#28 - Celebrating Two milestones

At the risk of serving you, my reader, too much of a rollercoaster of ups and downs, today I’d like to tell you of my two most recent milestones. Over the past few weeks, my posts were a bit all over the place. As were my feelings, and the things that happened. The battle to get a grip on my health isn’t a straight line. It has rewarding ups, but in equal amounts, It serves you with some serious bummers from time to time. That has been reflected in my writings here. But today, it’s time to celebrate. To reminisce about the road traveled. Literally at one hand. Yesterday, I rounded the cape of 2.000 km on the trike. I did that during a beautiful trip along a small local river. The path had been on my list to ride for quite some time, and I kept it to make it a celebration ride. Crossing the 2 K seemed more than appropriate for that.

And then today, I reached another milestone. A much bigger one I believe. Before I tell you about that one, I may need to explain a little. The blood sugar values are measured in two main ways. There’s the daily checks I do. A single drop of blood on a testing strip, gives me the current value. They have been going down for months now. But the main value that’s even more important, is called Hba1c. It’s done at the doctors office, every three months. It gives a value that indicates the levels of blood sugar over the past three months. In Januari, based on an Hba1c of 11, my doctor wanted me to seek guidance by specialists. He didn’t believe it was possible to make a real change, a change I needed so much, all by myself. At that point in time, the situation I was in, was not good at all. Higher risk for cardiac problems. Higher risk for my whole body because of the severe overweight. Higher risk on a ton more things a person really doesn’t want in his life…

Today, I’m proud to say, my Hba1c stands at 6,5. That’s the point where many consider the diabetes to be reversed. Not cured. You don’t cure from diabetes. Once diagnosed, you are a diabetic for life. And that’s fine by me. It doesn’t define me. It’s a word that indicates I have to be careful with some things. It’s the reason I turned my life around. And if the past half year has told me anything, let It be that diabetes is something I have control over. Now of course this is just a statement I make for me and my diabetes. Every person is different. So many people will have less or more control over the illness. But I believe that by far, most people have control over their diabetes. Maybe not enough to reverse it. Maybe not even enough to get it to a point where it doesn’t severely harm them. But a little better is still better. By changing my diet in a way that I still enjoy eating very much. By starting to work on my physical condition, I did exactly that. It’s been hard some times. Very hard even. There were times on the trike, I really didn’t want to ride anymore. But I had to get home of course. So I started peddling again. And once I got home, and I’d taken some rest, I found pleasure in the memory of that ride. Often, the pictures I took along the way helped me with that. Weird how our brain seems to filter out the negatives, focussing on the positives. It’s a tool that comes in very handy when things seem bleek from time to time.

So yes, today is a day to celebrate the road travelled. To take a step back, and scroll through the warmest memories I have from the past 6 months. To really enjoy the feeling of accomplishment. To allow myself to indulge in some sweet treats without being worried about my diabetes. Because that’s what I plan to do from now on. Allow myself a treat from time to time. Still working out, and still eating the healthy food daily.