depression

We Interrupt This Irregularly Scheduled Diabetes

I’ve been running high lately, and I don’t know why.

BG 220

That’s a lie. I know why. I eat too much, too often, and too late. Or I don’t eat, and then I go low or get super hungry, and then I eat all the things. Dang those holiday treats!

I haven’t been working out, exercising, or bringing sexy back. I have a gym membership, so accessibility to a place to exercise certainly isn’t the problem. I always find some seemingly good excuse for not getting there. First I was busy trying to find a new place to live. Then I was busy moving. Then I hurt both hands during the move.

Hurt Hands

Then I got even busier than usual at work creating something that I am extremely excited about. We are starting a new diabetes journal, available to all, and we’re now accepting research and volunteers to be peer reviewers. Check out The PLAID Journal. You can see a couple of videos and news articles about the The PLAID Journal on the Announcements page. Also, the Facebook page for PLAID. (Lots more to come on PLAID, so stay tuned.)

Then the knee that I hurt while cycling several years ago flared up again. Add to all of that an ever-growing to-do list, and there is always something that keeps me focused on something other than me.

I hate it. I hate the feeling of my blood sugar being high. I hate that I can’t get my BG to stay where I want it. I hate when I prick my finger and see a number that is dramatically higher than I feel because my body is getting used to it. I hate being thirsty. I hate waking up in the middle of the night to go pee. I hate thinking about it. All. The. Time.

I also hate being overweight. I hate feeling like I am the overweight that I am. I know that we’re in an age where we are supposed to accept our bodies and all that jazz, but this is not normal. I can’t just accept this. I don’t feel like me at this size. I feel like I’m stuck in a heavy fat suit, and everything I do is just that much harder because of it.

But for whatever reasons, I can’t seem to change it.

Before April of this year, I was on Weight Watchers, and I was doing pretty well with it. I had lost over 10 pounds in three or four months, and was feeling pretty good. I was on track to get back to a weight and size that I wanted to be. And stronger. And back to a more human shaped geometry, instead of just round.

Martin and Amanda on Bicycles

Today, I’m the heaviest that I’ve every been. Almost 207 whopping pounds. I put that out there for no other real purpose than to make it real. I should be about 170, in an ideal world. And I’ve seen a human skeleton. Short of an anatomical anomaly, there is no such thing as “big boned.” I’m just plain old overweight right now.

As joyous as April started out with Amanda and I tying the knot in beautiful Key West, it ended in tragedy with the loss of our precious little cat Squirt, and I know that losing her has played a role in where I am now. To some it may sound silly (she was so much more than “just a cat”), but she was a part of my life every single day for nearly 14 years. It feels like the loss of an immediate family member, because that is exactly what it is. I think dealing with that loss, on top of everything else already mentioned, has made me do things like eat my emotions and talk myself out of doing fun active things.

Working out and exercising has always been like therapy to me. Be it gym, walking, running, or cycling, it’s a safe place for me to get out all of my stress, frustration, anger, aggression, sadness, and any other negative emotions that I’m dealing with. Some days I only need 30 minutes or so. Other days I might need a couple of hours. It also makes sure that I have a few minutes during normal human hours of the day that are just for me, Martin Wood, where I’m not making sure that the needs of everyone else are being met.

It’s my career choice to help people, and it is a major part of who I am, and I love it, but sometimes in order to help people we have to make the time to help ourselves. I haven’t been doing enough of that. Now that we are in a neighborhood where there is less chance of going for a walk or run and interrupting a drug deal, I finally feel that spark of motivation to get out of the house and move around.

I also enjoy doing other things, like reading, video games, movies, and basically anything that doesn’t involve repairing yet another kitchen appliance in my house. Sometimes it’s hard to make room for those things, but we have to. Down time is as necessary to life as to-do lists and full calendars. A friend said recently that “cancelling a holiday commitment is like heroin.” Try it. Substitute an evening on the couch with the dog and the first half of this season of The Walking Dead. (Beth…noooooo!!!)

Life with diabetes is freaking hard, man. Life with diabetes is about so much more than just diabetes. Life with diabetes is a complicated balance of biometrics, medical therapies, activities, unexpected events, important considerations, random emotions, bright sides, dark places, and things left unsaid that have to be factored into an inarticulate equation that hopefully results in a personal definition of success.

All of this is what it takes to get my A1C where I want it, to get my BG’s on a more level plain instead of high or bouncing all over the place, to get back to Weight Watchers and better control of all of the delicious things that I’ve been cramming into my face hole, to develop the strength and stamina to avoid future injuries, and to drop some pounds and be able to haul ass without it taking two trips. That is what it takes to focus more on the things that I do have in my world that bring joy, for me, Martin Wood. Like these two…

That is what it takes to start to feel better. To feel happy. To feel able. To feel normal. And if I can’t do it on my own, then I’ll have to figure out who the right people are and get them on my bus to help me get further along down that road. For now, it’s one mile at a time.

