Before and After

I think in the rest of the family's sees Sweet's one years diabetes mark would be June 2nd because that's the day she was diagnosed.  It goes back earlier for me though, because it was in March that I started to notice a difference.  I cannot blame myself for not knowing something was wrong at that time.  It was a very slow progression and as everyone knows, small changes over a long period of time go unnoticed.  She was just extremely thin.  I can, now, compare pictures of her and see how sick she looked.

I had to go and delete all the pictures of her from March to June of 2014 because they make me soooo extremely sad.  My baby was very sick and we didn't know, but the pictures tell a different story.

This picture of her with the flower in her hair was the only one I allowed myself to keep and I can barely look at it without breaking down.  I remember this day so well.  It was nothing special, just a first spring walk along the canyon rim. 

So as I reflect upon the last few weeks of March, my heart is filled with feelings I cannot explain.  I won't try because, quite frankly, unless your a T1D parent yourself, there is no way to understand no matter how willing or how hard you try.

                                April 2014                                                             March 2015

These girls are two very different girls.  Sweets would say, the one before diabetes and the one after diagnosis.  She has changed and she knows she's not the same girl.  Anyone would say in shock "of course she is.  Just because she has diabetes doesn't make her different. How can you say that"?

Well, in retrospect, her personality hasn't changed.  Sweet's hopes and dreams, likes and dislikes, sassy attitude and all are all the same as before,  but she is physically changed and her life is changed.  A part of her (her pancreas) has died and that has changed her forever.

Sweets is a special girl full of extreme energy, drama, emotion, and fortitude.  There is nothing halfway about this kid and anyone who has lived around someone who is that dramatic about anything and every detail in life, knows that it can be an exciting roller coaster ride full of ups and downs. 

I can't go so far as to say that she has embraced her disease, but I am surly surprised at how well she has taken it and at how much she has learned over the past 10 months.  There is nothing, and I mean nothing, that she hasn't done, that she's wanted to, because of diabetes.   She has not self -pitied or cried or complained about life.  She is not depressed or sad.  She wishes she didn't have it, but who wouldn't.  She understands that she needs to keep herself healthy and will make good choices in what she does and doesn't eat to keep her levels steady.
I wish I could write post after post of awesome things that we've learned, or people that we've come to know, or how diabetes has impacted our lives for the good, but actually.............(and I am not trying to be negative) there really isn't.
All I can write about is our experiences and what is going on.
So here it is.......March......a year from when I first noticed something different about Sweets......and it's been a rough week emotionally.
I am just so thankful that she survived.....that our family is still in tact after this crazy year......and that she's happy.