So here I am with my first post on the new dblog. I’ve been sharing with the Diabetes Online Community (DOC) on Twitter so much lately I almost find myself throwing in # and @ signs in random sentences. It’s good to finally have a home built where I can stretch my thoughts out longer than 140 characters.

You can read the About Me section, and learn a little about me and my pump, Gort. Diabetes is a big part of my life, whether I like it or not. Whether ANYBODY likes it or not. I grew up with it being so taboo, so I am really thankful to now live in a world where I can be right out in the open about it. I feel like people see a needle, or a blood test kit, or vial of insulin, and without knowing specifically what those things are all about at that moment, they don’t immediately think you are a drug addict like it was when I was a kid.

I was in elementary school during the Reagan era, and Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” campaign on TV had the ever present images of needles and drug paraphernalia.

They would of course show these commercials during Saturday morning cartoons, exposing everyone to it, and beating into kids’ brains “Don’t use drugs!” Then I would show up at school, and someone would get sight of my syringes and vials, and game over…I was a drug user. Kids can be so cruel.

Maybe now I just have a lot more confidence, but I feel like the world has changed and matured. Today I can do a blood test right out in the middle of everyone, and I might get some side glances, but mostly people are just curious. I love that, and I love sharing and educating when they have questions. My favorite is when someone asks me right before I prick my finger if it hurts and I tell them no, prick my finger, and then scream bloody murder. That usually results in a laugh or two.

On top of that, the insulin pump (oh, the wonderful, wonderful pump!) has revolutionized diabetes even more by totally taking away the need to carry around syringes and vials anymore. It makes all of us T1’s so…free. We might still have to carry around a backpack full of other things, but it bids farewell to the days of having to ask a family member or close friend to stand in front of me while I draw my insulin out of the vial and shoot up.

This dblog is another voice, and another opportunity to bring diabetes out of the shadows. We can be diabetic, and do not have to be ashamed or feel we are less than anyone else, not ever. We don’t have to look in the mirror and see a broken machine. We may not have an automatic transmission like some people, but we can drive a manual transmission just fine. We have the technology, we have the science. We can do this!

And we will…every day…until there is a cure.