I like to tell everyone and everyone, because there is far too much ignorance within society. I hate the fact that books, magazines and media publish diabetes as a cause of obesity. I am far from obese, and people think it is my lifestyle that has caused my diabetes. I wanna scream at them sometimes. It's a small minority that have type 1 diabetes - approximately 250,000 in the UK and the amount of type 2's roll in at over 2.5million. Big difference and people should be made aware.
I tell them that i was born with a defect in my body (the pre-disposition) and that it's assumed that a virus triggered my immune system to attack the beta cells in my pancreas, leading to me producing no insulin, and currently it is incurable so i have to inject 4 times a day. I tell them that the majority of diabetics are type 2 and that this type is generally a result of poor lifestyle.
There needs to be more awareness of the facts about diabetes. I really hate the thought that there are many people in society who could simply alter their lifestyle and never have the disease. If I had been given the oppertunity to do that, i'd have accepted it with open arms. If more people were aware then perhaps less lifestyle inflicted diabetes would occur. I wouldn't want anyone else to have to inject everyday for the rest of their lives or worry about any complications that could occur with the disease.
Making awareness would also create more acceptance. I inject in public. I have the disease, I don't like needles, it's totally necassary for my survival, and I don't want to go to a manky toilet to inject. I've been gawped at as if i'm an insane druggie getting my next fix and i've been looked at with curiosity. I've also recently found out that my collegue's girlfriend thinks that i'm disgustingly rude for injecting in front of her. If more people knew about it, less people would have this opinion and more would be accepting of the fact that diabetes is an increasingly common disease. In my opinion, it is ignorant not to discuss the disease.