Thursday, April 5, 2012

Acceptance......

Last night on twitter there was a great discussion on acceptance. Acceptance of living with a chronic illness such as Type 1. I did not participate in the conversation but had a chance to read the questions and I would like to respond to them here. 

Q1. What are the things about living with diabetes that you accept? what are the things that you have trouble accepting?


I accept that it is something that I have to live with. I accept that I need insulin and I have to look at food a different way then other people. I have trouble accepting that it is FOREVER. There are days that  I am just "over it." I have days where I just cannot wrap my head around this being the rest of my life. Then there are days where I cannot imagine it ever not being an everyday part of my life. 

Q2.What, if any, is the danger of being too accepting about life with diabetes?

I do not think I have ever been "too" accepting. Maybe the danger would be that it is ruling you life? Maybe there is no such thing as being too accepting. 

Q3. There are a few tweets about “being too accepting of diabetes” & diabetes burnout. Do u think the 2 go hand in hand? why?

I think we are all human. I think we all have diabetes burnout, because it is hard. It is an everyday challenge. I do think being "too accepting" and burnout go hand in hand. We all go through different emotions about the disease at many different parts in our lives.

Q4.  How do you react to someone with greater/lesser level of acceptance of diabetes than yourself?

I don't really react. If they are on a greater level of acceptance then I can draw wisdom from that. If they are on a lesser level of acceptance I could only hope to help them by sharing my journey. I also believe that for me my level of acceptance changes with the roller coaster of life. There are times when I am way more accepting then other times in my life. 

Q5.  At what point did you accept that your child’s development of diabetes was not your fault? adults-when did you accept diabetes was not your fault?

I have never thought that it was my fault. I knew early on that God gave this to me for  a reason. I always felt like I could use it in my life to show other people that life is hard but you still can do great things.

Q6. Is  acceptance a one time thing, or is life with diabetes a constant cycle of acceptance?

For me it is a cycle. It has to be. I was diagnosed 12 years ago. I have gone through being a teenager, college student, wife and mother with type 1. I have not been able to go through all those stages in my life without being angry with type 1, then accepting type 1, then ignoring it. I am sure I will go though all those stages a few more times in this journey. 

I think acceptance looks very different to many different people. Right now I feel like I am not at total acceptance with my type 1. I feel like I am just tired right now. I  am always working on it. With the DOC I feel like I will have much more support then I have ever have and hopefully that will help me get back to acceptance. 

1 comment:

  1. So glad you are doing this! Love you and I'm going to share with my dad so he can follow as well.

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