Day 10 - Death and Diabetes

For the most part, death is commonly on the back of a diabetics mind because there are thousands of different pathways to end up with complications such as kidney failure, loss of eyesight, loss of a limb, and neurological degeneration, and it can be something that will plague our lives for the rest of our lives; constantly questioning, wondering, fearing when we are going to die and what is it that I am doing now that may cause complications down the road.

One thing that is for sure is that each of us is going to die one day and we don't have control or a say over when we will die. Tomorrow we may get hit by a car or suffer a heart attack, or spontaneously combust. When we die we certainly don't have a say in whether or not we do in fact want to die at that moment, thus the fear of dying resulting from complications of diabetes is a useless waste of space and a irrational fear that we're keeping.

Diabetes is certainly tiresome and it most definitely has it's drawbacks. There is the possibility of complications of our health. It is possible that we may lose a limb, or get heart disease, or have kidney failure, or become blind but these possibilities do not need to become fears nor do they need to create any anger or resentment towards ourselves for having diabetes. They are possibilities and that's all they need to remain. Focusing on the what ifs and the possibilities is going to be tiresome in itself because we will always have these fears running around in the back of our minds dictating what we will and will not accept or allow ourselves to participate in, or they will start to dictate how we are going to live our lives, meaning that we will become dictators of our lives, trying to control every out come to avoid these fears from manifesting as much as possible.

This brings up another point in relation to these fears and that is the fear of control or the want to have control or the fear of loss of control. We have the fear of death related to the complications that diabetes can bring and then we have the feeling of loss of control of our lives because it is a difficult task to keep the blood sugars stable and, for me, this can easily bring up a lot of anger. For example when I wake up and I see that the blood sugar is high and go into this fear of heart disease and fear that I have no control over whether or not I am going to get heart disease I can quickly become angry that I have no control over these outcomes. Again, we don't have control, we have the illusion of control via injecting insulin and eating right, but in the end of the equation whether or not we have complications we are not able to really decide and/or have control of whether or not we are able to stay away from any complications. We are able to give ourselves the best possible control via injections and eating but it is not a definitive decision upon whether or not any complications will come up. So again to place worry and fear upon getting complications is an irrational fear and wanting to have control over ourselves based on what will or will not happen regarding quality of life is irrational as well. We can only give ourselves the best care that we can in the each and every moment, so if we go low, we correct with consuming a sugar, if we are high, we correct with insulin, doing our best to get the ratio right to not cause any rebounds.

In addition to this I see that there is a fear of self within the whole equation. We fear that we are not taking care of ourselves, fear that we are not supporting ourselves the best way possible. We have a lack of trust for ourselves to

make the right decisions. This is irrational as well because within this we are stating that we are not ourselves and have no control over ourselves. This isn't true. We always make the decisions to live how we live, within and without, so in regards to lack of self trust to give ourselves effective care, simply apply practicality to this situation and give yourself good care. When you are in that mood of hating everything and wanting to destroy your life and diabetes along with it, forgive yourself, breathe, take a moment to step back from the anger/hate towards diabetes and self, and decide in that moment to support yourself rather than to destroy yourself.

In regards to death, we are going to die. We are only able to focus on what is within a moment and be here. This isn't to say be happy and be positive and diabetes will just get better on its own; it is to say that within a moment be aware of what we are injecting, be aware that we have diabetes and are going to need to walk through a lot of red tape to get what we need to support ourselves, be aware of what we are eating, and be aware of what decisions we are making that are not in the principle of what is best for all - considering the body.