Representation

 Diabetes in the public eye has to be a great thing, right? A diverse representation of all types of people can only reduce division, hate and normalise disabilities, including Diabetes.

Coronation Street got the Type 1 ball rolling a few weeks ago and last week Pixar joined the Diabetes party with a character in their Turning Red movie, seemingly wearing Diabetes devices. Both great things for Diabetics, particularly the Coronation St character as it appears they'll be focusing on the condition more than the Pixar movie's passing nod towards it. I hope the Coronation St character will be allowed to develop in the coming years and the difficulties of living with T1D are brought to the public attention, at least the public who still watch that particular soap opera.

Beyond the recent TV and movie rep', I've been thinking about others who have proudly acknowledged that they have Diabetes. In the mid and late 1980s, as a young boy, my only "Celebrity Diabetic" was Gary Mabbutt. Gary played for Spurs and was capped by England and he is still well known in Diabetic circles today, particularly football fans. That was it, for me. I'm sure there were others but Diabetes was a much less visible condition beyond the Diabetes clinic at the hospital.

Technology has made Diabetes a visible, talked about thing. It's forced the hand of Diabetics to become that bit more public about their condition. A pump, CGM or even a small Libre disc are physical signs which are often hard to hide compared to the sneaky finger pricks and injections, done covertly or behind closed bathroom doors. Perhaps we have more to thank technology for than simply improving the management of our condition? It's out there! WE are out there!

Not everybody uses technology, of course (despite what you might see on social media). Perhaps some will still hide it because years of conditioning can take a long time to overcome. So, representation is important in other ways. Representation by the masses (our peers) is increasing and I believe that is the most important way to have Diabetes seen by the general public, a general public which still struggles to understand types and which holds ideas of Diabetes, that are ignorant and harmful, firmly in their minds.

How you represent is individual to you, your life and your comfort zone. I speak and write about it in various places and I choose to do so using what I consider to be an effective method. Your methods might be different, of course. What is important to you in regards to Diabetes is almost certain to be different to me and others, too. A brief look through Twitter will reveal a variety of subjects, pushed as hugely important and they may indeed be that to a minority which could include you, or other aspects of Diabetes might be higher on your agenda of importance. What is important for us all is to talk about Diabetes, type if you wish, specific things relating to it if you wish, openly.

Social media is an easy place to air views and share your experiences. It's an easy place to represent D. If that's your comfort zone then embrace it and go to town! It can have a surprising, positive, effect. I'm astounded at the positive comments which have been sent my way in the last couple of years since growing a social media presence. All I do is share my experiences and views while engaging with my peers. 

We don't always agree, either! and that's an important part of life, too. To accept that others have their views and opinions on their own condition and health and subjects relating to it. It's important to not turn those times into arguments, to not bully or name-call or reduce yourself. The people who do that are not helping to represent. Using aggressive, "industrial" language does not help to represent - Do you want your children to read frequent use of the F word? Your choice, of course! I'm far from a prude and I have certainly used foul language and a harsh "tone" before. Within Diabetes, I try to keep it family friendly. That's not because I'm focused on engaging with families. It's because it's much harder to alienate or offend anybody of any age when the language is PG and the tone is soft.

I encourage everybody living with Diabetes to share their views. Talking about it is great representation for your peers and yourself. It's normal to have a health condition or a disability. Don't hide.

Thank you so much for reading this blog. I do appreciate your visit and your support. As you might know, I LOVE COFFEE! So I've teamed up with a thing called Buy Me A Coffee. If you enjoy my content and appreciate the time it takes to create such things then you can buy me a coffee! If you leave your Twitter @ name when you buy me a coffee, I will personally thank you. If you'd rather be anonymous then that's totally cool. Thanks for the caffeine!

BUY DIABETIC DAD A COFFEE HERE

The Cost of Hypos

Do you remember the "sugar tax" of a few years ago? Our favourite sugary drinks, the life-saving drinks which we used to treat hypos, suddenly became less sweet. Lucozade, Ribena, Vimto and the other teeth rotters became less attractive or pointless if you wanted to treat a low blood sugar. Lucozade clung on to a good chunk of its glucose but it was still much reduced, meaning more would need to be consumed (and bought) to treat a hypo than before the days of the sugar tax.

