Dealing With Control in Diabetes
Life with diabetes is closely connected with the word “control”. When diagnosed with diabetes there is usually a sense of being “out of control” and talk around you from mostly well meaning people, that you need to “take control”. There can be many reasons why it is hard to get, maintain, or hold onto, control – not just of diabetes but a range of things in life.
Much of the talk about control in diabetes relates to the practical management – “eat healthy, exercise, don’t smoke, don’t drink, cut down salt, sleep well, take your medication/insulin and check your blood glucose”.
But not a lot is said about how to do these things?
- What choices do you have and what impact might these choices have?
- What about the rest of your life?
- How can you make these changes when you actually have a life?
The practical tasks of diabetes sit on the background of the emotions, thoughts, feelings, worries and anxieties you may have about diabetes and about the rest of your life.
Often the way we think about things, including diabetes, can distract us from being “present” and getting on with life – if you hold on too tightly to your thoughts and problems it is really hard to see what is happening around you.
Nobody wants diabetes, let’s face it – there are many times we experience pain and negative or unwanted thoughts and feelings about it, but being able to “hang” with your diabetes, sit it on your lap, helps you to get on with life – including the tasks required in diabetes care. This can help to maintain a sense of control.
Being a parent
If you are a parent or loved one, you will also have a role to play in the control of diabetes in yours and your child’s lives. Many thoughts and feelings will fill you up when your child is diagnosed with diabetes and these thoughts and feelings can bring pain.
Parents later have to let go of control in their children’s lives as they grow up and this can be especially tough for parents of children with diabetes who can struggle with who has control of various parts of their young person’s life and their diabetes.
If we could switch off this pain with a magic button, you would never have to feel it again, but you would also never care again about your child – what would you choose? Most people say they would choose to keep the pain, as with caring comes pain – that is part of being human.
Control and Guilt
Control is something that can have both positive and negative meanings. Sometimes things like “guilt” get wrapped up in this, for example when it seems things are not in control. People who live with problems such as eating disorders tell us that they try to gain control of their lives by controlling food, their weight, or both.
Uncomfortable thoughts, experiences, worries, feelings and so on, can take over your every waking moment and things like controlling food, exercise, use of drugs or alcohol – these are all ways human beings try to avoid these painful thoughts and feelings. This type of control is destructive to both the person and their loved ones, as well as their diabetes.
In the short term you may have some relief, but in the longer term, this increases the negative and painful thoughts and feelings and a vicious cycle is set in motion. If you constantly try NOT to think about something it tends to have the opposite effect! Learning to “accept” or hang with these things is more helpful.
There is no question that feeling a sense of control over your life gives you a sense of wellbeing and of peace in your life. People need to feel in control and we need to be able to find ways to control diabetes as far as is possible.
Guilt is often present in diabetes – guilt about getting diabetes; about passing it on to your child; about your child going away to camp, or not having sleep overs when they have diabetes, or leaving them with a sitter for the first time; about being overweight; about eating or not eating something; checking or not checking blood glucose; taking or not taking medication and insulin – and the list goes on.
Letting go of Guilt
Guilt is unhelpful and often based on unfounded facts – it is better to be gentler on yourself and see that you are first and foremost a human being and somewhere lower down on the list, you are a person with diabetes or loved one of someone with diabetes; and/or you made the best decision you could at the time, then move on.
If the decision was not one you want to repeat – learn from it – and make sure you have the knowledge and support to make a different choice next time.
This is especially true with things like food choices, insulin doses, BGL’s and exercise choices. If it is more a scary but important decision being hampered by guilt, such as learning to leave your child with someone else, make sure you have support so you can take these important steps without the guilt.
Taking control does involve making healthy choices about food, exercise, alcohol, drugs, socialising, blood glucose management, and so on – but it is also about looking after your wellbeing, your mental health, your social and family lives, the impact that diabetes has in your life and how to make this as small as you can – a feeling you can live a happy and healthy life – a sense of hope and positive energy about your future despite diabetes.
How do you feel when it comes to control of your diabetes?
I would love you to share
Helen
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How timely your post is! I tend to swing between having very tight control and then times when I totally let go and eat food that I know my care team would frown at… then I am filled with guilt about what they would say, about what potential impacts my decisions will have on my health… This is such a dangerous pattern and I have basically lost touch with a gem of an Educator because I was struggling to implement some changes she had suggested (and was too ashamed to admit it). Last night, I ate a packet of fruchocs and to hide the evidence I gave myself an insulin injection so the carbs wouldn’t be recorded on my pump. I am embarrassed to admit this.
I think that if I can do as you suggest and let go of the guilt, the swings might get better and I would certainly feel better about myself… so, as I said earlier, how timely your post is. Thanks