Awareness Time

If you have been reading my little blog for any time at all, you know that I was diagnosed with diabetes fourteen years ago. 

And if you will take a little glance to the right, you will see that November is Diabetes Awareness month. 

Now, I know that it seems that every disease has a month nowadays and I won't argue that fact. But considering that CDC estimates that 25.8 million people (or 8.3% of Americans) have diabetes, perhaps we should be looking at his disease more closely.  Of that 25.8 million, 18.8 million have been diagnosed.  And here is the scary part,  7 million are UNDIAGNOSED.  In other words, they are walking time bombs just waiting to go off.  As long as we are looking at scary statistics, here is another one.  One third of Americans have  the indicators that are sometimes called prediabetes. 

One third people. 

This is a problem.

I won't recite a list of the complications of diabetes that almost everyone knows, but the one that sticks out to me personally is that 2 out 3 people who have diabetes will die from a stroke or heart disease.

But there is hope.  As a diabetic, I plan to run the Las Cruces Half Marathon in December (if my stinky ankle heals in time).  As a diabetic, I ate Halloween candy.  As a diabetic, I plan on holding my great-grandbabies in my arms and spoiling them silly.