Today, news reports have highlighted that an independent review of the food that we eat should be subjected to further taxes, specifically sugary and salty food, and vegetables should be prescribed on the NHS.

The story is here if you'd like to read through it.

That story aside, it has made me wonder what the cost of hypos are. I don't mean the physical exhaustion, stress and anxiety. I'm talking cash, moolah, filthy lucre. Just how much does a hypo cost? In an ideal world, nothing. Gluco Gels are available on prescription and assuming you only need 30g of carbs (3 x 10g tubes of glucose) to treat your hypos per month (my allowance) then you're golden, hypos will cost you nothing as a Type 1 Diabetic. Meanwhile, back in the real world, here are my hypo stats for 2021 so far:

At the half way point of the year (183 days, 26 weeks) I'd had a grand total of  74 low blood glucose events.  That's just under 3 per week. Of course, that fluctuates depending on a seemingly infinite number of variables but let's assume an average of 3 per week, rather than the days before CGM alerts when my hypo numbers were almost double that amount.

Hypo treatments and their costs will vary. I don't eat and drink the same thing in the same amounts for each hypo. So, what's the most common treat for me? Squashies and Lucozade! Let's do some pricing up:

4 x 330ml bottles of Lucozade are £2.70 (68p per bottle)

1 x packet of Squashies is £1.00

I conservatively estimate that I will drink half a bottle of Lucozade and eat around a quarter of a packet of Squashies for a hypo. Again, that will vary depending on many things but as an average I think that's a reasonably conservative amount. An average hypo is costing me:

34p in Lucozade

25p in Squashies

59p is no big deal, right?

3 hypos per week, though. Alright, £1.77 per week. 

Oh, £92.04 per year.

I've had T1D for almost 37 years. £3,405.48

Perhaps I'll still be here in another 37 years. £6,810.96

Remember that my hypo frequency was once double what it currently is? Yikes!

Suddenly hypos are starting to look like expensive events, over the course of my life. I could probably buy a weeks' groceries for what I spend treating a hypo over a year. And now a proposed extra sugar tax of 15% - 25%?

I know that my hypo events are a tiny number compared to some. I wonder how much your hypos are costing you? and do you agree with the proposed new sugar and salt tax? Let me know.

 Thank you so much for reading this blog. I do appreciate your visit and your support. As you might know, I LOVE COFFEE! So I've teamed up with a thing called Buy Me A Coffee. If you enjoy my content and appreciate the time it takes to create such things then you can buy me a coffee! If you leave your Twitter @ name when you buy me a coffee, I will personally thank you. If you'd rather be anonymous then that's totally cool. Thanks for the caffeine!

BUY DIABETIC DAD A COFFEE HERE

Size Matters

 

It's not what you're thinking, let's get that clear right away. Although! I am referring to little things in this blog, at least in regards to Diabetes. Those little things which we might be guilty of neglecting, ignoring or putting on the back-burner for another day. I've certainly done those things for various aspects of my Type 1 Diabetes.

Recently, it occurred to me that the little things can get neglected by others. Specifically, our healthcare professionals. I'm a firm believer that the majority of HCPs go into the profession with the very best of intentions and that they carry those intentions throughout their professional lives. Perhaps, with experience, shortcuts are used and without any problems arising from doing something to save time, to allow for a break, deal with a clinic which is overflowing and full of patients, etc. An HCP might repeat the practice because it's a small thing, nothing bad happened. Those of us who have been employed may have done similar things. Perhaps the job was stressful, you needed a break or you just really hated your boss! So, you cut some corners, reduced your load.

Yesterday, I tweeted the image below:

And I asked "Can anybody see the problem?"

The Tweet is here if you'd like to read through the replies.

