HAVE ANY OF YOU EVER THOUGHT ABOUT WHAT YOU WOULD LOKE TO SAY TO PEOPLE THAT DONT HAVE DIABETES AND THEY SAY TO YOU, “OH I UNDERSTAND EXACTLY WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT”. MY ANSWER TO THEM IS DO YOU REALLY, LETS JUST TALK ABOUT THAT A MINUTE. SO MY QUESTION IS WHAT DO YOU FOLKS SAY.
Jim:
I have a favor to ask of you. Please don’t shout on the site! I learned the hard way that typing in all caps was considered to be “shouting.” But, you know, the one thing that strikes me is that it is hard on the eyes. Hope you take this in he spirit it was proffered.
I might be tempted to say something like, “Do you have diabetes? You can’t even i>begin to understand what I am going through. Let me sit down and tell you.”
It may sound a little harsh, but I am to the point of wanting to barf when people presume to know how I am feeling without walking at least a little way in my shoes.
Lois La Rose
Milwaukee, WI
I just say “Do you test your sugars six to eight times a day, do you wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat and shaking, do you have to watch every thing you put in your mouth, do you collapse into a coma if your sugars are toooooo low and do you have to see so many specialists in a month?” After all that they just ask "How do you cope and I say I have too, its my way of staying alive.
I understand you Lois and Jim, people should think before they open there mouth. Have a great day.
The world is jammed packed with people who say “HI, how are you doing?” Then they keep on walking. I don’t think people know what to say sometimes…then they say something stupid. Sometimes I’d like to choke some of those TV reporters who ask those insensitive questions after someone has lost a loved one…“How do you feel about_____ 's tragic death?” How do they think that they feel??? Geez! Or when someone tells an over-weight woman that they have such a pretty face. Is that code for you’d have it going on if you’d just lose all that fat?? Wasn’t it Lincoln who said something about remaining silent and being thought a fool rather than speaking up and removing all doubt? Sometimes there needs to be more silence.
My point precisely!!!
Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.
Abraham Lincoln
What annoys me also, is when they start off with “Oh, I know what you mean”…then completely overide what you were talking about by, carrying on about their impression of the medical equation to your diabetes, suggesting that THEIR condition warrants everyone’s undevided attention.
I am reminded of my best friend, who when I told him I was dx with D in Jan. '09, he said “it’s not like you have cancer or something!”. Apparently, D is not something too serious to non-diabetics. After this blow, I was too hurt to say, Oh by the way I was dx in Nov. '08 with a pre-cancerous condition in my stomach.
I’m just tired of trying to justify having Diabetes cuz everyone (non diabetics) seem to think we caused this to happen by how we eat or what we weigh. Its difficult to explain to them my pancreas isn’t working right. Some people look at tme and say ? Pancreas? Do you need that or can they fix it ? Its not worth the time to explain… Frustrating !!!
Even many doctors just seem clueless what its like to be on the Diabetes roller-coaster. Very few have to deal with diabetes in the first person. Do this do that, and if it does not work, no matter how hard or how well was actually do it, was are NOT doing it or doing it wrong.
When I was 14 I was told I would end up on shots, like another kid (diabetic), I told them what they could do with their shots and that I did not want to hear another word about it. (I got better and no formal Dx) . Later in my early 20s the concern reared its ugly head again, in the Navy, told I had to be able to pass a urine check before leaving, back to duty, All I wanted was to pass and go on my way. (BTW my Navy medical records do not even mentino the test or wheather I passed,or not, just that i ahd to see a medical officer first).
The first time I get sick after the Navy, a sore thorat, my fam doc REFUSED to see me for follow-up, he had SICK patients to tend to. A couple weeks later I was taken to ER and admitted the the hospital. The Co Doc (my boss & everyone KNEW I was in fact sick) came in yelling at me “WHY is your BS so high”, I was ignorant and clueless, while I maybe should have known, I had never actually been told I was diabetic)
IN 07 I had a session with a CDE who hrself was a type-1 diabetic, for the first time in decades (formally Dx’d) of the D-dragon, I did not have to try adn explain, when I spoke, she UNDERSTOOD, what a fresh change! BTW I have another consult scheduled with her next month.
Takes one to understand one…PERIOD!
(&( GOMER
Tell them that everyone who doesn’t have a working pancreas needs to take several insulin shots a day. Some of those with a working, but overloaded, pancreas, can use pills instead to make them need less insulin. That should be a short way to help them understand the pancreas. Or, for the more obnoxious ones, just tell them to have their pancreas removed and then see how many days they can live without it.
More fat in the body has been shown to increase the need for insulin, though. So has diets high in fructose after digestion, but that’s still hard to measure.
I like your “stories” debb…never long, always interesting!! True true…pick your battles! I’m always genuinely amazed when someone WANTS to know more about diabetes, and asks interested questions…as generally, people in the non-diabetic population are not that “into it”. Amazed…but like yourself, delighted to inform them!! So…how’s the debb???
i say, dont you jsut hate sticking yourself, 8 times a day to test your blood surgar? I mean hey if they know what I am going through, they must know about that. Hmm, well maybe not.
LOL
Rick Phillips
Yes…it’s a wonder we keep a level head and not REALLY tell them what we’re thinking at that very moment of harassment!!!
Will post my Summer update on you page, OK? But will likely have to edit some…as though I don’t THINK I’m typing in too much…there’s always a little reminder below the post, letting me know how many words I’m over lol
Twins eh…lucky you…more wee cuddles…here, after our son’s little one (a boy again) born in March, and our daughter’s little guy’s arrival in June…we’re not likely to see another one for a couple years!!! Maybe a girl next time!!!
I will ask them what it is that they think they understand…when they tell me, it’s never there…So it’s an opening to do some education for me, and that always relieves the anger that I feel, when they are eating a hot fudge sundae telling me they know how I feel…NOT!
When someone starts asking me about diabetes I try and explain what it’s about. Then they start with their old tales of this and that, like they heard if your sugar gets too low you need to get a shot of insulin real fast. I’m like, DUH.
I’m from south Alabama and those country people will believe anything if it’s full of drama. My Aunt Gussy, bless her heart, told me once a man had diabetes so bad “he started throwing up bits of his liver.”
I looked at her and shook my head and said, “Aunt Gussy, now I realize why some animals eat their young.”
Your poor aunt Gussy…bless her!!!
Linda we have an unspoken rule in the deep south. You can say anything you want to about anybody, no matter how cruel, as long as you end it with “bless her heart.” Like this…
“That sorry Aunt Myrtice won’t work if it kills her, she sits on her sorry butt drinking beer all day while her old man is out working at the pulp wood mill. She’s a good for nothing drunk. Bless her heart.” Adding bless her heart to it makes it good, like it’s quoting from the bible.
lol Ronny…Too funny! I see “sorry” comes up often in the conversation as well…nice; it’s too the point, but doesn’t wound TOO deeply!
Also “bless her/his heart” sort of falls in the same category as “bless his/her soul” when bad mouthing someone who has passed on!!!