One year ago today, I received my diagnosis. This weekend, as I was looking at colleges with Emma, sweating in the heat and humidity of Virginia in August, I kept thinking back to this same weekend last August, when I was lying in a hospital bed, wondering what had hit me and whether I would survive. I did survive (so far!) and I've learned a lot in this past year. I'm now pretty good at controlling my blood sugar through insulin, diet, and exercise. I've accepted the fact that I've got a disease that will never go away. I'm totally comfortable injecting my insulin wherever I am -- in a restaurant, on an airplane, while walking through the park at a craft fair. But I'm not perfect. I still experience major freak-outs when my blood sugar is above target, especially when I don't understand why. Today, ironically, my readings have been significantly higher than normal, despite the fact that I've hardly eaten anything. Bad Levemir? Lack of exercise? Who knows? Whenever I have one of these days, and I do every few weeks or so, I become convinced that my blood sugar has gone haywire, that I'll never be able to control it, and I obsess and worry about it until I'm in a tizzy. My goal for year 2 is to calm down, to do the best I can, and to recognize that there will always be highs and lows and that, like stormy seas, the only thing to do is hang on and ride them out.
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