Chapter 1 - Diagnosis

I was born in the St. Albans, Vermont hospital while my parents and two older brothers, Jim & Bill, were living in Georgia Plains, Vt. My Dad was a Baptist Minister; my Mom a school teacher. Although I'm not sure, my younger sister Cheryl, may have been born here too. Dad & Mom moved quite often and before I was six, 1954, we moved to Dickenson Center, which is across Lake Champlain in upper New York State.

In December of that year I got real sick. I don't personally remember my mother taking me to my uncle who was an M.D. and being told that I had diabetes. However, I do remember being so thirsty that I couldn't stop drinking and then making bathroom runs. I was sent to the Joslin Clinic in Boston, specializing in diabetes, where they found my blood sugar reading was over 450 milligram per deciliter ( mg/dlˆ ). A normal reading is 80-120 mg/dlˆ .

Now I'm different. Glass syringe, insert plunger, attach needle, stick it into an orange to practice, draw air into the syringe, agitate insulinˆ so that it's a good mix, wipe the top of the bottle with isopropol alcohol on a cotton ball, inject air into insulin bottle, withdraw insulin, wipe injection site with same cotton ball, inject syringe, dispense insulin, over and over again to the point where you can do it in your sleep. Three times a day I bring out the clinitestˆ kit and take urine tests. If result is high, then I have to check for ketonesˆ .

A balance has to be established between Diet, Insulin and Exercise. If tests are high I need to inject more quick acting insulin, U40 Regularˆ , and still include a much longer lasting insulin, U40 NPHˆ . Three times a day for the rest of my life. Maybe I'll get run over by a car, tomorrow. That'll fix 'em. If I go into a low blood sugar condition, called hypoglycemiaˆ , no matter where I am or what I'm doing, I have to stop and get some sort of sugar into my body.

Hey, maybe it's not too bad. If I have a test in school, I can fake an insulin reactionˆ and have to go to the nurse's office. No way! That means everyone really will know I'm different.

Across the street from our house was a man who raised turkeys, Don Woods. He would occasionally let my brothers and I ride on the tractor when he took feed into the area where the turkeys were. I had no problem doing this while my brothers were on the tractor with me but I remember a time when I was alone and Don had gotten off the tractor for some reason.
Here come millions of turkeys trying to attack me. It didn't matter that I was on the tractor or that they weren't bothering Don, but I was sure they were after me anyway. Later, after my brothers got back from school and laughed at what happened, it was explained to me that my millions were actually hundreds and the only reason the turkeys crowded around the tractor was because there were too many of them to get to the wagon carrying the grain. Of course I really didn't care that they had all been de-beaked and had their wings clipped. But oh the noise a couple hundred turkeys can make.

My birthday is October 12th so I began 1st grade when I was only five years old. Dad moved us to Starrucca, Pennsylvania where I began fourth grade, so I must have been nine (1957). Most of my growing up years were here. Starrucca is a rural farming community in the north eastern corner of the state with New York within an hour's drive to the north and to the east.

We made sure that lots of folks knew I had diabetes. I have never been subconscious about what I do to take care of my disease. It's funny. My friends don't care that I have diabetes. Some are oblivious to my 'condition'; others are actually interested and want to know more. The needles really don't hurt; they're tiny. It only takes a few minutes a day. This isn't so bad.

"Mom, it's the ninth inning and I'm up to bat next. No way I can leave now." This is getting worse all the time. But it was supper time and I had to eat on time. If I waited an extra twenty minutes exercising at the same time, I'd be in insulin reactionˆ . They're no fun. The first time I got one, I didn't know what was going on. My body wasn't doing what I thought I was telling it to do. My voice was gone, even though I was trying to scream for help. My knees no longer held me up, but kept buckling. My mouth tasted like it was full of sawdust. It got to the point where I couldn't even remember my name. Mom brought me out of it by forcing me to drink orange juice. About fifteen minutes later I was 'normal' again, but I couldn't remember anything that had happened for the previous half hour. If someone had seen me would they have thought I was drunk? Embarassing!

"What do you mean I have to learn about the pancreasˆ , and Isles of Langer-whats-itsˆ ? How do you expect me to do all this? There's no one else around here with diabetes. Even my doctor says so."

Yes, I am different. A disease called diabetes has me in its hold. But I can and will combat it. I must take shots to furnish my body with the insulinˆ it no longer produces. So what. I can handle this. There is absolutely no reason to be ashamed I'm diabetic. There is no way I'm going to let diabetes get me down. Excuses and feeling sorry for myself are going to do more harm than good. There will never be a day when I allow my diabetes to be a crutch in my lifestyle. I may have to form habits around it, but I will never allow my disease to stop me from doing anything I want to do.

Now that I'm an adult, I see it was easier for me to learn how to live with diabetes than what it's like as a teenager for example. As a youngster, the peer pressure hasn't really begun. Habits can be formed rather than replaced. My daughter was diagnosed at the age of sixteen and her habits were established and had to be thrown away and new ones created. There have been struggles, however. Doctors who weren't up on diabetes, unexplained patterns of high and low blood sugars, added to my confusion. Things that today, with more and more information available, can be rationalized, weren't even thought about then.

Most children that I've run across have the ability to remember early events in their lives long before I did. Now in 2001, at the age of fifty-three I don't believe myself old but, if the shoe fits.... A friend of mine recently promised me, 'It's not Alzheimer's, it's old-timers'.

The name Joslin is going to be mentioned quite frequently. My training began at the Joslin Clinic but continued at the Joslin Diabetic Camp in Charlton, Massachusetts. I will always have fond memories of Elliot Proctor Joslinˆ , whom I personally met and talked to, and for whom the camp was named, where I spent so many summers of my life and still go to for visits. One of my best friends, Paul Madden, who has taken a career as a Diabetes advocate, lecturing and advising, still spends most of his summers taking a leadership role at the camp.

Isaiah 30:20,21-KJV Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it."