Paula Deen’s diagnosis of diabetes is not funny.
She didn’t have it coming.
She doesn’t deserve it.
No one does.
Most of us in the United States eat a less than ideal diet. Many of us are overweight.
But, but deep-fried twinkies! Butter-fried butter!
I get it. Deen’s cooking shows feature foods other than brown rice and tofu. Does that mean she deserves a chronic illness that in the long run could leave her blind or with toes amputated?
Deen’s going to have people judging and making fun of her every time she eats something.
Would you really want everyone around you watching everything you eat and then tell you, “Oh, oh, oh. You can’t eat that. You’re a diabetic.”
Her body has now failed her with an evil, insidious autoimmune disease. For the rest of her life, Paula will have to count her carbohydrates. She will have stick her fingers several times a day. She will have to take medications with serious potential side effects. She will have to deal with the daily challenges of high and low blood sugars.
Want to know what low blood sugar is like? Really low blood sugar? Read diabetes blogger Kerri Sparling’s brilliant description of a recent crushing low.
Want to know what high blood sugar is like? Really high blood sugar? Read about my recent experience with a brutal high over at Kerri’s blog.
Would you laugh at someone for having the autoimmune disease lupus? Would you make fun of someone for having cancer?
Our bodies are a wonderful thing when they work right. You get a real appreciation of that when you start having to take personal responsibility for running your body’s metabolism of carbohydrates when your body refuses to do it for you.
Because that’s what diabetes is all about.
It’s really isn’t funny.