I met Alexis Acker-Halbur when I was 16 years old and she was the Counselor-In-Training (CIT) coordinator at Camp Needlepoint, a Minnesota/Wisconsin summer camp for kids and teens with type 1 diabetes. I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in June 1981, one month after I turned 16 years old. I took the bus out … Read more
I don’t know about you, but for me, surviving the holiday season with good cheer is no easy task. I don’t hang out very much with my family. I am not married. At this moment, I don’t even have a boyfriend. I don’t have children. (that one I am quite glad about!) I am not … Read more
It’s a few days before Thanksgiving and I am thinking about what I’m thankful for, maybe you can relate. Are you considering what you are thankful for? There’s lots I am thankful for: my amazing circle of friends, my snuggly loving dog Echo, my overall good health, to name the top items. I’m also profoundly … Read more
In May I broke my ankle, which radically altered my plan to ride my bike 100 miles a few weeks later. In fact, it interrupted my general fitness plans. Slowly and surely, my weight has creeped up. Not fun at all. I noticed how bad it had gotten a few weeks ago, when two pairs of my favorite pants no longer fit comfortably. Weight loss with type 1 diabetes is never a very easy problem to tackle.
Breathe deep. Plant my feet firmly on this beautiful Earth. Feel my heart open. Allow grief, loss, relief, gratitude, to one by one wash through my being. Today, October 20th, marks the 12th anniversary of my first breast cancer diagnosis. I am still alive. I am healthier than I have perhaps ever been. My attitude … Read more
At the end of the school year last year, I was invited to join the Adolescent 1 (A1) Odyssey trip that headed West starting the 3rd day of school. I agreed to jump on the Odyssey train, not really knowing what I was signing up to do. I love working at Great River School, the Montessori/International Baccalaureate 1st grade through 12th grade school at which I substitute teach and help out in other odd ways. I used to take groups of teenagers on all sorts of overnight adventures, so tent camping for 7 nights with 50 7th and 8th graders didn’t seem like that big of a jump in my experience wheel.
On August 17th, it was officially Break The Silence Day in Minneapolis, MN, as declared by the City Council. As many of you know if you’ve been paying close attention to my various posts and blogs, what I posted on Facebook wasn’t a big surprise. On my Facebook page I said: Today, 8/17, is #BreakTheSilence … Read more
In May 2014, I went to see a shoulder orthopedic surgeon because of suffering more than 6 months with some terrible shoulder pain. It had come on suddenly and kept getting worse as the months went by. The physician took some x-rays and basically, because of having type 1 diabetes she diagnosed me with frozen shoulder. She sent me to physical therapy.
Do you have a shadow? Are you wondering, “What is a shadow?” I’m not talking about your body shape that appears on the concrete when the sun hits you in a certain way. The shadow I’m talking about is what Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung called the “unknown dark side of the personality.”
I want to talk about shadows because the violence and the terrorism and the difficulties of life in the United States, where I live, are reaching a critical point. As a result of my sadness and grief and anger, I found myself thinking and wondering, what can I do? How can I help? Talking about shadows made sense as something I could offer.
It is easy to get caught in the negative cycle of describing and feeling a difficult problem you have. With my diabetes, I spent years telling stories of how hopeless it was for me to avoid low blood sugars when exercising. I described, and over-described how awful it was to witness my father, who had … Read more