Interesting Day

Yesterday was finally supposed to be my blog about the diabetes walk that my son's school did last month....life changed that. First, I am still in the process of trying to get a new office set up, get my computer running, etc and basically am still pretty unorganized so I never had the chance to sit down and write yesterday.  Second was the fact that my day was so strange that I had to change the topic and save the walk for a later post.

What was so special about yesterday? Well nothing to start with.  My son was his usual self, sleeping through alarms, and driving me insane. I had decided that it was time to get the diabetes walk stuff all sorted out though. I wanted the paperwork done and shipped off as well as the money in the bank so that they knew I didn't run off with the proceeds!

I sat in my new office at my cool make-shift desk and spread all of the pledge sheets and money out around me. I had to dig to find paper, fight with my printer to get things to print but soon enough I had all of the details dealt with and packaged up.  My son and I grabbed our bags full of goodies--which included a large sum of cash and coins, and headed out to use our new neighbourhood. 

The first stop was the new pharmacy to get our prescriptions moved over and filled.  After that I was going to the bank to rid us of the weight of so much coin.  Don't get me wrong, I love, love, love coin that is going to the Diabetes Hope Foundation and will gladly roll and carry it any time! I stood in line at the bank of what could become my new "home branch" and waited to deposit the money so that the cheque I had just mailed to the charity would not bounce.  The teller (or customer service person as I think they are called now) called me forward and apologized for making me wait with all of that in my arms.  I thought that was pretty nice of her and said it was no big deal (I really could use to develop some muscles anyway).

The woman began organizing the cash, coin and loose coins. I had given her a sheet with my totals.  As she looked everything over, out of the blue she asked if this was money collected from a walk? I said that yes it was.  She then asked if I knew a specific family because they do a walk each year in memory of their daughter who died eight years ago.  I said that I was new to the area and was not familiar with the name.  I assumed that the daughter had died of cancer or some other disease but was shocked when the woman continued to say that yes, the girl had Juvenile Diabetes and had a "reaction" that had caused her death.  I told her that my son also had Type 1 diabetes and the walk was in aid of the Diabetes Hope Foundation. 

She then continued to tell me that two of her relatives had Type 1.  Her great niece and great nephew (who were brother and sister) were both diagnosed.  One child was diagnosed when they were eight years old.  When the second child turned eight, well diabetes came to visit again and the family was twice blessed?

I left the bank slightly blown away.  I was saddened that yet another young person had lost their life to this horrible disease.  It left me wishing more people would understand why I worry so much about my own son and so many others.  They do not see and hear the stories of death that I do.  They think I am paranoid and over-protective.  I still search for ways to one day make them understand so that perhaps they will watch our loved ones with diabetes a little more carefully and will be that much more willing to help us work towards a cure.

My day did not end at the bank however. I still had more running around to do.  My son and I picked up some things to put on his new bedroom walls.  We worked out design strategies and hit the grocery store.  After all of that we headed back to the pharmacy that  was to have our prescriptions all ready.  As I stood in line, a young man in his twenties was in front of me.  He was picking up syringes and as his conversation progressed, they were discussing the transfer of his file which included his insulin, test strips, needles, and more.  I was surprised to run into another person with diabetes moving pharmacies at the exact same time as we were!

I know its the small things but diabetes seemed to be in every facet of my life yesterday from phone calls to simply standing in line at a store.  Amazing!