Hey all,

My name is Christine.

I am a diabetic.

For years I hung onto the 'I am a hypoglycemic', or 'I am a low blood sugar person'.

This was the gateway drug to doing nothing about this life-threatening disease developing.

Last year, I weighed in at 250 lbs, at 5'5".

This is not the heaviest I have been.

At my heaviest, I weighed 275.

As my father died from a series of quick heart attacks, at age fourty two; complications from Diabetes left untreated, when I was almost 21,

you would think this would have scared me straight, but it did the opposite.

I somehow identified with the futility and lack of self-esteem, that would have funded my self-care, instead of the strength I feel today.

Don't get me wrong.  I am well aware of how imperfect I can be.

The difference is, my self-esteem allows me to see the perfection in my imperfection so that my flaws become opportunities.

Not opportunities for the fat police, or every trainer that jogs by, but for the chance to experience who I am in relation to who I could be.

At 275 lbs., I knew, low self-esteem or not, that after self-medicating, in the truest sense of the term,        i.e. : masking the symptoms, thus NEVER dealing with the issues, ice cream became an everyday companion, and pizza wasn't that far off.  I ate lots of bread, drank the deadly poison that soda pop is, and had pastries, all be them expensive, gourmet pastries, as many times a week as I could get to my favorite French bakery.  

This could not go on.  

I ate like it was 1999.

Having cooked professionally for 15 years, there really was no limit to the fun, food vacations, and fat creating forays that I could come up with.

I remember eating late at night so that I could go into a convenient food coma right after.

Well.

Then, one day, after fulfilling a dream of getting into Seattle University, I decided I didn't want to die before I graduated.

I used the great pool they had, every day, swimming laps until I reached a mile at each visit.  I weight trained three days a week, and did other cardio the other three days.  I took Sundays off.

Within a year and a half, I lost 85 pounds.

At one point, my sister, when I travelled to visit her, did not recognize me when I stepped into the waiting area at her work.

I went to Europe.  I got chased by some hot girls.  I felt like : WHOA.

Yet, the WHOA was also WOE.  I kept worrying about when I was going to wake up and all of this was going to vanish.

I couldn't figure out, why, even though I was wearing some great clothes, and doing things I could not do before, I was not happy.

I would OBSESS over workouts, and, even worse over missed workouts. 

At night, there was fear, real fear in the evaporation of this new body I had.

Then.  As if answering my un-prayers, it happened.

I actually remember the day that I felt a sort of *click*, and then seemingly nothing.  A moment later, I was absolutely averse to going to the gym or the pool.  I was averse to a parking spot far away from the door.  I found my 'free day' that I used to indulge in foods I loved, becoming EVERY day.  I didn't have to buy new clothes, because, with my self-fulfilled premonition, I still had my fatter clothes.

To make matters worse, I had a friend who was an alcoholic, and quite abusive at times, who was so judgmental that I could not bear to be around her.  What I discovered later, upon reflection, was that it was easier for me to be around her when I was fat than when I was thinner, as she was harsher when I was more fit than she.

Chasing girls disappeared, my cool clothes disappeared, my heart sank, and my blood sugars skyrocketed.

I thought constantly about the friends I no longer had, and tortured myself with the moments of breakups I had experienced.

I felt that I had lost so much, and none of it was the weight any longer.

This began the darkest time of my life.

I developed neuropathy, night sweats, isolationary living, and terrible dizziness.  Yeast infections, and indigestion.  

But most of all, I started to lose my will to live.

Indeed, there were times when I thought that that potentially self-fulfilling premonition would come to pass.

Finally, the pain of not dying, but of living with symptoms ranging from extremely annoying to very painful, became too much.  I actually started having anxiety attacks over them.

In January of this year I finally went to a doctor.

My A1c was at 13, and my waking glucose was 380.

No.  You did not read that wrong.  I know, I know, there are some people out there who might say, 'Oh, yeah?  I had...' but I don't care.  This is not a competition of who can make their lives the worst living hell before they die.

Suffice it to say, the doctor had something to say to me.

I completely flipped out.

I mean, I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't do drugs, I don't gamble.

Now I have to give up Eclairs?!

I was flat out honest with the doctor.  Angry tears were practically ejecting from my eyes as I said, 'I really don't think I can do this', when she started to suggest what we could do to reverse this diabetes.

Thank God for her.

She was not mean, but she was firm.  'Yes.  Yes, you can.  We will do this together'.

Before anyone gets all accusatory about possible co-dependence, I would like to take this opportunity to say that I NEVER accepted anyone's help with my health before.

I am the oldest in my family, I ran kitchens for a living, I've had my own business for over twenty years, and I have not had a lot of investment on the co-operative way with ANYONE.

Since January, I have learned about INTERDEPENDENCE, and the impossibility of my dealing with this alone.

This is how I have brought my waking glucose down from the original 380, to 164.

This is how a celebratory moment, when I go in in a couple of weeks to get my A1c tested, will be possible.

This is how I have lost a good amount of fat, and gained a good amount of muscle.

This is how I can see how this is possible...for the rest of my LONG life.

In fact, this is how I have traded in my death for my life.

This is how I could even THINK of writing into a support group.

This moment in superior interdependence has been brought to you by : My doctor, my partner, my mother and my family, my friends, my self-esteem, and God.

There is no substitute for life...except for maybe really living.