I had my branch manager at my old job ask me to do all shots, blood tests etc in my office or in the bathroom. I figured my office was a decent compromise since she was a needle-germ phob.
But the day that I almost re-inacted Dino’s stab-attack sequence was when we both had training for a new system at our corporate office and my manager told me that I had to do my stuff in the bathroom since I didn’t have an office available. I told her no and asked her if she had an alternative. She told me the car which was parked out front in the blazing Arizona in July sun.
I complied but I was so enraged(we’re talking Incredible Hulk rage) that I immediately went next door to our HR department and demanded to speak to someone. Nothing really came of it until I threatened to file a formal grievence/lawsuit. Then lo and behold all sorts of “reasonable accomodations” became just that, reasonable.
I have to laugh at this now because I got promoted to a superior position. I still secretly hope that she gets diabetes or some other disease that causes her to need MDI and tons and tons of blood work.
While on break between sessions at a diabetic summer camp, some fellow counselors and I went to a well-known restaurant. Without thinking, we all began to do our shots there at the table. A fellow patron asked us to “not do our drugs in front of her child.” We laughed, but understood that she was ignorant of what we actually were doing.
This doesn’t mean I sympathize with the restaurant or the waiter, not in the least. A) The owner should have approached you if they felt so threatened. B) The should have used more candor and discretion, especially if they want repeat business. Personally, I wouldn’t go there anymore.
wow, it would be a foggy day in july that someone told me where to shoot up…lol i don’t shove it in peoples faces because i know some people r genuinely queezy around needled. BUT i won’t go hide in a bathroom anymore …i used to do it out of shame but i figure if im not forcing u to look n u do and then complain well…ur just a sucker for punishment…if something grosses me out i don’t look at it! jeeeeeeez
I have been on a pump for 6+ yrs, but when I was taking injections, I was never asked by a staff person, but I had by a family member at a yearly get together. She told me that it would make her lose her appetite to see that, and it would go against the purpose of us all getting together in the first place. No one else even noticed I was doing it until she said something. I did go to my car to do it, partly because I was so humiliated. I wanted to tell her how it frequently made me lose my appetite to watch her - who had to weigh in at about 350 pounds, go back up to the buffett table at least a dozen times!!!
Incidentally, I have been asked to use the bathroom to nurse my daughter when she was a baby. Luckily, I had been prepared with my copy of the federal legislation protecting an infants right to eat in any public place. I told them they could keep it to educate their staff. I also mentioned that I didn’t feel Sophie should eat her lunch in the bathroom anymore than they should…
Personally, I would never inject in the bathroom … its the least sanitary place with more germs floating around posing even more health risks! Tell them to get over it – they wouldn’t ask someone in a wheelchair to go someplace else! I liked the comment “no thank you, I don’t have to pee right now” as a response!
I would refuse and I’d probably not use that restaurant again.
No, no I take that back. I say that I’m happy to use the Injection and Glucose Testing Room, if they have one! That might thrown the waiter for a loop. If he said no, I’d express surprise. “That’s strange, I’m seeing those in more and more restaurants these days.”
Well, I see ppl doing all sorts of weird stuff right at their tables. Picking noses, belching, yawning without covering their mouths etc, I feel if one just takes their shot at the table, in the leg, or abs, what the heck? If others don’t like seeing it they should stop staring at you, right?
That is one thing I love about the pump. I no longer have to worry, unless I’m doing some symlin. Then I sit there, shoot up and zing the rubbish into the trash can. 90% of the time, no one notices, or I’ll get a joke about ‘anabolic steroids’ LOL!!
At college, I was told I couldn’t do blood tests or insulin injections in the classroom, which is ridiculous because I spend hours in there and miss out on very important lectures if I have to leave the room (not to mention cause great disruption). I ended up demonstrating how discreetly can do both of these things and they okayed it.
I think it’s disgusting how we’re pressured to hide our diabetes from others. The more people know you have diabetes, the safer. And it’s dangerous when you have to skirt around other people to properly take care of your blood sugar. We have no control over our diabetes, so why must WE be the ones punished for other people’s squeemishness?
If I was in your situation, I’d tell that waiter I could end up in the emergency room unless I did that shot at that exact moment. Hopefully, they’d fear a lawsuit or something.
oh. my. stars.
i think i would have dumped a bucketful of tacky over the owner’s head.
shooting up in public is just one of the ways in which diabetics are allowed to “live out loud”. i’ve never been asked to hide out in the bathroom to shoot up, although i used to. it was when a friend suggested that i do it at the table because the bathroom is too germy and dim that i stopped going to the bathroom. i’m still grateful to that friend for encouraging me.
just think of the community we build when we live out loud with our diabetes. people find out about the omnipod because i wear mine on my sleeveless arm. people learn about diabetes when i test in public. my students at school know that i have to check my sugar before i eat. i don’t know about you, but i don’t feel like a 3 headed fire monster when i’m able to do these things in public (and maybe get to share my story).
