yes, they would still be private, even if they were always perfect. (I wish!) That doesn’t mean I never share my numbers, because I do, especially around here, but that’s different, because I made the choice to share. And I certainly choose to post in this thread, so I don’t feel like you invaded anything, no worries.
Kat
P.S. I just read in your profile that you’re doing research on diabetes and social networking. I think that’s really interesting. Will you tell us, when you published something?
I don’t know if it is intimate, but it is private!!! I have never tested in public or given a shot in public. 99.9% of the people in my life do not know I am a diabteic. My girlfriend of 11 months still doesn’t know!!! I was gonna tell her, but I keep chickening out. But I would say for the most part I keep my disease private. I mean people with heart disease or something don’t go around telling people they have a disease!!!
I’m with everyone else I’m not sure its intimate as such, but definately for me its private. I don’t just open my meter up and test my sugar or openly inject myself, I do it in public - but in the privacy of the toilet. Thats not because I’m ashamed of being diabetic or anything, just a personl choice. I’ve only been diabetic for 2 years and still now I’m coming to terms with having to do those “out of body” things outside the comfort of my own home. If I had the choice I wouldn’t, but I’m diabetic and I have to check my sugar & inject myself… End of. Its the way it is.
Although I don’t have a problem with telling people I have diabetes or discussing it, just testing or injecting in front of them almost makes it to real? Does that make sense?
Who knows, maybe when I’ve got a little more experience with this disease, there’ll come a day when I’ll be like heyy lets wip this thing out and go for it, do I care if that little old couple over there are sticking there noses in? Nopeeeee.
I feel my numbers would still be personal. Many “outsiders” think of my numbers as a reflection of ME,
when really there are times when I can’t control a damn thing about them.
For example: when I have been having a bad, stressful day (completely non-D related) and I pull a 310, my brother, father, sister, whomever notices- will wince and say something like “What did you eat?” or something to that effect. And it pains me to hear things like that because most of the time the answer is NOTHING.
So, if my numbers were prefect and always good, that would be reason enough for me to feel good about myself- but still would be a reflection of “how I did that day” to someone else. I guess I see my BG as if others are looking at them as grades.
No, it doesn’t have a face or a personality- if that’s what you mean. For me, it’s “myself”. When I’m angry at T1, I guess I’m angry at myself. When I don’t want to test, or inject, or am just frustrated, in my mind I KNOW that I’m really punishing MYSELF when I ignore it.
So, I guess T1D is MY alter ego? Like the “bad” side of me that I can’t control or talk to?
Maybe T1D is like your cousin who’s always on drugs. You can get him to talk and act nice sometimes- sometimes he just stares out the window and completely ignores whatever you’re trying to do to help him- and sometimes he lashes out at you for trying to help and gets completely out of control- then you have to bring in the authorities to bring him back under.
i’ve been diabetic for 2 years and have been open about from the start. Just goes to show we all respond and react differently to this disease. Like i said the only thing i keep private would be all the mundane uninteresting little things that could be hard to explain to somebody new to the disease.
I guess I seperate the mechanics of taking care of the disease from the details(? not the right word). The details are personal I just feel like they are mine to protect from prying eyes. But my relationship with the disease is intimate. I have a potential killer living inside me. It just came in the back door one night and won’t leave. I would kill it if I could. But I have known it so long now that we can be friends, enemies, or just exist together. Now it has let some of its nasty little friends in and they are the side effects. I don’t have the same realtionship with them. We are still enemies and only enemies. Call it Stockholm’s Symdrome if you want but when you live a long time with some thing that wants to kill you; I still think it is intimate.
i think it is private, not necessarily intimate. because of the value judgements have in our society about “control”… and i find it very hard to live up to and very hard to disagree with… for instance it is very offensive to me when they ask at the airport (and t.f. greene still does this) what my last a1c is. i always make up a number because they are just trying to see if you are in that realm or not. i found my self last time making up a number that was worse than reality… so it is not just the appearance of control, it is the peep into your world…
Managing the “mechanics” of diabetes, i.e. blood testing, injecting, reversing hypos and hypers, taking ACE inhibitors, statins and whatever else, are the outward appearance and clear manifestation that our bodies are physiologically abnormal. I don’t think there is anything inherently “personal” in these daily activities. But what is “intimate”, “personal” and “private” is our emotional and intellectual responses to all this testing, injecting and taking of medication. Whenever we do a blood test, for example, and the result is not what we’d like to see, it’s generally not the kind of thing we’d like to broadcast to all and sundry (except perhaps to other diabetics who know where we’re coming from and hopefully will not be judgmental) because it is a reminder that we are physiologically abnormal despite the fact that no one can tell we’ve got a serious medical condition just by looking at us. A major stumbling block is that we’re kind of fed the illusion that diabetics can do whatever they want in this world just like everybody else. No, it’s not as straightforward as that, but this is the sort of myth that floats around. A further stumbling block relates to the concept of “tight control”. Diabetes puts us in a catch-22 position: strive for tight control or otherwise face potentially serious consequences and an even earlier death. It couldn’t be starker than that. But achieving tight control ALL OF THE TIME is a battle we can never win outright. So when we get “disappointing” readings, we know we’ve “failed” yet again and this sense of missing the target is compounded by judgmental ideas from the past that go something like this: “You’re out of control”, “You should try a bit harder”, “You need to get on track.”
