Fighting Among Ourselves……How’s that Working Out?

Diabetes Community.
This all-encompassing phrase seems to be under siege of late.  Seems there is a movement that it is more important to be right, be the first, than it is to be a community in some people’s minds.

Let’s be clear.  As I have stated in writings, in lectures, and in interviews; no one has made more mistakes at this thing called diabetes than I.  But I try very hard to listen. to learn, not to make the same mistakes twice, and to apologize when needed.

Let’s be clearer: Whatever you feel is the correct way for you to treat your (and/or your child’s) diabetes, is up to you.  You can think it is 1000% sound for how you act day-to-day but here is the thing, it is not how I NEED to act.  You can come at me with 1000% all the stats and medically sound data you want…….but my question is, why do you feel the need to do that?

If you want to enlighten me, thank you, I will listen,  I will do my homework.  But we will make the decisions on what we want to do, and will do.  At the end of the day, it is our decision.  Right or wrong, it’s our decision.

What is with this ridicule and arguments how wrong people are because they disagree with a point of view?   Why?

I’m not a fan of many things that I see in our diabetes community.  But I also cannot learn if I think I know everything, I do not……..CLEARLY I do not.  I also see a huge amount of power out there.  And much has been going on for a long, long time.  People who have come and gone and were the first voices in many legislative actions and movements spoke out because it needed to be done…..and for no other reason.
This community is unstoppable but do not let a few tear down what has been going on for much longer than many have been around; the late GREAT Kitty Castellini comes to mind, as one of many.

Congratulations, the things you are fighting about as far as how this disease needs to be treated, the way you feel, is correct.  Congratulations, you were/are the first ones and best and shining a light on what needs to be a battle in congress and the public consciousness.
Congratulations.

Can we now get back to work?

The things we need to do, fight for, become, be, teach, learn, discuss, and move to the forefront of those who do not know is large and there is much work to be done.  Spending one second breaking this community down is useless and a waste of time and the second you find yourself ‘going after someone’ stop and ask yourself if your energy would be spent educating others who have no idea what our lives were like, as a better use of your time.  If what you believe and state is credible, it will be taken to the next level.  If it is not, it will ‘die on the vine’.

You know the saying, a house divided among itself cannot stand; it’s true.  Let’s get back to work, together.  Going after each other, wow, why?
I’m a DiabetesDad
Please visit my Diabetes Dad FB Page and hit ‘like’.

We Lose a POWERHOUSE; and I’m Sad, So Deeply Sad. RIP Kitty.

Kitty 1I always LOVED this picture of Kitty.  The microphone was always as symbolic as it was practical describing Kitty because if there was a person with a TRUE voice in the diabetes community; it was Kitty Castellini.  Thousands of hours of broadcasts and tireless efforts in advocating for you, for me, for us in the diabetes community.

You can look around out there and read much of who Kitty was, the transplants she underwent, the pain she lived through……but there is much more about what Kitty did for others out there than what she went through herself.  She shared her own story only in the context to show that she could and would live this life to the fullest, and so could anyone faced with this disease.

She would be the first to tell you that she was a proud Union Member.  As many know, the Diabetes Research Institute has a great friend in the members of organized labor (North Americas Building Trade Unions) who organize the Dollars Against Diabetes (DADs) Day around each Father’s Day.  Kitty would remind me often how she was involved in helping this cause years ago, and how proud she was to have participated.  Her leaving us on Father’s Day, I’m sure, was Kitty doing it ‘her way’, so we are reminded for years to come.

She would call with an idea, an undertaking, or a possibility worth exploring.  There was ways to get the word out there….and there was also Kitty’s way.  Direct. Tireless. And with a warm smile.  Kitty’s way was as unique as it was wonderful.

Blue candle tearKitty left us yesterday, her husband notified the world on Kitty’s FB page, after a long, long battle; but with the people she influenced, myself included, her voice will be heard for a long, long, time.  Rest my dear Kitty.  I think I speak on behalf of the entire diabetes community when I say…..thank you, we are surely a better diabetes community because you walked among us.

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