At the start of 2013 I only had one New Year’s resolution, which revolved around getting more proactive managing Amy’s diabetes and handing over knowledge to her to let her decide where to go next. I blogged a bit about it here.
Honestly, I’m not sure whether this has been fully achieved but I do know that she and her diabetes knowledge, attitude and advocacy towards and for diabetes care has much improved. And realistically that’s all that matters.
We started off 2013 getting playing around with different sports and she’s pretty much found that she prefers Squash and Badminton and is pretty good at the latter. Cycling has featured a fair bit and she successfully cycled 27 miles with Gavin’s GBR30/30 challenge this year. The good that’s come out of this is that she’s proved herself to be better, stronger and more determined to achieve than many of her peers and I have no doubt that diabetes has raised this drive and determination.
Having attended so many diabetes related events Amy has gained a lovely set of friends in Chloe, Mimi, Max and Harry, friends I hope will stay in her life for a long time, such is the positive effect it’s had on her attitude to feeling ‘normal’. Her own friends are great but there’s nothing like being able to speak to other kids who just understand.
Getting the insulin pump has been one of this year’s big achievements, from fainting at the mere mention of cannulas at the start of the year, to getting a pump in June and on to giving cannula change demos in public to soon-to-be-pump-wearers she barely knew.
So 2014 is almost here.
I have no doubt it will match or exceed the good things which happened in 2013. I have no doubt about this because we have so many wonderful people in our lives, in our family, locally and especially within the Diabetes Online Community. Thank you to all of you.
I’ll leave you with a picture of Amy with her much-awaited new shirt from Diabetees.
