All For Diabetes

Wednesday was the first day of sixth form, the 4th September 2013.

In all honesty these first few days of sixth form have got off to a slightly hazy start for a lot of us. It takes a lot of getting used to; we were literally plunged straight into our lessons as soon as we got into school- well, as soon as the teachers had finished giving us lectures on how hard these next couple of years are going to be.
The first thing most of the teachers said upon us settling down at our desks was "it's going to be tough" I'm not too sure what to expect to be honest, I almost feel like I'm 'not ready' for Year 12...if you know what I mean? I feel like, what if I'm not smart enough to do all this? What if I don't have any one I talk to in my classes? So many thoughts swam around my head this week.

The subjects I have picked are: Media, Psychology, History and English Literature. Not sure what I'm in for in these next two years but I suppose we will have to wait and see. I am yet to have my first lesson of Pyschology; that will be coming next week- but all the others seem fine. Media is the one I feel most excited about at the moment only because we get to film various things and we will be going on trips in November of this year and in January next year. I miss some of the old teachers I used to have like my drama teacher, my P.E teacher was pretty cool I suppose, I miss my old year leader...everything is just so, different and I'm not sure if I like it or not yet.

I'm someone who doesn't really like change. I am the type of person who will almost always get the same sandwich at Subway, or order the same pizza every time, I don't like sleeping anywhere else but my house-I just dislike things that are unfamiliar to me. I hate throwing things away even if they're probably the most useless thing ever like an old timetable from school because I always think "Wait, what if I want this for memories?!" I suppose procrastinator could be another word to describe me.

So going to sixth form, is a big step ahead in my education and when I look around in class I'm not surrounded by thirty girls who have been in my class for the past five years- all wearing the same, heavy burgundy uniform which I never thought I'd miss- but standing in front of the wardrobe for half an hour in the mornings wondering what to wear isn't really ideal. Instead I see anywhere from ten to fifteen girls, who I don't know so well, all in our own clothes trying to find our way through sixth form.

It's not a bad thing though- although going to sixth form is a massive step and a change it is a change for the better because it's almost like we're all learning to 'fly' effectively- all through our school lives we take leaps and bounds and strive in all that we do until eventually we find our wings and we're ready to be adults and take on the world.

Of course another year means different teachers, who don't know about my diabetes. This year I made a point of making sure that I definitely told all of them about my diabetes. When I was first diagnosed my mum told my teachers, the next year I told a few- but forgot to tell some. Year 10 saw me skim by with my diabetes, I only told them if I had to which put my in a couple of tricky situations- especially when they tried to ask me questions as to where I was going when I was in a hurry to treat a hypo.

I just cannot stress enough how important it is to tell the teachers about diabetes so they know to just let you get on with things when you have a high or a low blood sugar, or just when you simply need to test. I always used to hate telling them because I was afraid of what they might say or do, I didn't want them to see me as "the diabetic girl" and I didn't want my class mates to see me like that either. I learned that no one thinks that, they all saw past my diabetes and my class and teachers accepted me for who I was and most days diabetes never even got a look in. Obviously some liked to ask me about it which I didn't mind at all- but I was and still am a regular student- I just deal with more than my peers and it takes a bit more effort.

But do you see where I was talking about my sixth form subject choices in the paragraphs above? I don't think I even mentioned diabetes in any of those. *Goes back to double check* Diabetes is a part of my life but as you can see I've chosen to talk about it in a different paragraph- as a (very important never the less) part on the side, it's always there; I can't ignore it but it doesn't define anything that I do or say or the decisions that I make.

On a more exciting note, this week I received an e-mail from JDRF asking if they could use some of my writing about school that I have done in my blogs as part of their back-to-school section for the Autumn 2013 magazine. They wanted to feature my 'story' which is pretty cool so obviously I told them they could. DUK also e-mailed me as they had received an e-mail from Dr Rhys Williams who is the Professor of Public Health at the University of Swansea asking if he could use a picture of me speaking at the Parliament event for T1 essentials- He wants to talk about how how the most effective stories about diabetes come from those living with diabetes themselves. Dr Rhys Williams will talk about that at a presentation he is doing at the World Diabetes Congress in Melbourne this December.

So that's cool, my face is going to Melbourne!

I think that brings us to the end of this blog post- sorry that it's a little bit of an essay but I always do this because lately I haven't been blogging as much as I should and that means things I want to tell you guys all builds up! But I think, I've covered everything.

-Ellie
[Peace&Insulin]