My rights as a spouse of a diabetic

Do I have any? This is going to be tough for me to put into diplomatic words! LOL! I want to be serious...but this tiny little voice in my head just keeps repeating...."you have no rights.....you have no rights...." And yep, the annonymous poster who said I did not have the right to toss hubby's viagra got me to thinking....what are my rights?

I think I should have the right to live day by day without anyone screaming and hollering at me. I think I should be able to make it from sun up to sunset without my spouse getting completely and totally pissed off...just because he is in a low. I think I should have the right to have a normal conversation with him..to discuss my feelings and emotions....and not have to worry about the time of day it is, if he is having a low or a high, if he has eaten recently. And mostly (read my past blogs) I think I should have the right to sleep in my own bed without someone else having an accident, waking me up in the middle of the night and asking me to change the sheets.

You can see where I am headed with this post. There are a lot of things that a healthy couple just take for granted. There are a lot of things that you would think would not even need to be thought of as "rights". But when you make the decision to stick with a spouse who has this disease....and ride the roller coaster of uncontrolled blood sugars....you actually give up all rights that you might ever have had.

The poster said that tossing out his viagra was a violation of trust. Trust me...it has absolutely nothing to do with "trust" and everything to do with survival. Viagra is not a necessary medical drug. And I stand by my thought that it should never be prescribed to someone who has such uncontrolled blood sugars. But when I think about it...what doctor (most being men) would have the guts to tell another guy he's not going to prescribe him viagra until he gets his BS under control? We all know you can get it online. I must get 400 emails a day offering it to me!!!

Which is more important...trust in a marriage...or survival of a marriage? Excellent question and I suppose the answer would depend on your ultimate goal. For me, in the past, there have been so many times when just mere survival was the highest goal.

Does my husband go around and take things of mine and destroy them? Oh....well, once again....I "should" have the right to have personal property that is mine...that is left alone....that is not picked up and thrown against the wall and shattered into a hundred pieces when he is having a low. Once again..no, I do not have that "right". I pretty much have sold or given away anything that is breakable.

When a diabetic is in a true low...they do not know at all what they are doing. And they will not remember what they did. It's like you need a video camera, yet when you show them the film they will accuse you of having an actor do the piece. You just cannot win.

Why do I stay? Why am I willing to forego any rights that a normal wife might have? Why am I still here? Why do I put up with this? Trust me....I ask myself that a hundred times some days! And it does not help when my family and friends all tell me to give up and leave. My own mom said to me just recently, "I do not know how you do it...I couldn't."

I think part of it is the nurturing that comes naturally for women. We just want to take care of him, solve the problems, make him all better. Admitting that I cannot do that is part of my battle with this disease. And once you admit that....then what is the real reason you stay? I sure don't believe "love will overcome" this!

In so many ways, diabetes presents itself as an abusive marriage. If not physically abusive during lows and highs, then at least verbally and mentally abusive. Yet can you blame the person with the disease? Not when they do not remember what they say or do.

So let me refresh that comment...."I should have the right to a normal conversation/dinner/evening with my spouse". If anyone gives my husband a drug that will cause his blood sugars to elevate or drop....then surely I have the right to toss out that drug....as long as it is not mandatory for his health.

Really....who for one second thinks that the spouse of a diabetic has any rights? Well...maybe the right to walk out and never look back. Problem is...I still love him.

Low Purine Diet

I have finally found a website that shows photos that look similar to hubby's feet. The huge lump on the right photo....well, my hubby has multiple lumps like this on both feet.

http://www.arthritis.co.za/gout.html

Yes...you wonder how he walks at all. Well...not well. He mostly just limps. I do know that he has a very high pain threshold and I wonder if that isn't from years of dealing with this problem...being told that there was nothing that could be done...it was his Scottish DNA!

Upon further reading, I have found where these are quite dangerous for diabetics because sores can start from the inside and work their way outward.

In addition to these, he has all the little boils on his feet. The look like this:

http://health-pictures.com/conditions2/Carbuncle-picture.htm

But I believe they are caused by uric acid build up. I'm still doing my research on these.

Thinking today is the day to share some of my research....this site is very informative, yet rather scary....about memory loss in uncontrolled sugar levels.

http://www.diabetesselfmanagement.com/article.cfm?AID=367&SSL=n&page=1


And then I found this site, which particularily helped me to understand all the nerves that can be damaged by uncontrolled diabetes. I had really only heard about feet and eyes. This explains a lot of the diarrhea....as I'm sure the nerves in his stomach and intestines have been affected at this point.

http://diabetes.niddk.nih.gov/dm/pubs/neuropathies/#types

What scares me is the damage that you cannot see. I see his feet every day. I do not see what's going on in his heart. We know that his kidneys are down to 30% function. What else has been damaged?

Tomorrow we are going to start the low purine diet. I pray that he can stick with it for 6 weeks at least. He said that he would like to lose 10 pounds. He probably needs to lose 40-50 pounds if not more. OK...I'm just saying that he needs to lose that much within the next year...and then we can go from there.

Problem is that he literally can't walk....due to his feet....so dieting without exercise has to be to get healthy so that he can exercise to diet to lose weight. What a cycle!!!

I am not really looking forward to this holiday season because I know he will indulge in sugar....but perhaps if he will stick to this eating plan...he will see the benefits...and start to understand that diet and nutrition can have an impact on diabetes. Remember...he's the guy who's doctors tell him a carb is a carb is a carb....and he'd much rather get his carbs all from cookies, cake and donuts!