Dear CWD FFL…….Thank You for Saving My Children’s Lives

Dear Children with Diabetes Friends for Life,

It’s been 17 years since we started together.  Wow!  Where did the time go?
I don’t know if I’ve ever said this to you before, so I’m sorry it took so long.
Thank you for saving the life of my first child, and also for saving the life of my second child upon diagnosis of this dreaded disease.

After 17 years I looked around this year’s event in Orlando last week and reflected on how fortunate I have been to be here, since day one.  To many, I guess, I’m a CWD FFL insider when in truth, I’m just a CWD Dad.  I volunteer here, and there…….. as so many others do.  None of us are your favorites but what we are is YOUR ARMY of volunteers because in the beginning people were there for us — we must now be there for others. If you are now involved, you should get involved to pass it on also.

You’re not a huge organization with a huge infrastructure……no…..you are a group of people, friends for life in fact, who believe in just plain ‘ol helping. Helping because a two-year old has been diagnose and there is nowhere to turn.  Helping because we are up at 2 am and we don’t have to explain it to you.  After years of turmoil and doubt, coming here we did something we had not done in a long time, we laughed.  That happens when people are comfortable with each other, they laugh.   That happens here.

There were so many sponsors present……but not all….not enough.   It bothered me that Medtronic was not there this year.  Not sure why, its none of my business really, I’m just a volunteer.  But when my daughter went on their pump in 1999, I guess families mattered back then.  I guess they don’t anymore.  I’m sure it bothered you also, and I’m so sorry that it’s such a struggle for you all who plan and coordinate this incredible event all year-long.

You should not have to struggle to get companies involved.  People in our world are VERY LOYAL.  Friends for Life also means clients, patients, and customers ‘for life’….and they should think about that a little bit.  You should not have to seek out companies, they should seek you out to learn how to participate.

When my daughter was a very young age, we learned that education was the equalizer to battling this disease.  We learned to do all we could to ‘own it’ so it would not own us. We were taught.  We listened.  And in-between all of the sessions of knowledge and the updates of research; we laughed.  We talked.  We grew to love people who needed no explanation when we had to do ‘something diabetes’…….they knew.

And after 17 years, I have watched so many children thrive in the world around them. Mine included……because of you.  Us parents learned a thing or two also.

We have been taught and taught well.  No easy feat.  In fact, an impossible feat if one dare to sit down and actually figure out how it all comes together.  But it does.  There is only one explanation that can probably explain it.  Sponsors who care, volunteers who care, families who care and all who dare to dream of learning together….because good friends do that, but those who do it to save the life of a friend’s child are more than just good friends………we are friends for life.
Thanks again.

I am a diabetes dad.
Please visit my Diabetes Dad FB Page and hit ‘like’.