Just Between Us Diabetics:
35 Tips & a Ton of Inspiration
to Help You Manage Your Diabetes
Bil Holton, Ph.D.
Published by Prosperity Publishing House,
An imprint of Liberty Publishing House
Smashwords Edition
Copyright ©2009 Bil Holton
ISBN: 978-1-893095-34-2
Discover other titles by Bil Holton at http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/bilholton
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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To the Reader:
Just Between Us Diabetics is a down-to-earth booklet of inspiration that offers practical suggestions to diabetics for immediate self-help. Its guidance and advice are offered as spiritual insulin to diabetics, their families and medical caregivers who are directly or indirectly affected by the disease. Its premise is simple: Diabetics who recognize the relationship between body, mind and spirit can change their disease from a death sentence to a healthy, do-able life sentence.
We must take better care of ourselves, and that’s what led me to write Spiritual Insulin for Diabetics. What we need is a super drug to unite spirit and matter, spiritual cause and somatic effect. And that drug is spiritual insulin. Without it we diabetics will treat the symptoms and not the cure.
We have few specialists of joy to advise us what to do when we miss the rhapsodic impulse for the joie de vivre, the sweetness of life. Spiritual insulin reconciles the gap between spirit and medicine and restores the relationship between joy and everyday life.
The marriage must take place for diabetics. We need both medicine’s insulin and God’s spiritual insulin. Honoring the divine within us weds us to the endless possibilities of enjoyment as we experience everyday living. Somehow, we diabetics must slow our hectic pace enough to see that the cosmic fun light is on—and has been on for some time. Most of us hydroplane through life. We miss many of the simple pleasures that could bring immense joy to our lives. Our illness has come to us with the message: “It’s time for you to make a joyful noise.”
How to Read This Book:
Just Between Us Diabetics is filled with inspirational stops along the diabetic path … and it shows how you can gain mastery over your illness by paying more attention to the things which bring you joy and pleasure. More than 18 million people—about 1 out of every 15 Americans—have trouble doing that and we find ourselves facing our own particular health challenge called diabetes.
Diagnosed with Type II diabetes in 1995, I immediately launched my own self-improvement plan. I attended all of the American Diabetes Association workshops I could schedule, read dozens of diabetes-related books and magazines, interviewed doctors with diabetes expertise, researched the internet, discussed our mutual disease with other diabetics and started an aggressive lifestyle change program that included new dietary and exercise regimens. But it wasn’t until I considered the spiritual connection between body, mind and soul that the results I wanted materialized.
I discovered that science and medicine can help reduce, delay or remove the physical effects of illnesses. But the cure comes from Spirit, and as long as there are spiritual pathologies present in human bodies, there will be human disease.
In my role as an author and recovering diabetic, I want to help point the way toward the path of joy and health reclamation for all of us who are living with this illness. With not a little heartfelt emotion, I have shared my top 35 tips related to managing diabetes with grace and understanding. In addition, I’ve left you Body Checks, Mind Food, and Soul Notes along the paths I have taken, hoping to give you inspiration as well as some Diabetic humor. Your own experience will give you a sense of the validity of these doses of spiritual insulin that line the paths. All you need is an open mind, a joyful heart, and a willing body to find your way along the path of joy to the clearing called Radiant Health.
Body Checks
The charts we use to track our blood glucose readings during bouts of sickness are our resumés for health.
Listen to your heartbeat and let its cadence teach you about the moment. Feel its loyalty, and its petitions. Reverence the notes that come from within and you will hear symphonies of joy.
Cannibals, like acute hyperglycemia and ketoacidosis, prefer diabetics without the spines to properly manage the disease.
Nothing takes weight off a spouse faster than a diabetic who’s on a diet.
All disciplined diabetics know there is no amnesty for desserters.
Wise diabetics know less is more.
Mind Food
Diabetes is a slippery disease. Its theme park is the body and its favorite ride is a roller-coaster.
