I signed on to my Facebook page yesterday (it’s now early Friday morning as I type this) and saw much of the usual nonsense you find on Facebook – Farmville requests, nonsensical status updates from friends, feeds from groups…you know the drill. Buried in my Facebook feed was one update I wish I had seen. No, it wasn’t an update about the movie with my adorable cousin, Theo, in it. It was an update from my cousin, Debbie, and this one was a memorial to her grandfather, Walter, who died on Thursday.
My heart broke for Debbie, and for her mother, since it was her father who had died. I checked the link she had provided with the name and address of the funeral home then sat down to write some family members who do not have Facebook and I was certain would not have caught this news. As I was writing one e-mail, I started to recall converstions I had with my aunt Barb about her father. Then it hit me: Walt had type 2 diabetes. The dragon had claimed another person. Diabetes had claimed yet another life.
Diabetes ate at Walt, little by little. When aunt Barb first told me her father had diabetes, it was because she was frustrated that the disease was so hard to control and it appeared he might lose part of his foot. That happened, and as time wore on, more of Walt’s feet and legs had to be removed. He was dying bit by bit, slowly, yet inexorably. At the same time, though, I cannot deny that Walt was obviously a strong individual. Barb told me that she and her family expected her father to pass before her mother, but he surprised everyone and stuck around, fighting for an entire year after his wife had passed. I am truly amazed at his strength of will.
Diabetes awareness month begins in 10 days, on November 1st, and World Diabetes Day will be celebrated around the world yet again on November 14th. This year, I will be thinking about my aunt, uncle, and cousins and Walt. I will be thinking about all the people I have known over the past 18 years with diabetes who have not made it. I will be thinking about the “promise of a cure in the next 5 years” phrases I have heard every year in the 6,788 days since my diagnosis. I will be thinking about those who are unable to afford medications and supplies and who, because of that, are also likely to face a fate similar to Walt’s, in which they slowly, relentlessly fall apart.
I hope this year, some of Walt’s strength can be channled by both patients and organizations to truly start changing diabetes to a problem that will not take someone bit by bit.
Hopefully, the stories won’t be hidden by the games next month. Joanne