This weekend my co-teacher Jenny and I chaperoned our 6th grade class overnight at church to prepare for our ceremony. I thought back to last year, the first time I chaperoned this event. The mom of one of my students came up to me and said, "Ellen has diabetes. This probably won't affect what happens tonight in any way. But just in case she passes out, here's some cake gel. Rub it on her gums and call me and I'll be here in 10 minutes. It's never happened before, but just in case."
I was dumbfounded. "Okay." I took the cake gel. I put it in my pocket, and made sure I knew where the notebook with all the emergency numbers was, and went on with the evening. Nothing out of the ordinary happened (except the girls wouldn't go to sleep).
The next morning I handed back the cake gel & told Ellen's mom that everything was fine.
One month later, Daniel was diagnosed. Now I'm the one handing out the cake gel.
2 comments:
Naomi -
Diabetes Happens, and usually to wonderful people like your son and Ellen.
Maybe it was kismet that Ellen and her mom came into your life when they did. They showed you that normal kid things are possible with diabetes, it just takes planning...and cake gel.
k2
Isn't it amazing how such a foreign thing like what the mom introduced you to became such an intimate part of your life? I think about all the years I was so uneducated about my cousin's diabetes only to have me be living his life in so many ways.
Post a Comment