Yes! Even if the “failure” is not even your own “fault”. It’s so disheartening and destructive.
I guess I feel that vibe coming from other people- “You should try harder”, “You are a failure”, “You cannot control yourself.”
I mean, it’s my own BLOOD, shouldn’t I be able to control that?
Stephen- Thank you for stating better than I, the seperation of concepts.
I hadn’t thought about this intimacy at all until the original post of the subject. This thought of how and why I am intimate with the disease has been eating away at me since. I know how to make diabetes happy, tight control. When I can’t give it what it wants it hurts me emotionally and physically. I know I have to live my life to make the disease happy. I don’t name my pump or meter or think of other objects as alive. But I do now think of diabetes as a living thing, although not breathing or thinking. I hope that makes some sense. It seems to be an uninvited guest in my person. I can’t make it go away and I have to keep it happy or it will destroy me. It has access to me at all times and in all places. It brings its friends in and lets them do what they may.
Sorry to be continually posting on the subject but like I said it is bothering me more than I ever thought it would. It has also helped me understand some of my feelings about my numbers etc… When I wake after a severe low I feel as if I have failed myself but now I realize why it hurts more than that. I have failed my guest, myself, my family, my CDE, Doctor, etc… I am a caregiver, I want those around me to be happy and well taken care of. My guest demands that level of care or it will hurt me.
I like your descriptions. This is exactly what I was hoping would happen during this discussion.
I’ve opened another one “Does D Have a Face?” I think this post here represents that discussion well. Please consider futhering your “babble” to that discussion too. haha. I think it definitely really interesting to see how others see the Big D.
I think that my numbers would remain personal even if they were always perfect (how I wish I could pull that off haha). Honestly the reading on my meter is usually a good indication of my success or failure in management that day. Even if they were always in my target range it would remain very much an inherently personal triumph and not something I’d really feel like sharing with many people. Especially not my few (outside of the site) good friends who are also type-1, it would seem like bragging about my successes in managing my levels and I wouldn’t want to put anyone down if they’re not in good control that day because I know how hard it is to stay in good control. I might say something like “My numbers have been good today” but never something like “I never leave my target range” I feel like that is basically a put-down and diabetics have enough stress and drama in our lives for me, in good conscience, to knowingly add more to it!
I’ve never thought of it that way, I’m an athlete and intensely competitive, so I definitely view my diabetes as an opponent at times, I’ve found that my success rate goes up when I view situations as a challenge and I’m generally pretty optimistic about my chances of winning any given competition. I wonder if giving it a name or a face would help with this kind of strategy. What do you think? Have you had any patients who have used this type of strategic thinking to gain better control?
Wow, how do you manage to hide it Ryan? I told my girlfriend before we started dating because I got diagnosed right before we decided we might want to be more than friends. She learned all of the new things I’d have to be doing in my life with me and still decided that I was worth the drama (my words not hers)
Yeah, I’m with you, Ryan. I told my fiance when we first started dating. We started dating in High school. I had been diagnosed one year before I met him, but after we shared our first kiss, I told him what was going on before he decided that he wanted to discover me as a whole.
I figured it’s like saying: “I’m really great, but I come with a lot of baggage.” Because waking up in a “coma” is considered “baggage” in my eyes. Watching what I eat while he can do whatever he wants to do makes my life seem like it carries excess weight. The pending complications that can come up makes me seem “heavier” than he is. After a few months together, I told him that even though I want children desperately, I wasn’t sure if I could have any. I told him that sometimes I can’t control what’s going on with my body- I’ll have mood swings that I can’t explain, or act in a way that is uncharacteristic of me- depending on my BG level.
T1D is tough and it’s hard to control and hard to live with. I thought it was only fair at the beginning of our relationship that I told him my little disclosure.
For me it is neither intimate nor private. I do not hide my diabetes from anyone, nor do I feel I should do so. My loved ones, and those very close to me are aware I am diabetic and they know exactly what to do if I am unable to care for myself during a medical emergency. I refuse to test in a bathroom. The sanitation of a restroom will expose myself to germs and such. Would you like me to administer medication to your child while they are in the lavatory? My husband knew I was diabetic before we even started dating. To me, I would rather not hide it, as if a medical emergency arises, most will be aware of the situation and will help speed my medical attention and recovery.
I don’t remember when I told my wife. It was early on. I rely on her as a CGM she knows when I am low before I do, and has saved me more times then I want to count. She has it harder than I do, she has absolutly no control and has to deal with me.
It isn’t fair not to tell her, but it is also a bit dangerous. I was in better control when we met so she didn’t see the worst until we were living together and she had to call the ambulance. Be careful.
Yeah I felt like I would have been wondering the whole time if I hadn’t told her and it would have become a big deal when it finally came out. I’d rather just be upfront at the beginning and if someone can’t handle it then you know fairly quickly before you get emotionally invested in something.