And I’ve been doing my injections in my car – three times now, men have come over to my car to ask me if I was okay… I must have looked like a damsel in distress.
Say, under the ADA, we could sue for every restaurant to offer a sanitary, private booth with a sink for washing hands, and safe disposal buckets for sharps!
What a bad business decision that manager made. There are 20 million people in the U.S. with diabetes. He’s made a large chunk of the dining public and their friends and families unwelcome at his restaurant.
I would write a calm letter explaining how prevalent diabetes is and why it’s unacceptable to shove people in the bathroom. Be sure to tell the manager how often you eat there and why you won’t if he can’t accomodate you.
That’s just crazy. I would totally agree with earlier comments. First, contact the owner. If the owner backs up this craziness, then go to a local paper. Businesses need good publicity. If it gets out that a local business discriminated against someone with diabetes, it could really hurt them. Afterall, look how many T2’s there are being diagnosed every day.
This is shameful. I also ask everyone in my group if anyone has problems with needles or if I inject myself prior to using my pen. If anyone even hints at having issues, I respect that, and find a restroom. I will not, however, be mandated by the staff of a restaurant about how to proceed with my medical care. As an EMT, if I responded to that same facility for a medical emergency, I would not move my patient to the restroom for IV’s to be started… there is no difference, both are life saving medical procedures. I can hide it by adjusting my sitting position.
I’ve never experienced this in a restaurant from the staff. I have had the people I’m dining with suggest it, though. I had a professor that insisted all “diabetic care” be done outside of the classroom (for example-- in the bathroom).
Oh, for God’s sake… this is the 21st century and people should be aware there is this thing called Diabetes affecting more than 200 millions of people around the world. It’s like the old story when people complain about women breastfeeding in public. I know some have no shame, but seriously… testing your blood sugar and injecting your insulin should not be something people get freaked out about.
And how would I handle it? I would just ask the person what would she/he do if Diabetes was part of their life. I test whenever I want and wherever I want. I haven’t had anyone telling me to stop it, but if one day I do… Oh well, too bad for them.
Unless there is some kind of law that forbids diabetes testing/treatment in public, I don’t care if the place if privately owned or not. This is not a crime, it is survival.
I have yet to have anyone say anything to me in a restaurant about it, but I have worried about it. I think, though, if it were to happen to me that I would probably go to the highest ranking person in the restaurant at the time and explain the situation and how it is rather discriminatory to ask me to hide what I need to do in order to even eat. If it was available I would then take it higher then that.
I have found that people generally don’t notice. I’ve tested and dosed in front of people before and they never even noticed. I think those that are nosy and peering in at the table and/or watching me too closely might be bothered by it…but I figure that it’s their problem. If you don’t like it, don’t look. :-p
I think that if it had happened to me, I honestly would have answered NO THANKYOU…and they might have replied that they would get the manager or whomever, and I would have answered with something such as “That’s a great idea”…honestly, the gall!
Their discriminations are just ignorance. And just like all ignorant situations, their mouth precedes their brain and their lack of human compassion shines brightly. Bigotry is a shame, yet reality.
I have been asked to hide testing when the time comes, and that was in my own office at work. I told them to stay out if they don’t like it. People don’t know diabetes if they do not have it or it is not a part of their world. The things I have heard, (wimp disease) don’t even want to get into that right now. I lost my mother to diabetes on Mothers Day of all days.
Some provide handicap access and restroom facilities. Some provide places to change the baby, provide lactating rooms and feeding rooms. They need to provide sanitary places for diabetics and all others that need to care for themselves if they don’t want to see it.
I surely would not patron that business and give my hard earned money to the owner again! And I would let them know it.
I would have just said no. I would have told the waiter that if the manager/owner had an issue, they would need to discuss it with me directly. Then I would have told the owner/manager that I would not take my insulin in the same facilities that people use to go to the bathroom. I would have told him/her that I had consistently eaten there regularly for however long, and that if I couldn’t sit at my table and discreetly take my insulin that I would no longer patronize the restaurant. If it came down to that, I would also consider a little publicity over the matter. I would be livid if that happened to me.
Randy has mentioned that some see it as a wimp disease…that has got to be the furthest thing from the truth…dealing with D. makes you STRONG. They’re the wimps.
