Ginger Vieira - Dealing with Diabetes Burnout: How to Recharge and Get Back on Track When You Feel Frustrated and Overwhelmed Living with Diabetes

Also by Ginger Vieira

Emotional Eating with Diabetes

Your Diabetes Science Experiment

Ginger Vieira

Visit our website at www.demoshealth.com

ISBN: 978-1-936303-59-5

e-book ISBN: 978-1-61705-198-2

Acquisitions Editor: Julia Pastore

Compositor: diacriTech

2014 Ginger Vieira. All rights reserved. This book is protected by copyright. No part of it may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Medical information provided by Demos Health, in the absence of a visit with a health care professional, must be considered as an educational service only. This book is not designed to replace a physicians independent judgment about the appropriateness or risks of a procedure or therapy for a given patient. Our purpose is to provide you with information that will help you make your own health care decisions.

The information and opinions provided here are believed to be accurate and sound, based on the best judgment available to the authors, editors, and publisher, but readers who fail to consult appropriate health authorities assume the risk of injuries. The publisher is not responsible for errors or omissions. The editors and publisher welcome any reader to report to the publisher any discrepancies or inaccuracies noticed.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Vieira, Ginger.

Dealing with diabetes burnout: how to recharge and get back on track when you feel frustrated and overwhelmed living with diabetes / Ginger Vieira.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-936303-59-5

1. DiabetesPopular works. I. Title. II. Title: Living with diabetes.

RC660.4.V54 2014

616.462dc23

2014000386

Printed in the United States of America by McNaughton & Gunn.

14 15 16 17 18 / 5 4 3 2 1

For Blue, Petey, and Einstein.
Thank you, my furry boys, for ensuring that each morning starts
with a walk in the woods and a smile.

Diabetes doesnt define me, but it helps explain me.

Kerri Morrone Sparling, of SixUntilMe.com,
living with type 1 diabetes

Exploring the Pressures and Expectations That Can Make Diabetes Feel So Darn Overwhelming

Digging Deeper into What Is Currently Happening in Your Life with Diabetes

Setting Yourself Up for Success with Realistic Goals and Fewer Pitfalls

Taking on the Responsibilities of Medications and Blood Sugar Checks without the Overwhelming Pressure

Becoming a Person Who Respects His or Her Body through Food

Learning How to Make Exercise of Any Kind a Real (and Positive!) Part of Your Life

This One Is for the People Who Love and Care about You!

Embracing Your Progress and Giving Yourself Credit for Dealing with Diabetes Every Day

First, I cant help but thank my editor Julia Pastore for inviting me to create this book and giving me the utmost freedom to make it real, personal, and even silly and humorous.

I must also thank the Diabetes Online Community (DOC), for being this vast, vague, everywhere-and-anywhere community of people living with diabetes that is always nearby. When I asked you to share your experiences and stories, you shared. You are there for all of us during celebrations, disappointments, advocacy, sadness, humor, and much-needed venting. If anyone reading this book has yet to find the DOC, I urge you to type #DSMA into Twitter or join one of the dozens and dozens of Facebook groups for people with diabetes until you find a group or a few individuals who you connect with. Just say Hello! Im looking to meet other people with diabetes, and youll find yourself surrounded online with support and new friends. We are not alone. Thank you to the hundredsmake that thousandsof individuals who live with their diabetes out loud, across the globe, in a community where we can all reach other.

Lastly, thank you to Roger and Tara, the two greatest sources of support that a girl could ask for in life with diabetes. Without either of you, this would be so much harder.

Love and gratitude,

Ginger

Have you ever wanted to be one of those perfect diabetics? Me, too. As people living with diabetes, we cant help but compare ourselves to that perfect patient our doctors, parents, boyfriends, wives, strangers, and friends all want us to become. There is an unspoken expectation to be flawless in all things despite the fact that such perfection is impossible.

Since the day I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in 1999, I have never met one of those elusive diabetics who gets it right all the time. Ive met people with diabetes who work really hard to have the tightest blood sugar control possible, but even they havent attained perfection. Even they have moments or days when their blood sugars are higher or lower than perfect, when they eat something that a diabetic shouldnt eat, when they forget to check their blood sugar before a meal, when they cant find time to exercise, or when they miscount the total carbohydrates in their grandmothers all-natural, whole grain, homemade bread and thus, take too much insulin.

Ive also met people with diabetes who try really hard to do the best they can do, and people with diabetes who are sincerely struggling to find the motivation to take care of themselves, and perfection seems as illusive and mysterious as Big Foot. Or unicorns. (My sincerest apologies go out to those who are still waiting for a unicorn sighting.)

And thats okay, because this diseasetype 1, type 2, and type 1.5is really hard work.

From the moment we are diagnosed with any type of diabetes, we begin a part of our lives in which we are constantly graded. Constantly tested. Constantly told whether were doing a great job, a good job, an okay job, or a really bad job based on the numbers that show up on our glucose meter and A1C test. We are graded on what we eat or on how often we exercise. Whether we check our blood sugar regularly or rarely, and somewhere in our heads we cant help but tell ourselves that were good or bad based entirely on how well we are able to accomplish this neverending to-do list throughout every single day.

And that is exhausting.

It can go something like this: Im good for checking my blood sugar at least four times a day, but Im bad for going too many hours, or even days, without checking. Im good for drinking water. Im bad for drinking a martini. Im good for eating steamed chicken and vegetables. Im bad for eating ice cream and cookies. Im good for being able to accurately count the carbohydrates in my dinner, and dose my insulin for that meal, but Im bad if my estimated carb-count is off by even 5 or 10 grams and my blood sugar is high as a result.