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This day, six years ago, was just one more day with one more doctor's appointment. I had been sick for about a year and a half, and still they found nothing. Each time was more tests, each time was more questions and prodding into my personal life. No, I don't do drugs. No, I'm not on any weird prescriptions. Um, NO! I haven't even so much as kissed someone. No, no, no. Each time I went they tried a different bandaid to fix a symptom or two, but still I was ill.
This is why I shoved a single piece of chocolate into the pocket of my jacket. It had become a ritual of mine. A prize, if you will, for successfully enduring yet another torturous appointment. That single piece of candy, a round chocolate shell filled with with a solid chocolate center that would melt as soon as your tongue touched it (if I recall correctly...), would soon enter my mouth the moment I returned to the passenger's seat upon the completion of that nasty event. If I would've only known then what lay ahead of me...
A couple hours later, as I sat atop the examining table telling the doctor about the particular ailment for which I came in, my mom was insisting that something else was the matter with me. She had been saying this for months now, with no one actually listening. She was completely right though. Me, her little 13 year old girl at the time, was just that-- too little. I weighed only 65 pounds back then. You could literally count near every bone in my body. My eyes were sunken, my face pale, and I had absolutely no energy. For what should've been a spunky pre-teen, I was the bottom rung on my soccer team. I fell way behind all the other girls in every practice; I could hardly manage to complete a lap, let alone give force behind my kicks, and I would end each night with painful cramps in my lower legs and feet from the strain.
There were other signs too, not as noticeable to most, but my mom knew. She saw the extreme thirst. She saw the lethargy. She saw the shaking and dizziness. My family knew. My dad carried me once, after a soccer practice when my legs were so tired and my feet cramping so badly that I couldn't even stand. They knew, they felt it. My mom cried out, but no one would hear her. And thus we were back at the doctor's office.
One test. That was it. One test was all it took. A simple urine test, one that no one had thought to use before, answered all our questions.
"She has Type One Diabetes."
There it was. There was my bottom line. The doctor said it so matter-of-factly; not a hint of sympathy to be detected. My mom started crying and I just sat there stunned. I had no idea.
For those of you unfamiliar with the label "Type One Diabetes," I will offer a brief overview. All I ask is that you erase a preformed ideas that lay in your head. Type One Diabetes (or T1D for short) is not the overweight-can-be-fixed-with-diet-and-exercise kind of disease that your grandma has. No, T1D is an autoimmune disorder. What I mean by this is that one's immune system, instead of attacking an invasive germ or virus or bacteria, actually begins to attack its own cell structures- namely organs. Now there are thousands of different autoimmune disorders, but to be T1D specific, your pancreas is the affected organ.
The pancreas is responsible for the production of various hormones. For those with T1D, the islet cells that produce the hormone insulin are almost entirely destroyed. Your cells are fueled by glucose- sugar from the food you eat, but the glucose cannot enter the cell by itself. Insulin is the key that unlocks the cells aids the glucose in entering. Without insulin your cells starve for lack of that fuel, and the glucose (sugar) builds up in your bloodstream. If this is allowed to go unchecked, that sugar will turn into a deadly poison inside your body.
This is what I was diagnosed with. Type One Diabetes has no cure. There is no end in sight to this awful disease. Managing T1D comes at the hands of manual injections (shots), multiple times a day. It requires countless blood sugar checks throughout the day, and gives the recipient an ever-present knowledge that their life will never be the same.
After the doctor had walked away to inform the specialist of our impending arrival, I quietly slipped my hand into my coat pocket and my fingers touches the crinkly foil of the candy that awaited me. I pulled it out, not even yet knowing the full extent to which this disease would change my life, and held it out to my mom.
"I guess I won't be eating this anymore."
The next couple hours were a blur. I was told that I had to get to a specialist within the hour or I would be transported via ambulance. So we went. My dad, mom, and I headed to the specialist; where they proceeded to pump me with synthetic insulin. I was told that my blood sugar count was so high that the meter only read "HIGH". (That's not good.) There was some speculation as to whether I would have to be admitted into the ICU and I'm pretty sure all the staff was just waiting for me to go into a coma.
Yet I survived. The next couple of days I was overwhelmed with so much information. What was this disease? How will it affect my life? What happens next? It was very hard to process everything. I was prescribed 4 injections of insulin A DAY, for the rest of my life. I really can't describe what it feels like to give yourself a shot, knowing that you may never be able to stop. You may never be able to go back to the life you once had. It's depressing honestly. And I began to ask God "why?"
"Why this? Why me? Why now?"
It was a long struggle for me. I kinda went through a battle with God over His whole plan for my life. I journaled. I prayed. I was frustrated, to be honest. Yet through this whole thing, through every tear and frustrated moment, the Lord revealed Himself to me in a new way. I could almost hear Him ask me "Why not you? Why not now? Don't you trust what I'm doing in your life?"
Trust. That's a big thing for me. Did I trust God? I've learned to. I mean, every day I wake up with the reality that I need to, yet again, poke and prod myself with more needles. Every night I face the reality that my sugars may get messed up and I may not wake up- like ever again. It's scary! I still don't trust my Lord like I should, but I'm learning.
Ladies, to bring this back to a more normal blog theme for a moment, the thought does cross my mind that a guy may never want me for this disease. Medically speaking, I'm a lot of work. Monthly prescriptions aren't cheap and the constant management required is stressful. Mr. Right may never want me and I couldn't really blame him if he didn't. But that's still something I'm praying on. I'm still leaning to trust, remember?
A couple weeks after I was diagnosed, I found that piece of candy in the refrigerator drawer. I pulled it out and I ate it. I savored every moment of it. Was my life ever going to be the same again, absolutely not! But hey, I'm still a girl that loves her God, her family, and chocolate- no disease can stop that. I just have to learn to do this a little differently. So there you have it- I'm Elecia. I am a Christian. I am a Type One Diabetic. And I am different. Yep, different.