Illness gives us a chance to reset our inner compass.
Finding joy in ordinary things is the frontier of tomorrow.
When I was first diagnosed with Diabetes, I ran it through the Rolodex in my mind. It comes after Alzheimer’s disease, Blood Clots and Cancer and before Epilepsy, Hodgkin’s disease and Tuberculosis. I think I’ll play the hand I’m dealt.
The other day I squeezed one of my assumptions to see what leaked out. The thought came to me that although tight glucose control is not a bullet-proof vest, it will help me dodge a few bullets.
The responsibility for managing our own disease must never be abdicated.
Soul Notes
The path of joy leads to the clearing of radiant health.
Curse diabetes and it will curse you. Bless the disease and it will return the blessing.
I would rather diabetes bring me to my knees than prevent me from standing.
The moon’s reflection is distorted in rippled water. But when the water’s surface is calm, a perfect reflection of the moon casts a silver ribbon across the water. So it is with us diabetics. When we stay calm amidst adversity, we reflect clearly the image of the will of God.
Encrusted guilt and elaborate excuses are dungeons of doubt.
A lot of foot problems could be alleviated if diabetics spent more time on their knees.
Tips for Diabetics
1. Alternating rest with action accelerates healing and enhances our productivity. Too much activity leads to burn-out, but too much rest leads to rust-out. Too much consumption leads to excess, but too little consumption leads to starvation, emotionally, intellectually, materially, or spiritually. The operative word, especially for diabetics, is moderation.
2. It’s not what you eat—it’s how much you eat! I was eating the right foods, but too much of them. Use actual measuring spoons and cups, and a scale, to learn what actual serving sizes are.
3. Test yourself at different times of the day, so you get an accurate picture of your blood sugar. Remember the saying: Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored!
4. Face the fact that you have diabetes. Every moment we resist having diabetes straight-jackets our souls—and tying up our souls binds us to the disease instead of freeing us for the cure.
5. Keep a journal of what you eat, and compare it with your daily blood sugar readings. Each diabetic has his or her own personal “problem foods” that shoot the sugar up. It is important to recognize what yours are.
6. Bring your own dessert! The biggest temptation usually comes with the dessert tray—so be prepared by carrying a personal snack pack filled with sugar-free cookies or candy.
7. Joy is our spiritual parachute. Look for opportunities to do something outlandish or silly. You distribute joy (a.k.a. cosmic sweetness) to every cell of your body.
8. Let go of regrets. Regrets are emotional flypaper. The more things we regret, the harder the frustration is to shake off. Refocus your attention to the joy your future holds.
9. Have fun experimenting with healthy food. There are wonderful cookbooks available that offer a smorgasbord of delights for diabetics. Every week, try one or two new recipes.
10. Prepare ahead when you are eating out. Get a menu from the restaurant, and select the items that fit into your eating plan.
More Body Checks
When it comes to diet, being on a health kick means you’ll have the feet to do it.
If we don’t take care of our diabetes, it’ll take care of us.
Disease is the body’s version of tough love.
More Mind Food
Diabetics who miss three straight opportunities for joy should check their pulse. Those who miss three day’s worth of joyful experiences should be declared illegally dead.
We diabetics are all in this disease thing together — by ourselves.
Too many people, including us diabetics, value creature comforts over self-fulfillment. Rather than accept the risks associated with personal growth, some people settle for suffocating jobs, lingering health problems, disintegrating relationships and self-nullifying habits and addictions.
More Soul Notes
The body is our spiritual autobiography.
When we find the heart of the moment, we find the soul of the day.
Since the opportunity for joy is always open to us, the cure for diabetes, which represents the lack of joy, is also open to us.
Diabetics who won’t toe the line managing glucose levels may not be able to “toe” anything later.
Believe it or not, diabetes has our best interests in mind.
An insulin pump is a copycat. It thinks it’s a pancreas.
To label someone as a Type 1.5 diabetic is like saying someone is a little bit pregnant.