Although I don’t remember the exact date that I found out I had diabetes, I have narrowed it down to the last week in January, 1984.
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I suspected that I had diabetes – I had the usual symptoms of drinking a ton of water, running to the bathroom and losing weight. My grandmother and an aunt were both diabetic and my mother told me that I should get checked. I did not have a doctor at the time and I asked one of the partners at the CPA firm I worked at about one of his clients that were doctors. He said that they were urologists, so that would not help me. Another one of the partners suggested his doctor. When I called to make an appointment, I was able to get in with that doctor's partner sooner, so I took the appointment with the partner.
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When I saw the doctor, they took some blood and made an appointment for me to come back in a couple days. They were going to have me do one of those glucose tolerance tests. When I came in for the test for that, they said that it would not be necessary for me to do that because my blood sugar was extremely high on the labs that they did. Fortunately for me, even though the doctor I saw was an internist, the third partner in that group was an endork so the office had a good handle on diabetes stuff. The doctor that I was seeing also told me that he discussed my case with the endork (not quite his words though!).
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How do I know that was the last week in January, 1984? My cousin Kathy and I had a bet on the Super Bowl that year. The loser would buy the winner a case of beer. On January 22, 1984, the Oakland Raiders (actually, they were the Los Angeles Raiders in 84) creamed the Washington Redskins 38-9. Go Raiders! As you might have guessed, my bet was on the Raiders. 
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When I was in college, I was friends with Chris Bahr’s mother – he was the kicker for the Raiders while I was in college. At the time, I had no clue who the Raiders were and did not even like football. His brother Matt was also a senior while I was at Penn State and went on to play pro ball also. I semi-met Matt once when I was walking across campus with his mother and he was heading the other direction. Since I knew Chris Bahr’s mother, I picked the Raiders as my favorite team. When I moved to the DC area after getting out of school, the Raiders and Redskins were big rivals so …
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My cousin also had a big money bet on the Super Bowl with another friend of hers. She was paid once a month and because she had to pay her other friend, she asked if I could wait until she got paid for my beer. I found out that I was diabetic between the Super Bowl and the end of January. At the time, I thought I would not be able to drink again so ended up telling her that she did not have to buy me the beer. I would have found out that I was diabetic between January 23rd and January 31st. Since I don’t know the exact date that week, I decided to pick January 25th to celebrate – that was a Wednesday in 1984.
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Recently on TuDiabetes, Missy posted a question asking if people celebrate their anniversaries and if so, what did they do. I had already decided that I was going to do something to celebrate this year but had not decided what yet. Trudy suggested that I should at least have a beer. Guess what I am going to do to celebrate!
