Let me just say for the record that I am not a doctor, dietitian, or personal trainer. I am a regular person with a regular job and I do not claim to be a medical expert. My name is Stacie and I live in the Midwest of the United States, out in the country. I just turned fifty years old and I've been married to the greatest love of my life for four years. Between the two of us, we have five grown children and seven grandchildren! We love to go camping, fishing, and I am learning to deer hunt. We have a small homestead with three dogs, some chickens, rabbits, and quail - and I love taking care of all of them!

I found out I was diabetic for my forty-third birthday, yay me! I already knew that Diabetes is serious because I lost an aunt to the disease when I was sixteen. The number of aunts and uncles and cousins on both sides of my family that are or were diabetic is too high for me to sit here and count. So why I was shocked when they said "with a fasting number over 200 you are definitely diabetic" at my first health fair, I'll never know. I was one hundred pounds heavier than in high school, did not exercise, ate whatever I wanted, and smoked a pack a day.

Briefly the Good Diabetic!

I panicked at the diagnosis and immediately stopped eating anything with a carb or a grain of sugar in it. I began walking in the evenings and as the weight started to drop I began jogging. I lost fifty-five or sixty pounds and felt wonderful. I went back to the doctor for a diabetes check-up and he was floored. He was so happy with my bloodwork and weight that we high-fived in the exam room! But that kind of diet was too severe to be sustained, and it wasn't long before the back-slide started. I began dating my (now) husband and when we went out to eat I would think "I haven't had a french fry in six months, I WANT FRENCH FRIES!"

Fast forward four years and I put all the weight back on (that only took one year) and was only putting minor effort into watching what I ate. I was only on Metformin and vitamin D for my disease and in December something went haywire and I couldn't get my sugar to come down under two hundred. It got so high that I was getting dizzy and throwing up. That's when I decided to get back on track with taking care of myself but to do things slowly and in a way that I could manage for the rest of my life. I found a doctor closer to where I'm living now and it was like starting all over. New bloodwork, she gave me a new meter with bluetooth (I love it!), and a new plan to get my sugar levels down and my health under control.

The Struggle IS real

Through all that I've realized that Diabetes is a struggle that I have to face every day. I struggle with things like junk food at home, that chocolate cake sitting in my fridge, feeling too tired to go for a walk or a bike ride, and being burnt out on veggies. I consider it a "win" when I don't eat that piece of cake or buy a candy bar, but a "loss" when I eat mashed potatoes or noodles with my supper. Most of the diabetic people I know face the same struggles, or they just ignore the disease and pop lots of pills or shoot up with insulin so they can eat what they want. I don't want to do that. I want a minimal amount of drugs in my life. I want to do what I have already done once, which is get my health and weight under control and reverse these symptoms and effects of diabetes. I started this blog so that people going through the same struggles can relate to my stories and share their wins and losses with me while I'm sharing mine.