My Mother's Perspective

 I am quite sure that every parent that has a child with diabetes can remember the day they were diagnosed. I can picture it vividly down to the pajama's Jeffrey had on in the car on the way down to San Diego to meet with the endocrinologist.  That was 22 years ago and it feels like yesterday. We didn't even know what a endon???? did, let alone know much about diabetes. Other people had that, not my beautiful healthy son that was happiest on a basketball court or a football field. I have wanted to write on Jeffrey's blog for over three weeks now. All of the memories, good and bad, have been swirling around in my head and I just couldn't put any words down on paper until now.

I could say that diabetes really didn't affect our lives that much, but that would be a lie. The lives of everyone in our family was changed that day. Since my husband and I are the parents of three very athletic boys we gathered together as a team. It certainly made us stronger. If Jeffrey was "low" the youngest or the older brother would run to get his machine. We tried to convince his brothers that diabetes was not going to change his life. We were a team and we would all be there for each other. Someone was almost always at football practice just in case, but it was never obvious. We truly just loved watching him. The need for food was a constant reminder, but one that we just got used to. When Jeffrey decided to go surfing the cooler was always with us. People would look at us and think we were crazy to let our son be so active. We were not going to stop him and the Dr. was in agreement. His sports no matter what he was doing was his way of fighting this disease. Was it hard? yes, but so well worth it.

When I saw the name for this blog,"Breaking Diabetes" I smiled to myself and knew exactly what Jeffrey meant. He broke the code 22 years ago and we were going to allow him to full fill every dream that he had. One time when he was 13,  he broke his little finger badly and insisted he could still play with a splint. During the game he looked up at his Dad and motioned at the taped up splint and his Dad gave him the thumbs up. Jeffrey unwrapped his finger on the field and made a touchdown. It was a huge moment in his life at 12 and we were not going to take that away from him. That little finger is fine by the way.

This is no way meant to be a tribute to his atheletism but an example of how anyone can break diabetes especially through exercise. Jeffrey has always been there to help anyone who has diabetes and if he can help only one person understand how to deal with this disease then his has accomplished quite a goal.

 Love you buddy,

 Mom