Relationships

Parents come and go. Children come and go. Partners can come and go as well. The only person who will ALWAYS be with you is yourself. If you're lucky a special friend or two. But for the most part, the people who surround you are like the seasons -- they stay for a while, and then they're gone, for whatever reason -- it isn't usually because they dislike you, but because life sends us on our separate journeys.

I'm visualizing a rock in a stream. The water molecules each pass the rock, and caress it, but then they leave. There are always water molecules, but they are never the same. Some are nearer and some are farther, some pass by quickly, and some eddy around the rock for a time. But at some point, they always leave.

So loving ourselves is what we have to do first, even though it may be harder for us than for people who haven't had our struggles. Once we love ourselves fully, then we can truly commit to loving other people, and give them the love they deserve for the time they spend in our lives. Always aware that nothing is eternal, and always aware that we can love powerfully in THIS moment, and then forever, even if we never meet again. 

Progress Report

 1. I do binge sometimes, and then not take any insulin until my BG is godawfully high. And then I spend the night chasing it down. It comes down a bit, and then starts right back up again, because when my stomach is full, it empties only slowly. So I take some insulin, and 3 hours later, take some more, and that lasts up to 12 hours. Not fun.

2. Left-over behaviors are binge, guilt, and compensatory starving. Also limiting insulin -- I've been very good about not omitting completely, but I tend not to take enough, and I also tend to take it late, which means after my BG has gone up and my CGM is yelling at me that I'm high.

3. The only thing that helps if I'm edging toward a binge is to eat real food until I'm definitely full. I can't tell you how hard it is, because I don't really like real food, and it's a struggle to FORCE myself to eat it when what I really want is sweets. I LEARNED this while I was in full-time treatment, and I'm still seeing the world's greatest dietitian, and she reinforces what I really DO know, but want to ignore. I didn't shop for a team, because I wouldn't be able to travel, anyway, but a lot of girls travel to the Center for Hope here in Reno, because they do have specific resources for women with T1 diabetes.

4. I'm LOUSY at regimentation! The only things that are consistent with me are meds as soon as I wake up, and before I go to bed. Since I have a pump, long-acting insulin is not an issue, and my real need is to be disciplined about bolusing whenever I eat. ANYTHING. I have a bad habit of not bolusing for snacks, and like I said before, I don't usually bolus when I'm starting a binge. While I'm TRYING not to binge, I'm not always successful. I also need to bolus for protein, and not very successful at that, either.



5. I'm trying very hard NOT to weigh myself. My mantra for what may be the rest of my life is it's not weight, it's HEALTH! I need to do what's healthy for me, and not fuss about my weight. I haven't weighed myself for a month or two now, and I really don't know whether I've gained or not, but my clothes still fit, so that's doing well in my book!

And I DO have successes, in that I'm NOT omitting insulin entirely, ever, even if I'm late sometimes, and I'm working on portion control, and better carb counting. I'm working on learning to use the square wave on my pump, with varying degrees of success. And I'm making the effort to force myself to eat vegetables, sometimes, even though I really hate them. I still feel guilty about eating "normal" portions of real food, especially carbs, but I'm working on it. And I'm working on being able to eat "normal" portions of sweets, instead of gargantuan ones.

So I feel pretty good about what I'm doing, food wise, even though it's not perfection.