It's probably obvious to you, if not - That's my prescription for 100 needles to be used on my Insulin pens. The NHS app indicates they cannot be reordered for 3 months. That's 100 needles for around 90 days. A needle should be new for each injection and I average around 8 injections per day.

It's probably an app issue. Probably! It's still a reasonably new way of ordering your repeat prescriptions. I know a way around this by calling my GP's prescription line and re-ordering needles through that method. It's never been challenged so, what's the problem?

Let's assume you're newly diagnosed. You're given a mountain of information to take home alongside the emotional pain of dealing with your new chronic condition. You're going to forget something or make mistakes. Maybe, after seeing your 100 needle allowance, you forgot that your DSN told you to use a new needle for each injection. You assume you can only use one needle per day and you're unscrewing it and moving it around between your basal and bolus pens, each time it's getting blunter, damaging your skin, perhaps not delivering the dose you require, damaging your BG and health in other ways.

Perhaps your maths isn't great and the numbers don't even hit home to you, until it's Saturday morning and you notice one needle left in the box.

It's just a little problem. Perhaps nothing terrible will happen but the chance is there and even things with huge odds have to happen sometimes, otherwise nobody would win the Lotto.

Needles and other Diabetes "paraphernalia" are the basics of life with the condition. Although I can work around my particular problem by ordering meds on the telephone, this isn't the first hurdle I've faced with access to the things I need to stay well, to stay alive. In 2017, I had my test strips reduced from 200 to 100 per month by my GP because my HbA1c was too high. Because, in her wisdom, giving me less test strips would seemingly improve my blood glucose. We spoke, at length, and after I questioned how long she'd been living with T1D and all it's difficulties & quoted NICE guidelines to her (thank you, Martin) my original prescription was re-instated but not without more gatekeeping. "If your A1c is over 7% in 3 months then I'm referring your care to the hospital". It was 6.8%. 

Little problems, little annoyances, a little more burden, Sir? Why, don't mind if I do! Just pop that on to my already burden-laden plate of Diabetes. 

"Oh, you think tech will help your Diabetes because it's proven to help hundreds of thousands of others? Well! We need you to jump through some hoops, go on some courses, give thanks at the DAFNE altar and if things are looking better in 90 days then maybe we'll let you continue to use that"

I've used some artistic licence, there but this one is accurate:

"You're too good at this to need a pump".

Flattery goes a long way! But deflecting through positivity is something I've known for many years. 

There are more but you get the gist. Gatekeeping some things might seem like a small matter, something of little concern, keeping things well within budget. The bigger picture for a growing condition within our population? I don't think I need to spell that out.

I know the NHS isn't perfect and that mistakes will happen. I also know it's 2021 and we're about to trial the use of artificial pancreas technology with 1000 individuals. Amazing stuff! Yet, some are denied enough BG test strips, some can't get an appointment to see a DSN or Diabetes Consultant, some have been promised a pump... in 2019! (they don't have it). Little things are still happening which do not lend themselves to good Diabetes care. Perhaps we need to start spending pennies on very basic care, uniformed care no matter where you live, before we get giddy with the pounds. 

 Thank you so much for reading this blog. I do appreciate your visit and your support. As you might know, I LOVE COFFEE! So I've teamed up with a thing called Buy Me A Coffee. If you enjoy my content and appreciate the time it takes to create such things then you can buy me a coffee! If you leave your Twitter @ name when you buy me a coffee, I will personally thank you. If you'd rather be anonymous then that's totally cool. Thanks for the caffeine!

BUY DIABETIC DAD A COFFEE HERE

Death & Taxes

The two unavoidables, apparently. So, there's a cheerful start to this blog! June was a strange month for me. New things happened and not all of them were fun. 

Let's get straight to it and given that the header image is of a shoulder X-ray I'll focus on that. You might have read my brief tweets in regards to my shoulder X-ray results. You might have even heard me suggest that I have the dreaded Frozen Shoulder, which visits many people living with T1D. That became in doubt after a few months and eventually I was sent for a low dose of radiation.