–MW

Just Ask

It’s the 4th Annual Diabetes Blog Week! If you want to participate, or if you want to see what other diabetes bloggers have to say about the daily topics over the next seven days, head over to Karen’s blog at Bitter~Sweet and jump in.

Today’s blog prompt comes from Melissa over at Sweetly Voiced.

Often our health care team only sees us for about 15 minutes several times a year, and they might not have a sense of what our lives are really like. Today, let’s pretend our medical team is reading our blogs. What do you wish they could see about your and/or your loved one’s daily life with diabetes? On the other hand, what do you hope they don’t see?

Unless I’m traveling or just too busy to stop what I’m doing (or in denial…yes, that happens), I see my endocrinologist (endo) and CDE every three months, my ophthalmologist (eye doctor) every year, and my dentist twice a year. That amounts to, at the very least, four hours a year in the office of my healthcare team with my pancreas hanging out, my pupils dilated, or my mouth wide open. Sometimes at the same time.

Considering that there are 8760 hours in a year, I spend about .5% of my year in doctors offices in various compromising positions (not counting labs, time on the phone with insurance, time spent hooking so that I can afford my copays, etc.), which begs the question… How the heck am I still alive?

There are plenty of other doctors that I could spend time with too. Presently on my list of docs to find include a dermatologist, a podiatrist, and a psychologist. That last one will likely make my doctor time (and spend) increase exponentially, but that’s a conversation for another day. When I’m less crazy. Because that happens too.

The thing is, I need all of the services and advice of all of these doctors in order for me to stay at my optimal health status and achieve my health goals. Yet, I struggle. What little bit of time I have with each of these doctors, we don’t have a chance to talk about some of the things that they could really help me with probably better than anyone.

At my endo, we talk about diabetes, pump settings, high and low blood sugar trends, A1C’s, prescriptions, and sometimes even new diabetes research and technology. We don’t talk about my struggle with my weight, and how it affects me both physically and mentally. We don’t talk about my depression, and how sometimes I’m smiling on the outside and absolutely falling apart on the inside, and nobody ever truly knows the extent of it. We don’t talk about stress, and ways to manage being overloaded, and strategies to cut it down so that I don’t have to add hypertension and heart disease to my laundry list of sh–stuff to deal with on a daily basis.

At the eye doctor, we talk about diabetes, A1C’s, and the importance of keeping and EYE on things (see what I did there?) in the back of my eyeballs. We don’t talk about how prescription glasses are expensive, especially when you need multiple pairs (stylish regular glasses, plus sunglasses that make you think you look stylish, plus sport sunglasses for when you play volleyball on the beach with no shirt on all Top Gun style). We don’t talk about how much time I spend staring at a computer screen, and whether or not that is good or bad. We don’t talk about anything to allay my fears and anxiety from potential and, in reality, way over-exaggerated diabetes complications. We don’t even differentiate between Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes, but rather treat it as just this overarching definition of diabetes that sucks and makes you go blind, your feet fall off, and your wenis not work properly. And I need my wenis to continue to work properly dangit! (I don’t even know how I got from eyeballs to wenis, but I’m mildly impressed and entertained with myself right now.)

I want my healthcare team to know that, just because it isn’t their area of expertise, all of these various other things in Martin World impact me, and are related in some way, and have the potential to impact my health in both positive and negative ways. Because I’m stressed out that my BG’s are running higher than normal may mean that I don’t check my BG as often because I don’t want to deal with the stress that I feel when I see that high number on my meter. So then I go get something awful to eat to feed the stress with, and then my pants start fitting a little tighter, and I feel like I’m the size of a whale and the idea of an 19th century style corset sounds like a pretty great idea if it will make my pants fit better. Then my pants get too tight and the pressure makes my eyeballs fall out and my teeth point forward.

What I also want my healthcare team to know is that I have absolutely no clue how to bring these things up and talk about them in the time limit and in a way that makes sense to them before they have to run off and see the next patient. I’m doing good to remember to even show up for the appointment most days. If it’s not on my Outlook calendar with an alarm, don’t expect me to be there. If there was one thing I wish they would all ask, it might be, “So all of these numbers aside, how are YOU doing? Feeling okay? Any particular issue not related to insulin, BG test strips, and pump supplies that I can help with?”

Just ask. The answer might be no most of the time. But sometimes it might be yes. And that’s when it is most important that you asked, and that you are there to listen.

