Thankful Thursday: The D.O.C.

My Thankful Thursday topic today is the D.O.C. , the Diabetes Online Community.

I only started blogging back in March of this year. In the beginning of the year we were moving towards me getting on the pump which was a huge change. February is when I got it, and it was like being diagnosed all over again. It was like my eyes were all of the sudden opened after having T1 for 4 ½ years, it all of the sudden became more real. Firing my old endo after having a consolation with my perinatologist and then meeting with my now CDE, it was as if, or maybe even worse than when I was first diagnosed. I think in one way it was because it was then that I was realizing that I hadn't been doing all that I thought I was for my health and diabetes for those 4 ½ years like I thought I was. I felt like a failure, it hit me that this is forever and not going away. With all of this, I felt like I was being pulled into a dark hole and didn't know how to stop or if I would be able to get out. I don’t want to say that I was depressed, but I was getting pretty close to it. I remember it was March 16^th and we stopped by the grocery store after going downtown for the St. Patrick’s Day race. I was in the checkout line and Brad had gone to grab one last thing while I waited in line. When he came back he had a magazine in hand, Diabetic Living, and asked if I wanted it, it has some yummy looking recipe on the front so I flipped through it and said sure. It was in this magazine that I found an article on Kim @ www.textingmypancrease.com. The magazine had a section where they had talked to people who were making an impact in the lives of PWD (People with diabetes). She was talking about her story, and about the DOC. So I found her site and immediately became obsessed! As I read through her blogs it was the first time in those 4 ½ years that I finally felt like I wasn't completely alone in this. My heart felt like it was about to break out of my chest as the tears of loneliness ran down my cheeks. I felt validated for the first time for all my thoughts, feelings and emotions about this disease. I realized I wasn't weak, I wasn't dumb, I wasn't taking things too seriously, I wasn't a failure and again, most importantly I wasn't alone, I wasn't the only one. As I read her blogs somewhere along the way I found others, Kerri @ www.sixuntilme.com, Reva @ www.typeonderful.blogspot.com, Laura @ http://a1conceive.wordpress.com/ and so many others. I started blogging myself, I think before I even found any of the other blogs. Kim’s was the only one at the time and the one that inspired me. When I started blogging I thought of it as way to let things out, a way to vent without always letting it out on my husband or just holding it in. It was also a way to educate family and friends around me. Since it had been years, I think people around me just didn't think anything of it, especially since I never really talked that much about the “D”, at least not like I do now. So I created this blog partially to educate others around me because it’s hard to bring up my lovely friend “D” to my other friends most of the time, but I want, no….. I NEED others around me to understand this. So with these reasons, those are why I started this blog, never expecting to really get connected with other T1’s or even really find anyone else out there other than Kim’s blog. That’s where I was in for an unexpected, much needed surprise. I found the D.O.C. and it has been my saving grace! I may never come into physical contact with any of these people, I may not ever have my own huge following, it may just be a couple of other T1’s that I connect with, but that’s okay. I read so many on my own and sometimes this is enough to encourage and inspire me. I never joined a support group because I was afraid that it would be something like what I've seen on TV or movies where everyone sits around crying all the time. Yes, I cry, but I don’t want to be brought down, I need to be lifted up and that’s what happens when I read others stories. They may all be different and unique but at the same time we are all the same. So that’s what I’m thankful for today, I’m thankful for a place where I know I’m understood and not alone.