all mentally there … Anyone have some of their own thoughts about that movie and I recommend that if you are newly diagnosed and haven’t seen this movie yet keep it that way !
Well I agree it is a horrible portrayal of t-1. I have had to try to force feed my mother jelly and or juice many time when she was semi out of it do to a low. She will also act like a drunk and hallucinate. Lows hit people differently and everyone acts different with lows. I get angry my mom acts like a drunk. The character may also have been very hypo unaware. Still a horrible portrayal
I have had T1 for 20 years now and I have experienced a low just like that many times. One time I can remember off the top of my head is when I first started dating my fiance and started acting like I was “drunk”. He knew right away that I was having a low and tried forcing some gingerale on me. I was fighting him on it for a while then just gave in eventually. I have had lows where I feel “normal” and lows where I am like a totally different person, very defiant and stubborn.
It is just a movie and the it is not about the life of a diabetic. We also have to remember the movie was made 20 years ago, medicine has come a long way. Maybe she wasn’t in control of her diabetes, maybe the birth of a baby was too severe on her kidneys…things like this happen, everyone and their experiences are different. It is up to us to educate ourselves and take our health into our own hands.
I think the movie is from the early 1980s and is based on a book so I would presume it depicts pre-BG machine diabetes? I’m not 100% sure though as I only saw it once, a long time ago. Likely a college movie. Utterly not the sort of movie I’d ever see. I can’t imagine what would have posessed me to see it.
Most likely a young lady convinced you to see it
OH MY GOD! I was just talking with someone last night about the scene. She agreed with you…mostly. She did agree though that everyone acts differently when feeling low and it is possible that Julia Roberts’ character could be mean like that…like refusing the juice.
How funny that I literally just had this conversation 24 hours ago!!
Can’t stand that melodramatic tear jerker movie.
LOL
+1 LOL
Don’t know how many times I had to watch steel magnolias and grease to keep a young lady happy
I HATE that movie. My family, especially my grandmother loves it. I have seen it several times, not by choice, since I was a child. It has convinced multiple family members I am going to die/ will never have kids. I get that it was from 20+ years ago, but not everyone has that kind of common sense. It also did not help that my uncle married a type 2 diabetic who had extreme complications (unrelated to diabetes but it is cause and effect with this disease) with both of her pregnancies and really did nearly die if she wasn’t hospitalized 75% of the time.
My blood sugar dropped into the 30s about a month ago and apparently I was “being very difficult” while my boyfriend was trying to help. I could hardly walk straight (like I was drunk) but kept telling him I was OK. He was very frustrated that I wouldn’t let him help, but I was convinced I had it all under control.(I still have a tendency to over-correct my lows) I apologized and told him I would try to be more cooperative in the future. I’m just grateful that I am NOT hypo-UNaware.
On a lighter note, anyone ever see the 80’s movie Warlock? It wasn’t that good of a movie but the main character was a diabetic. Its been a while, but from what I remember. They mention once at the begining of the movie something about insulin. And then at the end of the movie during the climax…
(SPOILER ALERT)
the main character pulls out her syringe fills it with sea water and injects the warlock in the neck and he dies almost immediately. Just another case of diabetes saving the day!
Um, the Steel Magnolia movie was made a long time ago. I have pushed people away who were trying to pour juice down my mouth and screamed that it is poison! The movie is pure drama, and it wasn’t specifically about diabetes but about the intense emotions that are part of the disease, not just for the diabetic. I forgive the possible misinformation, but will say that back when the story was written, the insulin we used was not the same stuff we have today, and control was much more of a challenge. There are folks (I am one) who never feel a hypo coming at all. Maybe the writer was working from the way things were in the 80s and not the way things are now. I would recommend the movie to anyone
1989, talking glucose meter? The one I was using then still took 3 minutes to get a result and needed more blood then a vampire! lol
LOL, Brock! So true, and the meter from then was as big as a bread box!
The movie was based on the play written by the brother of a woman who died from kidney-rejection (i.e. diabetic complications) at the age of 32. Shelby was modeled after his sister so unfortunately, most of the portrayal was true to her experience. From what I’ve read, she was described as a very “brittle” diabetic. She did get pregnant when the doctors told her not to, was on dialysis after giving birth because both of her kidneys failed, and then went into a coma after her body rejected her mother’s donated kidney. Never came out of that coma - in fact, the doctors and nurses used in the movie were the same doctors and nurses who attended to the sister. The writer said he originally wrote the play as a short story to deal with the death of his sister, and eventually it became the play that centered more around the womens’ relationships. The original play was written in the early 80’s I think, so that lets you know what kind of tools the sister had at her disposal.
Yes, I hated it, and felt singled out and thought I was going to die.
I saw that movie for the first (and only time) one week after I was dx’d. Scarier than any horror movie I ever watched!
It’s melodramatic, yeah, but it’s also dated: set in some mid-20th-century southern setting where home bg testing was not available presumably the 1960’s or 1970’s.
It freaked me out when I first saw it, but you know what? I have had severe hypos since then (including glucagon and ER trips) and I’m still around today.
I had a girlfriend back when I was much younger and the movie was new that made me see it. Don’t think I’m ever gonna watch it again :-).