[/caption]Carol Forsloff --It’s 6:30 a.m., and the prick of a finger, followed by food and a finger-filled portion of pills, and a small vial filled with insulin, are the day’s first reminders of diabetes' needs.
This daily ritual is routine and part of the individual prescription given by doctors to reduce the impact of a scourge that envelops a growing number of Americans. The Centers for Disease Control and the American Diabetic Association tell us 50% of adults will have the disease by the year 2020 if there are no major changes in the way diabetes is managed both individually and by the culture.
How diabetes is defined and what medications can be used to treat it have changed dramatically over the past two decades, as the potential for a cure is investigated. Millions with the disease already create pressure on an already burdened healthcare industry. Those without the disease may shrug and say, “I know about diabetes. My aunt has it,” while few examine their potential for it. But while the world’s pressures require optimum emotional and physical abilities, those who suffer from diabetes find the progressive nature of it to significantly influence their ability to physically, cognitively and emotionally cope. So what more makes up that “day in the life” are the personal features that interfere with how time and energy are utilized to cope with the disease.
That daily finger prick provides the ongoing chronicle of numbers that the patient and his/her physician use to determine whether or not the interventions of diet, exercise and medications are appropriately managing diabetic symptoms. They remind the diabetic of any changes that must be made to normalize blood sugar so that the mind and body are not eroded in the particularly awful ways that scourge can do. If blood sugar numbers are out of control, a physician will require the patient to check those numbers daily and often more than once.
The ritual for dressing for each day’s work begins with a routine check of possible wounds or bruises on a body that may no longer have the normal sensations to protect from potential injuries. The feet become a focus, as the peripherals of the body are negatively impacted by circulatory problems and other medical issues that block the nerves from functioning in satisfactory ways. For many diabetic patients this phenomenon can lead to amputation and amputation to death. The right fit for shoes and socks becomes increasingly important to help prevent those injuries. The routine intervention is to check those feet and hands while getting dressed each day.
While other women worry over fading looks with aging, the diabetic female must double down on ways to disguise the marring of the skin, thinning of the hair, and lesions that appear spontaneously over time. While other women worry over weight and vacillation of those pounds, the diabetic female must always be aware that increased weight must be prevented as the carbohydrate load is reckoned with every bite of food. Throughout the day the carb count tally details must be referenced, taking time from work and play while living daily with conscious worry of that diabetic hell. Makeup can cover but often cannot really hide the damage that occurs.
When night falls and the rest of the world is sleeping, the diabetic hopes to rest as well. But counting sheep and drinking milk are not the tools to reduce the unconscious physical, emotional and cognitive interruptions that also impact sleep. A pinch of pills that start the day becomes its end as well.
Every day is somewhat different for everyone on earth but the disease reduces differences in folks, except how specifics consequences of diabetes impacts each person as it progresses through one’s life. An ordinary day for diabetes may carry few routines at its beginning, but as it gathers strength that scourge can really cause great harm. For some the disease develops over many, many years; for others the litany of problems seem to happen all at once.
That diabetic journey to its unknown destination has a time one can’t predict. It is that day in the life of diabetes repeated in a cycle that others must resist.