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October 28, 2008
9 Weeks Post-Partum
So, I have to start this week’s blog writing about the luncheon I attended last week. It was put on by the Behavioral Diabetes Institute (www.behavioraldiabetes.org) and entitled “Celebration of Strength: Honoring Women with Type 1 Diabetes.” It was amazing. I’ve never been in a room surrounded by so many women who understood so much of my life without me having to say a word! Nobody stared or even flinched when someone at the table took their blood sugar, some insulin, or a bolus from their pump. For once I sat through a meal and actually felt normal!
Amy Tenderich, who began the website DiabetesMine.com and co-authored the book Know Your Numbers, Outlive your Diabetes, was the guest speaker and during her speech she mentioned Diabetes Sisters! She was talking about some of the support systems for diabetes that are available online, and of course Diabetes Sisters is the only one specifically for women. It was so cool! What an amazing resource Brandy has created here. If you go to Amy’s website: www.DiabetesMine.com she wrote two blogs about the luncheon that are really interesting to read.
Anyway, what a wonderful experience the day was, and hearing all of the women’s stories was so powerful. The room was full of beautiful ladies who each had lived with this disease for varying numbers of years. There were a few women who had lived with diabetes for 50+ years! I hope to look as amazing as they do! So inspiring! I only wish every woman with diabetes could experience a day like that. It was just reassuring to know there are people out there who “get it” and who are living with this disease and doing amazing things.
It was also a good week because I was able to start running again. I wish I could say that getting better control of my diabetes was my only motivation for getting back into running, but the truth is I want my pre-pregnancy body back. I still look about 5 months pregnant, and it is just hard to look in the mirror and see the leftover weight from Baby Jake. My two-year old son was playing with some balloons yesterday and after a while he came up to me, pointed at my belly and said, “Mommy, what you have in there?” I immediately knew where the conversation was going, but asked him, “What do you mean? I don’t have anything in there.” He reached up to touch my belly and looked at me questioningly, “You have your balloon in there?” Ahh, the honesty and observation of a two-year old. So I’m getting motivated to try and get that balloon to deflate.
It feels good to be able to run again, and each run has been without kids, so it is also a much needed 30 minutes alone. It is good to have some time to myself and be able to just think as my feet pound the ground. Getting out to do the run is always hard, but once I’m doing it and afterward, it feels so good. I think it’s so easy for us as moms and women to let what we do for ourselves get forgotten or “put on hold” as we raise families and care for others. I’m trying to remind myself of that and to just make my runs happen. To make it a priority. To not feel guilty about leaving the kids with my husband or my mom in order to go do something for myself. But with three kids, making the time for me, whether it be exercising, seeing a friend, or writing a blog has only gotten harder.
I guess that is where as women with diabetes, we do become strong. We need strength each day to wake up with this disease, to test our blood sugar, knowing the result might not be a “good” number; we need strength when it would be easier to just not exercise, to eat a healthy meal rather than what we might be craving on a given day. It takes strength to count our carbs, take our insulin, and then do it again knowing that we will never be perfect. Strength to explain (again) what having and living with diabetes actually means to our friends, family members, or doctors. Strength to get over the fear of complications, the “what if’s” that plague us in order to live some kind of normal life with diabetes. To not get overwhelmed with everything that is involved on a daily basis because the reality is there is still no cure, no remission, and no days off from the disease. So, I hope that you acknowledge your strength and realize how strong you can be!
Until next week,
Laura |
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