Hello friends!

Welcome to the first installment of Diabetes Blog Week 2011! I know I don’t usually talk about diabetes or how having type 1 affects my daily life. But that’s exactly why I jumped at the chance to participate in Diabetes Blog Week last year, and again this year. It really is a big part of my life, and, although I would like to ignore it, I can’t. So, please bear with me for one week as I take some time to give you a little perspective. :)

Today’s topic is “Admiring our Differences.” Here’s the description from Karen:

Admiring our differences – Monday 5/9: We are all diabetes bloggers, but we come from many different perspectives.  Last year, Diabetes Blog Week opened my eyes to all of the different kinds of blogs (and bloggers) out there – Type 1s, Type 2s, LADAs, parents of kids with diabetes, spouses of adults with diabetes and so on.  Today let’s talk about how great it is to learn from the perspectives of those unlike us!  Have you learned new things from your T2 friends?  Are D-Parents your heroes?  Do LADA blogs give you insight to another diagnosis story?  Do T1s who’ve lived well with diabetes since childhood give you hope?  Pick a type of blogger who is different from you and tell us why they inspire you – why you admire them – why it’s great that we are all the same but different!!

The truth is I am a bit of a d-blog stalker and read up on a lot of different diabetes blogs. But I LOVE reading the blogs of parents of diabetics. I get to learn all about diabetes from someone who doesn’t personally have the disease, but who is near and dear to someone who does.

It also helps me have a better understanding of what my parents went through when they were caring for me as a child with diabetes. I was diagnosed when I was 4 and don’t have many pre-diabetes memories (or ones that are distinguished by the fact that I wasn’t a diabetic yet). It wasn’t until I read Hallie‘s post, “The Scariest Night of My Life,” a week ago that I even started comprehending how my parents must’ve felt the numerous nights that my bloodsugar dropped. Or the one night when I was rushed to the ER after spending the day at Disneyland. I had been to the ER before, but, I wish diabetes didn’t follow us to Anaheim that year! My mom even developed a ranking system for ERs across the US. I think the Disneyland ER was pretty high up there, but Atlanta’s was WAY down on the bottom. (Stay away, y’all! :))

Additionally, reading the blogs of d-parents gives me lots of fun ideas that I wish I had thought of years ago! For example, Lorraine and Caleb created the cutest Christmas ornaments out of empty insulin bottles last December! (I’m saving all my bottles this year!)

So, thank you, d-moms and d-dads of the D-OC, for opening my eyes to the world of parenting a child with diabetes!

Stay tuned for Day 2 tomorrow!

xoxo,

Lauren