With two small children, a full time job and living on a cattle station in outback Australia, my life was plenty busy enough to make me tired. But it got to the stage where I was exhausted all the time, and I just couldn't get well. No matter how many times I went to the doctor to tell him 'There must be SOMETHING wrong with me!" - he couldn't work it out. Eventually a urine test revealed high sugar levels, so the testing began. Being in such an isolated town (700km to the nearest Diabetes Educator or Endocrinologist) it took quite a while to get me sorted out, but eventually there I was, at 27 years old, a Type 1 Diabetic. Now I really knew the meaning of being isolated!
Since then I have had two more children, and come to know the challenges of health care in a rural and remote setting. It is not as simple as just making an appointment - sometimes it means waiting months until the specialist I am after comes to visit my town. Support from my family has been so important, as has support from a great close knit community.
There have been some scary times - while pregnant with my fourth child, I had a hypo while driving and had to be saved by my then 8 year old daughter - my girls have certainly learned how to deal with having diabetic in the family!
And there have been some frustrating times, when needles and finger prick tests, and the need to always be AWARE, just get you down.
But I have never stopped living my life the way I want to live it - I don't live with diabetes - diabetes has to live with me! There is nothing about being diabetic that means you can't have the fullest and most memorable life you want to have.
I have decided having a disease like diabetes doesn't have to define me!
I dream of a day there is a cure, but until then, just keep plugging away at my wonderful life!
Normanton, Australia