After removing my top because "You're not allowed buttons on an X-ray" the enthusiastic HCP zapped me a few times in various positions and told me to check back with my GP in about a week. Can do! Did do! Yesterday, in fact. 

After some note checking, Dr MyMumHasType2 declared that I have some mild degenerative changes which translates to Osteoarthritis. A diagnosis is a strange moment. You probably remember that moment because you have Diabetes or you know somebody who does (or you're just here because you're attracted to middle-aged men with body parts which are increasingly breaking down, Hi! How you doin'?). Whatever. That moment might result in that little voice in your head exclaiming something which rhymes with Clucking Bell. If you verbalised your Clucking Bell then you have my huge respect, well done. I did not. I left and did some online searching. Of course I did! Isn't that our default route when delivered new health-related news?

I've digested, I've tweeted, some of you have the same condition for which I offer my fullest feeling of your pains, brothers and sisters. And today? I'm alright with it. My shoulder is in relatively good condition and that gives me hope for some physio and maybe some tremendous pain relief to keep the screams of agony away for a while. At least until I need to remove another Libre.

The unavoidable? 

As my friend told me, soon after the news, coating their thoughts in razor blades rather than sugar: "You're getting older" which was almost as sympathetic as friend no.2, of a similar age, who declared: "Yeah, we're both f***ed".

I have the best friends.

However, aging is unavoidable. You can't escape the passing of time as I've learned from watching Prof. Brian Cox, of a Sunday evening. And you can't avoid the ultimate health complaint. Sorry, not very cheerful again. I also think it's the fortunate minority who go from cradle to the grave without a single health problem. Some problems are clearly more serious than others and I think a little crumbly shoulder isn't high on the list of the possible problems which I could face. So! As always, I'm grateful for the amazing NHS, who have tried various things and treatments and will continue to support me and make that particular complaint as small of an issue for me as they can.

Taxes?

That's enough doom and gloom for one blog! 

 Thank you so much for reading this blog. I do appreciate your visit and your support. As you might know, I LOVE COFFEE! So I've teamed up with a thing called Buy Me A Coffee. If you enjoy my content and appreciate the time it takes to create such things then you can buy me a coffee! If you leave your Twitter @ name when you buy me a coffee, I will personally thank you. If you'd rather be anonymous then that's totally cool. Thanks for the caffeine!

BUY DIABETIC DAD A COFFEE HERE

Confessions Of A Diabetic

 

Please forgive me Diabetes for I have sinned against you.  Have you ever been to a confessional? I haven't and I suspect if I did it might be a case of "Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin!"

T1D comes with advice from the professionals for living healthily and rightly so! Once upon a time, that advice came in the form of strict rules. "You will eat at X O'clock, inject at X O'clock, wake up when we tell you to and pee in a very small tube for us four times a year". Things have improved, of course, and now I only need to pee in a very small tube twice a year. 

With rules, comes rule breaking or maybe rule bending. And so, today, I present to you some stories of my own rule breaking and bending for your consideration. They are all going to be Diabetes related, of course and all suitable for family viewing although I encourage you, reader to not copy any of the below or think that because that bloke from the Internet got away with it then you will too. Are we clear? Super! Let's begin.

My rule breaking began at an early stage. Oh, lancets were being changed, carbs counted and injections given on time (at that stage) but at school things went very differently. Please check out Hobnobs in Hiding for some tales of my schooldays with T1D. 

Following education, with a job, money in my pocket and a Fiesta Popular Plus on the the drive, the world was my oyster! Diabetes had to tag along despite me generally ignoring it and refusing to answer it's calls. Those were the days of parties, drinking, pubs, clubs, girlfriends and things were great! Of course they were. I think most people refer to their late teens and early twenties as great times. I'm no exception although I do feel incredibly lucky. 

