June 19, 2005

????? wrote: > If you don't mind me asking what caused you ESRD?

?????,

Here's the long version. Some of it my mother has told me. Much of it I've lived. ;)

Apparently, I didn't begin walking until I was three years old. My parents took me to every doctor imaginable (so, I am told) to figure out why I wasn't walking. Finally, one of the doctors told them "You're doing everything for her. She's lazy. She doesn't have to walk and she won't till you leave her alone and make her have to start walking to get what she wants." So, they did just that. Left me alone. (for 37+ years) Eventually, I began walking. I tell you this part so you might possibly understand my parent's thinking later.

When I was a youngster, somewhere between 1st and 3rd grade, we had one of those fall carnivals that elementary schools in the country have. I remember going to have my blood sugar checked by a nurse in one of the booths manned by people from the local hospital. At that time, my blood sugar was over 500. The nurse there told my parents to take me to the doctor, immediately. Dad brushed it off as me just having eaten cotton candy. He had no idea how blood sugars worked and that a normal person's blood sugar should never be over 120, 2 hours after they eat.

Years (make that decades) go by....Girl Scout camp physicals, softball team physicals come and go. Dad fills them (the physical forms) all out and turns them in. I go my entire childhood without doctors check-ups. There were times that I didn't feel 100%, but that really didn't matter. The attitude from my parents was "Suck it up and get over it. You're fat and that's why you're having any and all problems in your life."

Once I got into college and began raiding the vending machines for chocolate en masse (like the other students-to be able to pull all-nighters) and was falling asleep instead of getting sugar highs, I got "enlightened" to the whole diabetes scene.

And that, my friends, is the REST of the story!!