The health and wellness challenge of the diabetic condition

Diabetes is a complicated condition. This article isn’t about the finer medical details of the disease. Nor is its intent to offer any medical advice. In fact a quick Google search gives an enormous amount of information on just about every facet of diabetes. Except the personal one.

In the early 1950s there was the discovery of autoimmunity. Then there came recognition in the 1970s that Type 1 diabetes has an autoimmune basis. Furthermore, it is still increasing in the pediatric population. Additionally it is most common in children between the ages of 4 and 7 and between the ages of 10 and 14.

Type 1 diabetes is a condition that changes everything for someone that has it. It’s an extremely complicated disease. Furthermore, it is beyond the imagination why in this day and age, it still exists without a cure. There are proposed reasons, and many of us know of the conspiracy theories with the extended chronic conditions pay model. However, conspiracy theories are not always false. Similarly, if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck.

The Health and Wellness Challenge

As mentioned earlier, this article isn’t about the technical details of the disease. It’s about personal experience with the diabetic condition. I knew someone with diabetes. This young man got the disease just before he turned four years old. He made it all the way to 38 years old. When he died, the disease had taken his eyes and his kidneys. Furthermore, it pained him every single day.

I was his dad. I was there for every one of those thirty eight years. Furthermore, I got to see first hand what a bitch diabetes is. If that term seems harsh, it certainly doesn’t to someone suffering the condition.

With this in mind, there are things no one knows about his life. Mainly how he suffered. He kept a lot of that to himself. Also he remained courageous and kind. That is beyond uncommon in this world. He lost his eyesight when he was 27. I remember the day he gave me the keys to his truck. He cried. He still wanted to drive, and was trying to do so, but couldn’t see the road any longer. A few weeks later his sight was all gone.

The Health and Wellness Challenge of the Diabetic Condition

He was thirty three when he went into renal failure. The week before Christmas, 2019. The loss of his kidneys was not as devastating to him as the loss of his eyesight. I was there every day. We had conversations I wish on no parent ever. Therefore, I am well aware of how he felt about everything. And I mean everything.

This small article is nothing compared to what he went through. That is thanks to a disease that should have had a cure years ago. A cure available to all. Not just those who can afford it. From the time he was able to understand what a cure could mean for him, until the time of his death, he hoped for a cure. Unfortunately, none ever came.

In fact, one of his favorite conspiracy theories was that they wanted him to have the disease, because of all the supplies he had to buy to treat it. Including insulin. A cure could have solved it. A cure would have made all the difference. Once upon a time. End part one.

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