One of those moments

The thing that people with type 1 are really good at doing is just getting on with it. Is pretending that everything's fine, even when you're 25.5 and feel like you're about to implode. Or you're 2.9 and look fine, but feel like death. We're pretty good at hiding those things. If we stopped every time we went high or low, we'd never move anywhere!

Which is why I think sometimes it's hard to convey to people, especially people who have never met someone with type 1 before, just how rubbish it can be. This evening, for me, has been a perfect example.

I started getting the sweats on the tube. I didn't think much of it (why do I never think too much of it!!) and just assumed that it was...hot, or something? Anyway. Tube and bus ride later, I'm walking through my front door thinking "something is not right, but I shouldn't be hypo!" Answer? 2.9. An hour before I had been 7.7!

Awesome.

Not.

I was still boiling hot and sweaty, so the obvious answer? Take your clothes off! Which is how I found myself sat in my underwear, clutching my apple lucozade, in the middle of my bedroom floor.

It reminded me that hypos make us weak and vulnerable. That even though they are generally short, they are terrifying. That they strip us of our very basic function: the fuel we need to think and move and be!

I've been asked to give a speech at the North East Diabetes Symposium in May, focusing on the transition from paediatric to adult care. I think this is something that really needs to be addressed: yes, we may be adults, we may be grown up with jobs and cars and houses and children of our own, but hypos do not 'grow up'. They do not make us less vulnerable. We don't have a parent to come and sort us out; we have to deal with it ourselves. Thankfully, lots of us have partners, husbands, wives, friends, etc that we can rely on in an emergency - but when you find yourself hypo on the tube, there's noone but yourself to rely on.