Confessions of a Recovering Sugar-holic

For the first time in probably two years of yo-yoing back and forth in taking care of myself, I am finally coming to a place inside this head of mine that is ready to start taking more responsibility for my actions, my food choices, exercising.. etc. I am listening more to my body and how it reacts to certain things I eat, even though it has been screaming from the sidelines of my thought process from the very beginning. I am recognizing the calmness of my mind and body after doing half an hour of yoga, jogging, or walking. I am transitioning, if you will, from a mindset of eating whatever I want, giving in to eating something I shouldn't just because it's there staring me in the face telling me to eat it. I am learning to forgive myself for making mistakes. I have a pretty sound knowledge based on my own experiences of eating sugary desserts and snacks of the "hangover" that occurs the next morning the day after eating them. I have learned that what matters most is my quality of life. In my diabetes support group that I go to on a monthly basis we have discussed that by the choices we make in what eat, ultimately we are choosing the kind of life we want to live. Just as with every decision we make in our lives has ramifications, so do the decisions I make on a daily basis of what I am going to eat. What I eat affects my blood sugar, my mood, my level of energy, as well as my mind.

I have learned that while many diabetics are stifflers for eating well, and exercising the moment they find out they are a diabetic this does not reflect my own story. I have always been somewhat of a spontaneous person. I go through periods of my life where I love structure and routine, to times where I just kind of go with the flow. This is how I have always been. The stupid part of this though is that the more spontaneous part of me has more than infiltrated the structure of my ever important diabetes regimen. I will sometimes do very well at taking care of myself, and sometimes I will even "forget" to give myself insulin after eating. For my quality of life, I have to eat better, and be quicker to remember to shoot up after meals. ;) I have seen the scary things that can happen when you don't take care of yourself. Diabetes is a serious disease, and when you stop caring about taking care of yourself and lose control, it wreaks havoc on your body. I don't even want to start listing the horrendous things that can happen.

The funny thing is that through all of this "learning" and "experiencing" I have a confession. I am still addicted to sugar! I always will be! I will never tell you that cupcakes, cookies, chocolate, white flour baked anythings don't look good. Pizza has always been one of my favorite things, especially my mom's homemade. The first 21 years of my existence were filled with these things. My favorite types of food were Italian and Mexican and they still are. Last night I was at a staff meeting where admittedly I ate 3 rice crispy treats. I know that I have little to no self control when it comes the sweets. What I do have is my knowledge and my myriad of experiences of making myself sick in eating crap. I have a saying that goes something like this "If you eat well, you'll feel well, if you eat crap, you will feel like crap". The other funny thing is that I know that I will still make mistakes, I will give in to that occasional treat and over indulge and pay for it later. Because I am still human. It has taken me a long time to reach this realization because I am so hard on myself. I expect perfection. I expect that even when I go to family functions, or parties or wherever I know there is going to be lots of food that I tell myself that I am going to resist the temptation to eat anything sweet. Like my sister Katie so eloquently puts it "that goes over about as well as a turd in a punch bowl".

So again my point is this: I am finally at a place in my life where I can forgive myself for my mistakes and celebrate the triumphs that I face or make every day. It is not an everyday thing for normal healthy people to have this perspective on life. In fact it just might be a little weird. My world is one of constantly looking at nutrition labels, counting carbs, medication, and needles. And instead of being embarrassed or depressed about these things, I am accepting them. Diabetes is an integral part of my life now, but it will never define me as a person.