That Stupid Pancreas!

 Hello bright and beautiful internet! I am highly aware of the fact that it has been many moons since I last posted, and I duly apologize. I have no worthy excuse, except that I'm in high school and consider myself to be a good student, and therefore I like to live up to that standard by actually committing myself to studying/attending class/doing homework, all of which takes up time and physical/mental energy that I would otherwise devote to this, my most treasured blog. (also I've been kind of busy with advocacy stuff, too)  So in conclusion, sorry I've been MIA, but yeah, what's to be done about it? Let us all simply go forth, allow bygones to be bygones, and jump right into the fifth and final post of House of Cards: A Series!  If you've forgotten what House of Cards is about in the four months it's been since my last post (which I wouldn't blame you for - again, so sorry it's been so long!), please feel free to get caught up by reading  House of Car...

   Okay so I am super glad that the topic of this post is the one that I had already planned on for this week, because the past couple of weeks have been an adventure of sorts and are the perfect example of my main points for this topic. Even if I had been planning a different kind of post for this week, I would've had to abandon it to write about the past few weeks instead, because the past few weeks have been, as I previously stated... (*deep calming breath*) an adventure. So let's get into it, shall we? We've got a lot to talk about!    This is part four of House of Cards: A Series, and we're talking about being careful with the amount of pressure you're putting on yourself (like how you'd be careful adding weight to a house of cards to avoid sending it crashing down). And what are the main points that my last few weeks exemplify so very well? Well, they all kind of boil down to one point, which is this:    LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES. LIKE, SERIOUSLY.  ...

   This is me and Alex, my cat (or, before my brothers freak out, I should say, my FAMILY'S cat). You've seen pictures of her on the blog before, I'm sure. There's also a tiny Canadian flag in the background, some post cards on the wall that my grandmother gave me (Hi, Grandma! Now you're famous! Well, sort of.), and a yellow board of birthday messages that my friends gave me way back in February 2020 before this whole COVID mess really started impacting life in Canada! (*sigh* those were the days...)    Why are you looking at this picture right now? Because when you think about it, it actually segues well into what I wanted to talk about for this post! This picture only shows a small part of one corner of my room, and even that small part only exists as it does now because lots of different people contributed to it! My grandmother gave me the post cards (and the Canadian flag too, actually), my friends (hi guys!) gave me my birthday board, and Alex provided... well...

   Welcome to Part 2 of House of Cards: A Series! In this post I'm going to share what a strong base is to me, diabetes-wise. Please note that I am not a doctor or a medical professional in any way, shape, or form, and do not claim to be one, nor do I suggest that any type ones reading this make any changes to their diabetes management plan solely based on something I say. Talk to your doctor if you have any concerns about your management plan and want to make drastic changes. Every type one has their own experiences and feelings related to diabetes and managing it, so I can only speak to mine, but hopefully someone out there in Internet Land finds this helpful or relatable.     A strong base to me is something that you can trust to be stable and strong, and something that you can build on. What does this mean in the context of diabetes?    Something that you can always build on is knowledge. The more you know about diabetes management, the easier it i...

       Diabetes is very complicated.      I mean like, diabetes as a disease is realistically pretty simple if you ignore the fact that we don't know exactly what causes it - immune system attack on beta cells = no beta cells = no insulin = type one diabetic - but managing type one while also:      - working/completing school      - trying to have a healthy lifestyle (exercising and sleeping enough)      - managing family relationships and friendships and possibly a relationship with a significant other      - participating in extracurricular activities      - having quiet time to relax and take care of yourself can be quite difficult and overwhelming! These other important things must be scheduled around type one, and even when they are, type one can easily disrupt them. School, relationships, and mental health are supposed to be priorities. And usually, they are. In normal cir...

The term "self-care" means something different to everybody, but it all comes down to basically the same thing - taking care of yourself. Self-care can mean something different depending on the situation. Taking care of yourself will look different for a low blood sugar than it will for a high blood sugar. Taking care of yourself when you're stressed will look different than taking care of yourself when you're sad. Taking care of your mental health during a pandemic will look different than taking care of your mental health when life is more normal. But all of these situations would benefit from self-care. ( None of these quotes, pictures, or artwork are mine . They are screenshots of posts I found on  Pinterest that help explain what I'm trying to say. I do not claim them to be my own in any way .) Taking care of your mental health comes in many different forms. It can be so many different things, including but definitely not limited to:  - setting healthy bound...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WpPjdWTmS0 Did you know that Nick Jonas was diagnosed with type one diabetes at age 13? And that he wrote a song about it? The song is called A Little Bit Longer, and it's about life with type one. I've been listening to it for months (I know it's not a NEW song, but it's a GOOD song, and that's my kind of music so 😛) and I was thinking today about how it kind of applies to the situation of COVID-19 and how hard it's been on everyone in so many different ways.  The line that is repeated throughout the song is " A little bit longer, and I'll be fine. " In the context of life with type one diabetes, I've always taken it to mean just a little bit longer and we'll have a cure , just a little bit longer and I'll be back in range , just a little bit longer and people will understand , just a little bit longer and I'll be fine .  When you're diagnosed with type one, you're told tha...

I'm taking Canadian Geography as a course this semester, and as well as the names and locations of thirty major rivers, water bodies, and islands, and the names of all the provinces and territories, another thing we're learning about is the concepts of geographic thinking. This week we are focusing on interrelationships (how one thing can have an effect on another thing basically). Things like how the movements of tectonic plates cause earthquakes and tsunamis and other natural disasters that cause destruction. How things are connected and how everything has an affect. "Now, Anne, you brilliantly beautiful Potterhead, why are you talking about geography class in your diabetes blog?" Well, my brilliantly beautiful readers, I am talking about geography and interrelationships because my A1C is tomorrow. I had actually completely forgotten about it, but my mom reminded me and I naturally began to wonder what my result is going to be. I don't remember what my last...