Joy has lived with diabetes her whole life, but it wasn't until she was 30 and starting to go blind that she started living to control her disease.
Joy's Story
"Growing up with diabetes was hard."
I was diagnosed just after my sixth birthday. My mom was diabetic, so she knew all the symptoms. I was thirsty all the time. I was going back and forth to the bathroom all the time. I had headaches and blurred vision at times. She let me have my sixth birthday party so that I could eat plenty of cake and ice cream, and a couple of days later I went to the doctor and was diagnosed and thrown in the hospital for a week.
I was given -- what seemed like to a six year old -- a death sentence: no more candy, no more cake, no more cookies, no more of the things that make the world beautiful. And I was also going to have to stick myself a bunch of times everyday.
My mom gave me my shots. It didn't take her awhile to teach me how to do it, but it took me awhile to come around to the idea of doing it myself. I was really rebellious, and I was just not going to do it.
"The reality of having diabetes is just now hitting me."
Before I was young, and even though you hear the horror stories about how you can lose a limb or lose an eye, kidney function and all this, when you are young you feel invincible. Now I am 30, and I am getting older. I have lost vision in one eye. I know these things are real.
"Losing my vision was a wake up call to managing the diabetes."
My vision was always pretty good, but in June I started seeing spots in my left eye. I knew that was wrong, especially after being told that blindness is one of the complications that can result from diabetes. The doctor examined my eye and did laser surgery the same day. After the laser surgery, I noticed that my vision was still diminishing; it wasn't spots anymore. Things looked blurred and distorted. I went back to the doctor, and he told me my retina was detaching and I would need to have surgery to reattach it.
I was very scared because my mother went through the same thing. She had a couple of corrective surgeries, but they didn't work for her and she never recovered her vision. I was still hopeful because I knew the medical technology has advanced a lot.
"If I can see out of my left eye, it is a good day, but my vision is coming back."
I test my vision when I am walking down the street. I close my right eye and see where I am walking with my left. I can make out plants and things like that. When I am watching TV from time to time, I close my right eye and look at the TV with my left. I noticed I was watching TV one day and I was like, I can tell it is a lady, I can tell it is a white lady, she has blonde hair, she has on a light colored sweater. That was good because at first I could just make out shadows and movement; I couldn't make out distinct figures. I feel good about it now.
"Even after having this disease for 24 years I am still not friends with the needle."
They have made a lot of medical advances with the treatment of diabetes since I was diagnosed. Recently there has been an inhale-insulin that has come onto the market, and I am working with my doctor to try and do the inhale-insulin. I won't be able to totally stop taking shots because the inhale form is a rapid-acting insulin, and I also need a long-term insulin. But instead of me having to take four shots a day, with the inhale insulin I would go down to one shot a day. The shots are just difficult. I am not friends with the needle.
"I am working on my diabetes now, working on getting it under control."
Keeping my diabetes under control is all about balance. I have to balance what I eat with the amount of insulin that I take. That involves checking my blood sugars a number of times each day. I am trying to re-incorporate a good amount of physical activity into my daily routine. When I was younger it was easier because I was active, but now that I am older it is harder. I am at a desk job, which makes me sedentary during the day. I am trying to get out of the habit of being like that. Instead of parking close to a building, I'll park farther away, or I'll go for a walk at lunch instead of sitting at my desk all day.
I get cravings all the time, but that goes back to balance. If you want to eat sweets, you need to check your blood sugar and know where you are and calculate the amount of insulin you need to take to counteract the food that you are about to eat. I am working closely with an endocrinologist here. Hopefully with some changes and some hard work it will get better.
Living with diabetes is hard, but there are ways for you to control the diabetes and not let the diabetes control you. It is not easy, it is not easy at all, but with the right work and the right attitude you can do it and do it well.