To view other posts on this topic, click here.

Working Through It All

I’ve been busy lately. Extremely busy. Too busy. I’ve been doing all kinds of things, but without divulging my Dead Sea Scroll-length laundry list of things to do, suffice it to say that I’ve been working really hard at just trying to keep up.

From being so occupied lately, I’ve developed a bad habit of setting aside important things that make me feel better and happier, like writing on this blog and being an active member of the Diabetes Online Community (DOC), exercising, reading for leisure, getting enough sleep at night to not feel like I’ve been hit by a truck the next morning, keeping in touch with friends I care about and miss (both online and offline), and in some ways even my diabetes. I feel so out of touch, missing invites to events that I would have loved to have been a part of, missing news, and even missing out on the jokes. And I LOVE a good joke. Speaking of which, has diabetes been cured since I’ve been M.I.A.?

In addition, I can’t seem to get anywhere with my New Year’s goal of losing some weight, which just adds to my frustration. Most days I find myself completely worn out by the end of my work day, and I come home and grab the carb-heavy easy foods and try to cool my jets instead of grabbing my gym pass, the iPod, and a water bottle. By the way, I need a new iPod Nano if anyone is feeling particularly generous. No, seriously. Anybody? Bueller…Bueller…

My bicycle is sitting in my laundry room collecting dust, the spokes wrangling wayward dryer lint, taunting me each time I do a load of laundry. I can hear it whisper, “Psst! Hey, fatso! Wanna go for a ride?” My swimsuits, from board shorts to triathlon training gear, sit in the bottom of a drawer just waiting for me to slim down enough so that I can fit into them and get back into the pool without it looking like the Twitter fail whale retired to the local YMCA. Thankfully, my swimsuits know better than to make any snide comments in my general direction. I’ve already threatened to give them to the dog to play with if I hear one snotty remark out of them.

I know that I’ve been missing online. I know that I’ve missed being online. I also know that sometimes there is just no extra time for much beyond the things that absolutely must be done.

So what the heck does this have to do with diabetes? Last weekend, Jacquie, her husband Bob, and Sara spent the weekend visiting with A-Flizzle and I, and it really helped me to remember what I love about our community of people. It ended up raining the entire weekend, but I still loved that we all got to hang out and spend time together. When you can hang out with people and do nothing and still have fun doing it, you know it’s a good thing.

We are so much more than just people with diabetes. We are friends, even family. I get a text from Jess late at night for no reason but to ask how I’m doing, and I smile. Sara walks in the door with a hug and says, “We’ve missed you!” and I swallow that little lump in my throat and change the subject really quick. Bob (not to be confused with Jacquie’s Bob) sends me a Twitter mention from somewhere in the middle part of the country and it reminds me that I’m missed, and I’m not alone, even when I feel like I kind of am.

I’m working through a lot of things right now. I’m processing a lot of change lately. Don’t take that negatively, a lot of the change I’m dealing with is amazingly good change, but it’s still change, and by nature we human beans are change resistant.

I know I’m dealing with a bit of depression too, but I’m not willing to truly admit it to myself. I tell myself I’m too busy to deal with that right now. I’ve got a lot going on internally about external influences, trying to process my own feelings about some things that I’ve been dealing with for awhile now, while trying to manage my anger and hurt levels on an almost daily basis.

I really have a lot on my plate with work and trying to get my career as a director of all things awesome to the next level. I also long to be a bigger voice and presence in the diabetes community. Something that I use this blog for regularly, and something that I’ve somehow veered away from, is making people laugh. I love to make people laugh, and I want to be able to laugh too. Laughter is a ginormous part of who I am, and I need it.

I’m overwhelmed with the sheer amount of things that I feel like I have to do, that I want to do, and that I need to do. Regardless, I am trying my best to work my way through it all, or at least get things to a manageable level of stress and outstanding items so as not to be so neurotic. If you don’t hear from me, or reach out and get only silence in return, don’t fret. I got the message loud and clear, and I appreciate it more than words, and I’m working my way through everything in an effort to find my way back to you all.

Laughing At The Hard Times

National Health Blog Post Month, Day 12: Teach a class. What’s something that you are uniquely great at and could teach a class on? Write the tutorial in a blog post. Bonus points for images, links to resources, and video.

It’s okay to complain. I do it, you do it, we all do it. It’s a natural vent for getting things out, and getting to the positive side of things. Something that I feel I am good at is finding the brighter side, which usually also includes humor and laughter.

I love to laugh, make jokes, and entertain. It is part of who I am, how I define myself, and what makes me happy. It’s difficult not to be happy when you are smiling and laughing. And when you are riding a roller coaster. Or sky diving.

