Tag: hope

Do You Know Mr. Make-Sure? Don’t You Wish You Didn’t?

Posted on | by tomkarlya | 8 Comments on Do You Know Mr. Make-Sure? Don’t You Wish You Didn’t?

Making sureI want it back the way it was.

We dug out for 7 hours yesterday.  The official results is that our little town in Medford, Long Island was hit the hardest with 33 inches.  I measured 31 inches but who am I to squabble at two inches.

Just as we were finishing, some friends of Rob came by and they all went sleigh riding.  On a snowy day that is what kids do, right?  And what do you think we’re thinking about?

Just about every parent in the aftermath of a snow storm went to play in the snow and I cannot get my thought process off the point: “Make sure you check your blood.”  After shoveling for hours, now out in the fun and each parent who lives with this disease knows EXACTLY what I am talking about.

During the ‘digging’ Jill and I took turns.  We did not discuss it, it was just parent-nature kicking in.  We took turns looking, observing, and occasionally asking, “How are you feeling?”  Always ‘making-sure’.

I hate diabetes.  I do.

Every little thing we do always has one eye on making sure.  That ‘making sure’ list is a mile long.  We cannot even shovel snow without worrying about what it does, did, or can do. 

We all moved on through the day.  We got through it.  We?  Well our kids got through it.  We just observed.  We just watched.  We just hoped.

It seems like forever-ago we played in the snow with no concerns but staying warm.  No more.  “Making-sure” is in our lives now.  Moved in and took residence.  Every parent has some degree of ‘making sure’; those of who have kids with diabetes ‘making sure’ is like good morning.  Oh yeah, and to many parents that first ‘making sure’ when we walk into the bedroom to wake our kids up is the scariest 30 seconds of our lives……every day.

Just ‘making sure’.

I am a diabetes dad.

Please visit my Diabetes Dad FB Page and hit ‘like’.

T.G.I.F. (Thanking Great Individuals Forever)

Posted on | by tomkarlya | 2 Comments on T.G.I.F. (Thanking Great Individuals Forever)


His efforts are tireless and his reputation well-known not only to his worldwide colleagues but many PWDs and to parents who wait for a cure.  He works in the lab, lectures worldwide and yet, still finds the time to speak to those with a full heart investment interest in finding a cure for diabetes.

 Here he lectures and states on a two-year project to , “……learn how to transform an academic institution into a CURE FOCUSED Machine……”

Because it is that important to him that a cure for diabetes be found.

He has been published in over 600 scientific publications and issued 11 patents, and yet one is struck at seeing their child’s picture on the wall in his office to continually remind him of why he is at this mission day in and day out.

His official title is the Stacy Joy Goodman Professor of Surgery, Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Microbiology and Immunology, and serves as Scientific Director and Chief Academic Officer of the University of Miami Diabetes Research Institute.  What is interesting about that title is it bears the name of a child who lost her battle with diabetes, Stacy Joy Goodman; again an ever reminder of the laser focus he needs to stay.

(Stacy and I spoke, and were together, as she bounced out of my office with the exuberance of a teenager with a lifetime ahead of her; just two days later she would be gone forever)…..her name in this man’s title is as powerful as his scientific findings and says mountains about how important he takes his challenge.

His lives by his own words; “We will cure diabetes, this is not a prediction, it is a promise.”

He is my friend, my colleague, and he (along with his incredible and entire team) represents the hope for my 2 children and why I come to work EVERY DAY for this place. 

He is Dr. Camillo Ricordi and he is Diabetesdad’s T.G.I.F.  Take a bow Dr. Ricordi.