Shall we begin with hypos? I once made a video which described my worst ever hypo and it's still true to this day. Following a weekend of excess, I woke for work, showered, injected (twice per day mixed insulin jabs at this point), jumped into my car and headed off to work, no finger prick. I didn't need to take finger pricks, I hadn't for years at that stage, I could feel when I was low. Yeah, right! Yawning, tired, a bit hazy? Absolutely, it'd been a long weekend and I was looking forward to getting to work for a rest. However, yawning, tired and hazy are also strong hypo symptoms for me. Then the sweating began and I opened a window. Then the shaking... the shaking... oh no! I'm hypo. I grabbed my bag (still driving at this stage) and opened juice box after juice box. Because of my ignorance of T1D and the frequent hypos that I was coping with, I used to carry several with me in the car to take to work. I was probably 5 minutes from my place of work when the flashing lights began. I'd stopped the car and took it out of gear. Engine still running, I reached for what must've been my third or four juice box and then nothing. Black. I woke up in hospital, tried to punch a doctor and then started crying.

I'm lucky because I'd stopped my car in a busy place where police would often drive by. One spotted me with smoke bellowing from my car's exhaust. At that stage I was having a seizure and had planted my foot on the accelerator. There were seconds between that happening and me stopping the car, even fewer seconds between that and me taking the car out of gear. The police officer dragged me from the car, ripping my blood soaked shirt open in the process. I don't know if he was expecting to perform CPR or was just clumsy. Blood soaked? Oh, yes, I had bitten my tongue during the seizure and things got a little red for that lovely white shirt. I'm lucky. I spent the next week at home, recovering from that incident which could've quite easily killed me or many innocent others. Diabetes, on that occasion, had had enough of being ignored. My behaviour changed, I began testing my BG before driving and ate a breakfast. I took all my Diabetes stuff to work and confessed my condition to my incredibly kind and understanding boss, who hadn't seen or heard from me in a week.

Hypers were more frequent... I think! That's because, as you've just read, I wasn't taking any finger pricks. I don't remember getting any test strips or lancets on a prescription for several years! I wonder if my GP thought that I was cured? I was getting my insulin pens and needles and that was it. Remarkably, I was never unwell because of high blood glucose, no DKA, no frequent need for the toilet or raging thirsts. I would love to see my BG results from those days but suspect they would reflect my extremely infrequent HbA1c tests which were often around 9 - 10%.

How many HbA1c tests did I submit to? After passing out, following one when I was 11 years old, I have memories of three others over the course of the next decade. I didn't have time for blood draws and the ensuing bollocking from my then DSN. I was young! I was a roarer! a rogerer! a gorger and a puker! (You'll understand that if you've ever watched Blackadder).

My DSN gave up trying to convince me to have an A1c. Instead, she relied on my detailed blood glucose diaries. Never in the course of human history had so many lies been written in one book, it was like a Tory manifesto! Of course, she couldn't question why I was always between 4mmol and 8mmol, solidly for a month because I wasn't letting them take an A1c from me! Those works of fiction kept me in their good books for years. Little wonder that I gained some success as a poker player in later life.

"How was your appointment?" family would sometimes ask. Oh, you know, fine considering I hadn't been and was eating a bacon sandwich in the Cafe instead. Nothing tastes as a good as a bacon sandwich when you should be getting strips torn off you by an angry DSN. Yum!

Life changes. I grew up, kind of, eventually and with family comes greater responsibility. Today, I check my BG all the time! I wear a CGM and finger prick to calibrate it. I go to my appointments. I don't lie to my HCPs. My A1c is between 6 and 7% and I will submit to as many blood draws as I'm asked for.

My blog is for my thoughts and brief tales relating to Diabetes. I have a larger collection of notes and stories which aren't necessarily family friendly. Confessions Uncut, if you will, which might make an interesting book. Should I write it?

In the meantime, if you relate or have a confession then tell me everything, my child in the comments below or Tweet me!

Thank you so much for reading this blog. I do appreciate your visit and your support. As you might know, I LOVE COFFEE! So I've teamed up with a thing called Buy Me A Coffee. If you enjoy my content and appreciate the time it takes to create such things then you can buy me a coffee! If you leave your Twitter @ name when you buy me a coffee, I will personally thank you. If you'd rather be anonymous then that's totally cool. Thanks for the caffeine!