I am not a psychologist, counselor, therapist, brainwasher, Vulcan mindmelder, or use The Force, and I don’t have ESPN. But in my world, I trust that when people can laugh about things, they can survive them.

One of my very favorite quotes, and I use it often, is by Bill Cosby.

“You can turn painful situations around with laughter. If you can find humor in anything, even poverty, you can survive it.” – Bill Cosby

I believe that, to my core. We’ve all been through difficult times in various shapes and sizes. What has gotten me through almost every single hard time and helped me learn how to smile again is the power of laughter and the support by people who like to laugh as well.

Try it. You might like it.

This post was written as part of National Health Blog Post Month (NHBPM) – 30 health posts in 30 days: http://bit.ly/vU0g9J

DTreat: With Diabetes

After an amazing evening Friday, on Saturday we started the DTreat day off with Joe Solowiejczyk (who has had Type 1 diabetes for over 50 years) talking about the psychological aspects of diabetes. With diabetes, we get a lot of feelings. It is a struggle sometimes to not let the negative emotions overwhelm us: Anger, sadness, depression, frustration, exhaustion, fatigue, and sometimes even boredom from feeling like we’re doing nothing but the same things over and over.

Joe encouraged us to allow those emotions to come up, because they will lead to what is really going on and the things that we really need to give attention to most. Whether you have diabetes or not, it’s important that we learn to deal with our emotions in a healthy way so that we don’t adopt a more detrimental pattern of behavior.

Something Joe proposed to our group at DTreat really stuck with me. I don’t think there is one person that doesn’t get depressed at some point in relation to life with their diabetes. It is okay to feel that way, and something we need to be okay with dealing with. It is a progressive and all-consuming disease, and sometimes we just don’t have the strength to push back. He suggested that when we’re starting to feel this way, we should schedule a Diabetes Depression Day.

We all do so well taking care of our diabetes day in and day out, going to work, school, church, raising children, traveling, and everything else that comes are way. As a group of people, the things that people with diabetes are able to accomplish truly defines what it means to be heroes. We save our life with every decision we make throughout the day, and it’s often a thankless job. It is hard for us to appreciate what we do because we HAVE to do it. We work so hard day after day to avoid complications, not to win a prize. The prize is when we don’t get anything at all as a result of diabetes. When you take a Diabetes Depression Day, it forces you to take the day off from work, or school, or other previously scheduled activity and take a day for you. You can even take more than one if you need it. You have the choice of a day to give in, where with diabetes, you did not.

Joe said that on his day, he tells his friends and family ahead of time that he is going to take whatever day off for his diabetes day, and he has them call every hour to tell him how awesome and courageous he is for what he has accomplished in his life with diabetes. Then, on the night before, he goes to the store and gets two different kinds of ice cream and movies to watch. He said, “I didn’t have a choice with the diabetes, but I have a choice in what type of ice cream I want and what movies I want to watch.” By the time he starts his day with ice cream and movies, and folks calling him and telling him how awesome he is, it doesn’t take long before he is in better spirits.

Speaking of spirit, Joe also explained to us that there is a spirit of powerlessness that is at the core of diabetes, and something we fight every single day. He said at one point, “There is nothing more helpless than an adult with a low blood sugar.”

I can certainly appreciate that, because yesterday morning (24 hours after Joe’s talk with us), I had a severe low BG myself. Thank goodness I was around people who “get it” and understood that I needed some help. One of my three roommates, Tremayne, found me on the floor after I had gotten out of bed, dressed, brushed my teeth, and that was the last thing I remember before seeing him, my other roommate Zack, and Mike who works with people with diabetes every single day. They stuck me with glucagon, and were patient with me and eventually helped me to get back to normal.

This low BG was the same as others that have put me down before in that I’m still sore all over from the seizing up, and my tongue is swollen and hard to talk and chew from the involuntary biting, and I was super nauseous (I suspect from the Glucagon). What made this low BG different (and so great!) was when I joined back up with my DTreat friends, not one single person made me feel guilty, or embarrassed, or anything less than a part of the group. I think that is because we all know that it could be any of us in that severe low BG situation, and we all know that it is nobody’s fault, especially not our own. As Joe said, “There is no one that judges us as harshly as we judge ourselves.” We can only do as best we can with all of the unpredictability that comes with a life of diabetes. If anything is to blame, we should leave that burden right where it belongs…with diabetes.

Our first circle of support at DTreat Tampa, 2011.

	Rick Phillips on I Lied
	Tina on A Bunch of Sensitive Pric…
	Heather Gabel on Diabetes as a Disability
	Martin on Diabetes as a Disability
	Heather Gabel on Diabetes as a Disability