Faces of Type 1

November 2018, my family and I went to the Friends For Life Diabetes Conference in Niagara Falls, Canada. It was quite an interesting weekend, a lot of which I spent inside the teen program. 

During my time in the teen program, we participated in a number of activities. We played games, listened to guest speakers, and talked to university students with Type 1. Out of the two or three speakers who came to talk to us, I remember only being truly engaged in what one of them had to say.

I don't remember her name, but I do remember what she talked about. Rather, I remember her being the only speaker who interested me. She asked her audience questions, and allowed us to answer them fully and share our experiences. When she came to the end of her presentation, she gave us an activity to do. She called it "faces of type 1."

The activity worked like this: everyone got a piece of paper and pencil. After receiving those things, everyone found a space in the room where they wouldn't be distracted, and they each drew on their paper what they thought diabetes would look like if it was a person. Some people drew monsters, vikings, sad faces, and villains. Some people didn't draw anything.

I drew a stick figure with a blank facial expression.

I mean, I get why people were drawing that kind of stuff. Diabetes totally sucks, and some days it does seem like a monster. But not all days. Sometimes it's just there in the background. Sometimes you can almost forget it's there, and just focus on the more fun parts of your life.

Some days are a roller coaster of frustration and anger and the monster drawing would be accurate. 

Some days are uneventful diabetes-wise and you can just live your life.

But you never know what kind of day it'll be until you're living it.

I think it's good to remember that the opportunities of tomorrow are boundless and your future rests in your hands. You decide what you want to do with it. Tomorrow is, as they say, a blank slate, so we need to remember to make the most of it.

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Till next time, Type 1 Warriors!