BUY DIABETIC DAD A COFFEE HERE

Diabetic Oddity

Bowie was superb, wasn't he? Even several years after his death, his coolness only seems to increase with the passing of time. And look at his amazing eyes! - Obviously, I'm going to think that they are cool. I'm not here to talk about Bowie and what a great song Space Oddity is. That's not very Diabetesy. I did hear that song on Spotify, today and when Bowie sang "This is Major Tom to Ground Control" it brought about thoughts of how we describe Diabetes to others and how they ask questions about it to us.

Major Tom/Bowie went on to describe leaving his space capsule and entering the void of space. Bowie was a tremendous lyricist and wordsmith, of course but I wonder if he would've considered a hypo as "floating in a most peculiar way"?

Perhaps he would've come up with a description which is beyond most of us.

Where am I going with this blog? I've made comments about this previously. That the words we use to describe Diabetes, our Diabetes, cannot ever be challenged. I describe myself as a Diabetic or a Type 1 Diabetic. I take blood tests. I try to control my Diabetes.... Oh! Ground Control! Perhaps I'll stop trying to ignore Bowie in this blog and just carry on referring to his lyrics. 

Control is an interesting one. It seems to bring about great angst from some while others use it freely. Myself, I'll use that or "management". There are two reasons for that. Firstly, I'm of a vintage that is not upset by the words used by others unless they are used with the intent to cause upset or are used through hate. Secondly, sometimes, elements of MY Diabetes can be controlled. If an HCP asks me "How is your control?" or "How is your blood sugar control?" my first thought isn't how dare you use 'control' for a condition which isn't controllable! I'm not going to stand up and walk out or aggressively correct them. Instead, my default thought is that they're trying to get a basic grip on how I'm managing, lately. Lots of hypos, hypers, 100% in target, everything in between... something that can be improved? Great! If not, we move on to how magnificent I am. I accept "managing" and "control" in the same way.

I firmly believe that we shouldn't be challenging singular words in such circumstances. Reviews or appointments can be stressful occasions for us, as patients. I think our focus should be on gaining a positive from that 10-15 minute time slot and not leaving the clinic, feeling unnecessarily tense. HCPs are advised and trained on how to interact with patients but they're human beings. Human beings make mistakes sometimes especially after years of using some words which are now considered "No-Nos".

That doesn't mean we should ignore or forgive absolutely everything. I think if your HCP insults you or puts you down, if you're made to feel like a naughty schoolchild, then that's absolutely the right time to be vocal and complain. 

What is correct and not correct in regards to how HCPs interact with us is personal to you. Your own offence is completely valid, of course. I do think it's time that we stopped indicating what is right or wrong, in regards to language, to people living with Diabetes, though. There is no right or wrong. You don't need to change the words which you've been using forever when talking about your own condition. We have enough on our plates, in my opinion. Leave the "correct" way to talk about Diabetes to your overworked and exhausted HCPs. Overworked and exhausted after working in hotbeds of Covid-19 for 18 months - Perhaps something to consider when the next HCP puts a foot wrong.

One thing which I do struggle to control is my coffee addiction...

Thank you so much for reading this blog. I do appreciate your visit and your support. As you might know, I LOVE COFFEE! So I've teamed up with a thing called Buy Me A Coffee. If you enjoy my content and appreciate the time it takes to create such things then you can buy me a coffee! If you leave your Twitter @ name when you buy me a coffee, I will personally thank you. If you'd rather be anonymous then that's totally cool. Thanks for the caffeine!

BUY DIABETIC DAD A COFFEE HERE

It's Good To Talk

 

I have a new-found admiration and I'll get to that in a moment. Firstly, some context;  I've hosted podcasts, created several vlogs, spoken on the radio, quite a few people appear to follow me on social media, too. In a different life, I played poker on TV and once upon-a-time I played in the World Series of Poker, the biggest card game in the world. You might say I've been around in various guises when it comes to being in the public eye in the last 15 years. I must be brimming with confidence, right? You might read my tweets and my online persona comes across to you as a confident, sometimes outspoken, funny, charming and rather good looking, humble, young man. Some of those things are true! The real truth is that I'm a quiet person. I suffer from social anxiety. I use the word "suffer" deliberately because, unlike Diabetes - which I have, there have been times when it has been on a different level of troublesome.

