Hi, I’m Donna and I’m on a mission to inform and educate my people and myself about living better in spite of diabetes. 

Guess what? We are in control of diabetes. We can improve our lives, even if it’s just a little every day.

I’m investigating and researching diet, nutrition, general health and wellness, and activities that keep me healthy and active. I want to share that information with you.

I want us to have the tools we need to find better health and a happy life. 

My doctor diagnosed me with diabetes at age 49. My hemoglobin A1c was 10.5. Normal A1c is between 4.5 and 6.5.

My blood sugar was so high that my doctor immediately wanted to put me on insulin, but I resisted. She gave me prescriptions for oral diabetes management, and for high blood pressure and high cholesterol control, the dreaded circle of three that signal metabolic disease.

My doctor referred me to a nutritionist who provided me with a glucometer and a picture of a food pyramid showing me that carbohydrates (mostly refined) should comprise 50% of my daily caloric intake.

The nutritionist sent me home with a huge packet of information from pharmaceutical companies, brimming with advice on managing my diabetes. (I’ll let you guess what their solutions were.)

I left the doctor and nutritionist with no real help on how to manage my new and confusing disease. 

And it scared me to death. 

My mom died of breast cancer. Well, really, the chemotherapy killed her. She fought many health battles after a spinal cord injury she received when she was in her early forties. 

In the middle of all those health concerns was diabetes. She slowly lost her ability to walk unless she used a cane or wheelchair. Years of inactivity, coupled with poor diet choices, allowed the diabetes to take over, causing cardiovascular disease, kidney disease, ulcers on her feet, and a severe anxiety disorder.  

My mom died in her sleep at the age of 59.

We woke up, and she was just gone. 

She spent the last years of her life fighting through diseases of almost every major organ system, never understanding the actual disease she needed to conquer was diabetes. 

All this was swimming around in my head when I came home from the doctor’s office with my hand stuffed full of prescriptions. I sat down at my computer started looking at websites about diabetes. 

I discovered there’s a lot of information about diabetes out there. Some of it is well-researched, articulate, and useful. A lot of it is little more than snake-oil disguised as a physician-approved treatment for your disease.

All of it was overwhelming. And confusing. I didn’t know where to begin to make sense of a disease with symptoms I couldn’t even see or feel.

After a few years of trial and error, I got a handle on what was happening to my body. I’m not done by any means, but I decided I wanted to share my thoughts with others who are just as lost as I was. 

I created this blog so we can share information, research, ideas, tips, tricks, hacks, dreams, and life. 

We’ll get through this together. I know we can. 

Let me tell you what this blog is not going to provide:

• A bunch of click-bait ads at the bottom and in the margins of every article
• Ridiculous and un-verifiable home-remedy stories
• Articles authored by people who don’t understand diabetes
• Lectures and judgments about your disease

What you will find here is informative, healthy, interesting, entertaining, and timely material for you and your family while you recover from this disease. You deserve to know the stories of real people, just like you, who win every day. Stories of triumph and tragedy, stories of humor, of drama, stories of balance and control, and even the often cold and harsh realities of living with this disease.

Here you will find relevant articles, sound advice, a research source, and even a community to share your own travels, if you so desire. Recipes to give and to take, and friends to make, too.

Whether you were just diagnosed with diabetes, or have fought it for years, I want you to know that you will not die today, and probably not tomorrow, either. I want you to see there is hope in every day and room for all the dreams you have in your heart in spite of this damn disease.

Intellectually, I understand that I will probably not meet my end the same way as my mother.

But emotionally?

Emotionally, that thought scares me half to death.

It would be nice to know there are friends who will walk with me and to learn with me.

Please join me.

We have so much to talk about.