The American Diabetes Association and many other diabetes organizations have declared the 4th Tuesday of March of every year to be Diabetes Alert Day. This year, that’s today.
And what exactly does that mean and what could you or should you do today? Well, it’s a day to raise awareness to the un-aware general public. Un-aware as in not aware that diabetes is a big deal these days, and quite a few people in the United States have diabetes and don’t know it. Well, to be perfectly clear, it is difficult to go very long and not know it if you have type 1 diabetes. But one conceivably could go a while and not know that one has type 2 diabetes.
Two faces of diabetes
And basically not knowing you have type 1 or type 2 diabetes is really really bad. Because uncontrolled, or as I prefer to say, un-managed or un-accepted diabetes causes a lot of big bad ugly problems. To your valuable parts: your heart, your kidneys, your eyes – places in your body that have small blood vessels that if those blood vessels are overfilled with glucose, well those blood vessels cause damage to those important organs. And the end result of that is not good. In fact, early death is the highest bad risk
So, today, my call to action to you is this: TODAY tell at least 2 people that you have diabetes. Whether it’s type 2 or type 1. Just tell some people. And see what they say. And use the opportunity to do some educating.
In fact, the Diabetes Advocates group, of which TeamWILD is a member, today put out a very cool PRESS RELEASE about “getting it right” about diabetes. Too many people do not understand what diabetes is, what the different kinds are, and whether or not you can actually CURE diabetes with diet and exercise.
For the record, here at TeamWILD we do not believe there has yet been found a cure for diabetes . Diet and exercise are tools to manage diabetes, it’s not a cure. Not even for type 2.
What we do believe here at TeamWILD is that once you get the diagnosis of diabetes, no matter the type, you need support and education to be able to live a really active, physically fit life. And that’s what we exist to provide! Training plans and camp to empower you to experience yourself as an athlete, an athlete who has diabetes. GO WILD!