There are reasons for my social anxiety which go way back. That is for another blog, perhaps! It'll likely be too long to be interesting. I'm not going to offer advice or suggestions on how to "get over it" either. That's for you to work out, if you're relating, sorry. What I can offer is my own experience.

Life has a way of moulding us, directing us, forcing us into situations. Sometimes it takes trauma, grief in it's many forms, exquisite joy or an event to really open our eyes to important things and exciting opportunities. Perhaps the Covid-19 pandemic, the lockdowns and well documented horror have given you a new perspective. Perhaps you're doing new things already and appreciating the people and things around you more than before. Maybe you promised yourself to be that way but it hasn't worked out. That's alright. Lots of us promise to live a new, healthy life on Jan 1st each year. I'm not sure how many of us live up to those quietly spoken words which we weren't truly believing in anyway.

You might have read about my Diabetes complications, before. Sight loss and the dark (no pun intended) places that it lead me to, followed by recovery and a new-found "Wow!" for the world. Then, I told myself that I would do new things. I did. I built a business and probably over-enjoyed myself in many other ways (again, stories for another time). My 40th birthday had a similar but "purer" affect on my views. I decided to open up about my Type 1 Diabetes, expecting nothing more than some minimal engagement on my very early and terrible vlogs. 4 years later, it was one of the best decisions of my life. It's good to talk!

The new-found admiration? It's for those taking a leap of faith by speaking in public for the first time. I've spoken at business meetings and haven't really felt uneasy. Those meetings are often boring and a matter of fact, information sharing, exercise. Speaking publicly about something personal such as your health is pretty terrifying! but... fun! Terrifunning? Like a rollercoaster! but a rollercoaster which you control. That's because you're the one who truly knows everything about that subject. I did that a few days ago at a grand old hotel in Stratford-upon-Avon. A private engagement with some lovely people who were extraordinarily kind to applaud me and ask many really great questions. Although that subject was about the CGM which I use, rather than me, I still felt comfortable after a few seconds. After I left that rollercoaster, I wanted to get back on. The fear had gone and the excitement of the occasion came through. Also, I felt I'd lived up to my own promise of doing a new thing which I once would never have even considered. It's good to talk!

I realise that I'm lucky to be given opportunities within Diabetes. I am after all a "Joe Bloggs" (blogs?) Diabetic. I won't be running any marathons or climbing any mountains, you won't catch me trout-pouting in a bikini on Instagram, I'm unlikely to star in any Super Bowl ads or have my hilarious jokes recognised by TV bosses. I don't create drama for content, either. I'm no false advocate who has unsavoury motives. I'm just a person who talks about Diabetes with his peers. Perhaps you are too? I imagine we get along famously already. It's good to talk! 

Social anxiety feels real. That demon is frightening but I'm beginning to realise that he's not real. He is an imaginary monster under the bed, who goes away when you're brave and you look under there. That bravery takes a lot, it can take a long time or it can be triggered by an event. If the opportunity presents itself then I strongly encourage you to go for it and look under the bed and never look back. Do the scary things.

If you'd like me to do something scary then get in touch - daddiabetic@gmail.com Bungee jumpers and sky divers need not apply!

Thank you so much for reading this blog. I do appreciate your visit and your support. As you might know, I LOVE COFFEE! So I've teamed up with a thing called Buy Me A Coffee. If you enjoy my content and appreciate the time it takes to create such things then you can buy me a coffee! If you leave your Twitter @ name when you buy me a coffee, I will personally thank you. If you'd rather be anonymous then that's totally cool. Thanks for the caffeine!

BUY DIABETIC DAD A COFFEE HERE