I’ve been using the TuDiabetes forum for many years and never really understood the story behind the name. Since I knew the founder, Manny Hernandez, has roots in Latin America, I figured it was some adaptation from the Spanish language. I also know that the parent organization, the Diabetes Hands Foundation, runs a Spanish language sister-site called Es Tu Diabetes.
My curiosity may be slow in this case but, after participating here for about eight years, I finally put “es tu diabetes” into an online language translator. Here is the result.
I may be the only one who did not know this before today, but I suspect there may be others. What a great name! It’s your diabetes. Lot’s of good things can happen when using the knowledge gained from participants of both sites, but it’s not likely to help too much until you take full responsibility for your diabetes.
@askmanny had a really nice explanation of the name and how he came up with it, but it was in our “notes” section on the old platform and that didn’t come over with us when we transitioned to Discourse.
I feel it fits in perfectly with our credo “Your diabetes may vary” #YDMV
Professor Terry, you’ve now taken me back to my high school latin days, & William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, some 50 years ago;
Et tu, Brute? (pronounced [ɛt ˈtuː ˈbruːtɛ]) the Latin phrase meaning “and you, Brutus?”, “even you, Brutus?” or “you too, Brutus?”. Purportedly as the last words of the Roman dictator Julius Caesar uttered to his friend Marcus Brutus at the moment of his assassination. So I get the connection with Es Tu Diabetes. Its always nice to learn something new each day God gives us.
You hit the nail in the head, @Terry4! But the plot thickens…
When Andreina (my wife) and I first launched TuDiabetes, the very first iteration of the community was meant to be a bilingual platform, where people in English and in Spanish could interact around diabetes. Back then, we used a platform called NING, to host the communities.
Over time, we realized, we needed to have TWO separate communities: one in English and one in Spanish. Given most members on TuDiabetes (we’re talking about early 2007) were English-speakers, we decided to keep TuDiabetes only in English and EsTuDiabetes became the Spanish community, with the “Es-” part of the name as a way to designate “español”.
But in the first place, TuDiabetes had in it all the elements you describe, because “Tu Diabetes” in Spanish means “Your Diabetes”. Also, in our minds (because Venezuelans speak that way), “Tu” sounds like “Too”, so to us there was a reference to community: as in “You Too”, you are not alone.
There you have it: the story behind the name all bare!
Thanks for the backstory, @askmanny! My mono-lingual brain just accepted the name at face value and it simply became the name for my diabetes online community.
