 
This article was written by Debi Orton (below, left), my aunt, about what she's gone through in caring for my grandmother (below, right).
"What was your sugar this morning?" Mom asks. It's a ritual that we observe every time we speak. She asks me what my morning blood glucose reading was, then I ask her what hers was. Although I was only diagnosed in 1990, diabetes is something I've lived with for over a quarter of a century now. Mom was first diagnosed with Type II diabetes (also known as Adult Onset diabetes) in the summer of 1974, and her first reaction was denial. From my vantage point, it seemed that she refused to acknowledge the disease and its ramifications, refused to take the medications that the doctor had prescribed to control her blood sugars. I can remember Dad nagging her about the pills through that fall and winter, and can remember Mom virtually slamming the door on any such conversation every time the subject came up. Mom's entry into menopause was not graceful and included almost manic hormonal mood swings. Dad was being scheduled for surgery to repair a long-standing problem that had all but debilitated him. My brother was about to be married, and I had just moved home after being on my own for several years. In retrospect, it was probably easy for Mom to overlook a small bottle of pills sitting on the ledge behind the kitchen sink. So much turmoil! A quick succession of upheavals overshadowed all of our lives for many months. Dad died suddenly in April after what appeared to have been successful surgery, and was buried on the day my brother was to have been married. My brother's wedding took place in May, and by November, they were expecting their first child. Dad hadn't left a will, or had insurance, or any of the other things that would have made dealing with his death easier on us. Mom was barely functional, and fell in October, breaking her hip. Her recovery was made more difficult by the fact that her diabetes slowed the healing process. I stayed on with her to help. I knew a bit about diabetes. Both of my grandmothers suffered from it, and one of my great-uncles had it as well. But I didn't know enough to recognize the serious trouble Mom was having in early 1980. She was feverish, disoriented, and lost bladder control. I became frightened when I discovered that her urine had become sticky. I theorized that it was caused by the ginger ale she'd subsisted on for days, I went out to buy diet soda for her to sip. When Mom became incoherent, I called an ambulance. My family and I spent the next month in the intensive care waiting room at Saratoga Hospital while my mother, in a diabetic coma, flirted with death. Different doctors informed us three separate times that she wouldn't see another day, but she was defiant. Mom overcame a diabetic coma, kidney failure and heart attack, and emerged from the hospital six months later without any memory of her ordeal. One doctor called it "traumatic amnesia." Part of me was pleased that she didn't remember all that she'd gone through. Another part of me was angry and resentful that she didn't recall what she'd brought upon herself by ignoring her doctor's advice. Her lifestyle changed in response to her new status as an insulin-dependent diabetic. Mom had to test her urine and give herself shots at least once per day. That was when the reality of diabetes -- the awful day-in and day-out of living with a chronic disease — began to sink in. Since that time, I have lost both grandmothers and an aunt to complications of diabetes. Before she died, I watched my maternal Grandmother Sesselman go blind. I have watched Mom lose her eyesight, have watched her kidneys fail, watched her bones break after being weakened by years on dialysis, and sat at her bedside as she waited to go into surgery for her kidney transplant two years ago. Every week I prepare her medications, pay her bills, read her mail to her, and help her pay for her aide. I find adaptive devices to help her cope with being blind, help her maintain as much independence as she safely can. My own diabetes has progressed to the point where I'm on medication for it. I visit the ophthalmologist every six months now instead of every year, and she tells me I'm glaucoma suspect. My doctor tells me I have reduced kidney function and hypertension, in addition to my diabetes — and probably caused by it. Thankfully, my only brother is free of any sign of diabetes, as are his two sons. My older nephew Mark, a staff sergeant in the Air Force, is collecting pledges for a "Hike for Hope" to be held in June of this year — just before his first son is scheduled to be born. Mark and his friend Jeremy are going to hike the Appalachian Trail through Virginia's Shenandoah National Park, a total of 110 miles in nine days. The money he raises will be donated to the Diabetes Action Foundation for Research and Education. When he asked me for help in setting up a web site for the Hike, I immediately said yes, and gave him space on my own web site at www.consideration.org. I'm dismayed to hear that children as young as eleven are being diagnosed with the "Adult Onset" variety of diabetes, in large part due to the evolution of the American diet toward sugars and fats. I have spent a part of every day working on that web site, trying to find ways of convincing people to help in getting the word out about how insidious — and in many instances, how preventable — diabetes is. Please take the time to find out as much as you can about this awful disease, and what you can do to prevent it. 
 |
