Dealing With It

One thing I think I've always been afraid of losing is my health.

Please don't get me wrong and tell me how you struggle with your allergies, because most people an intolerance or allergy to something. Milk, for example. A bowl of cereal with dairy milk keeps me full not because it's an amazing source of protein and nutrition, but because my stomach just has never liked milk and I probably should avoid it. I deal. Or the ones who talk about how distressed they are because they have all this debt that accumulated because they spent way too much money when they were unemployed.*

Maybe don't be so eager to play grownups when you know you can't afford it?

We live in a world where people can collect disability for a cloudy day making them sad. I kid you not; my parents actually know someone who is on disability for this very reason. Truth is, many of those that society would normally call "disabled" reject the title and prove that they are very able, even when it's so hard.

Case in point: a good friend of mine, who I roomed with in college for a year, was recently diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. In her 20s. While in grad school, working as a GA.

Dang.

I'd always been pretty aware of Type 1, because one of my uncles has had it for pretty much as long as I've been alive. I literally do not remember a time when I didn't know the bare bones, kiddie explaination for diabetes. You couldn't have sweets and you had to give yourself shots. Later, when I read The Babysitters Club books, I wasn't all that moved or freaked out that one of the characters had diabetes. Maybe that was a "very special episode" for other kids, but in my family, it was just dealt with.

My cousin's daughter, who I either six or close to it, has Type 1 as well. A lot of my family has Type 2 (including my dad, who is now on insulin.)

Every single one of these people just deals with it. It is part of their lives.

It still scares me a little.

I go to the gym as often as I can. I run on one of the elliptical machines there, and I enjoy that high I get from it. I was sort of a hippie about food in high school, and I'm a little paranoid about the things I put on my face. Heck, I get a little freaked out when I think about cheese too hard.

Watching this friend go through this as a twentysomething is downright scary. (She blogs about it at The Clumsy Juggler. Have a read!) Soon after I found that out, my dad found out from a former next-door neighbor that his son, a year younger than me and either a firefighter or a paramedic, had also recently been diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes.

And these people still deal with it, and go on with their lives, making the adjustments. Yeah, it's stressful. I admire everyone I know who deals with a disease that can become life-threatening very fast.

So please don't whine to me about your minor, non-life-threatening allergies. I promise. You'll be fine.




*This isn't a blanket statement. My own fiance has nasty allergies and a deviated septum, and a lot of my good friends have them. This is more about people who love attention and crave it. I know some of those too. Owning a house? No problem. But 22 might not be the best age to take on a mortgage on a house you may not ever fully pay off. That's all I'm saying. Get an apartment.