AnneP said:
I have had diabetes for 50 years now, I have lots of hypos and have lost the ability to tell me when I am having one apart from when occasional time my vision goes blurred. Over the last few weeks I have had people talk to me about my life expectancy. My parents tell me that I was given till my teens then twet=nties then my thirties, I am 54 (just) can you please give me some ideas.
Hi Anne!
Congratulations on living with this **** thing for so long! I was talking to a friend recently who was having problems with contact lenses, of which she's been an enthusiastic user since they were first available, and I compared it to my own situation of being a long time survivor of HIV: no-one knows how we're going to react in future because they're still writing that bit of the textbook!
When people who know I have HIV ask about my life expectancy I tell them I was supposed to die in 92 or 93 (in the late eighties accepted fact was that once you tested positive for HIV you had about five years to live), but the paperwork got lost. Now I don't know what's happening and I'm just looking forward to waking up tomorrow morning and enjoying life in the bonus round, especially if there's an over-pompous doctor to deflate on the way... Maybe you could use a similar approach.
What has happened in the past is not the same as what might happen in the future...
Steve
