World Diabetes Day 2007

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Wednesday November 14th, is the World Diabetes Day, the day dedicated to raising awareness for this massive world epidemic known as "Diabetes Mellitus" or just Diabetes. For 2007 and 2008, the theme for World Diabetes Day 2007 and 2008 is Diabetes in Children and Adolescents, for the first time under the auspices of the United Nations. As more children are becoming overweight and inactive, type 2 diabetes is increasingly being diagnosed in young adults and children. Type 2 diabetes can be prevented in many cases by maintaining a healthy weight and being physically active.



Please watch these videos, look at the real people presented on them. Watch the kids who happen to live with diabetes and take a glance at their strive to stay alive. Take a look at their everyday lives and think about their right to living a healthy, fulfilling life while struggling to grow up as people with diabetes. Bear with them!



I wish I were a 10 year old again. A child that didn't have to grow up overnight after been diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. I wish I could play with my friends without worrying if I'm hungry, or need a shot, or I'm becoming tired because of raised blood sugar. I wish I were a child like everybody else around me and not being "sick" or "different" for one reason or another. I wish I could grow up without living with my diabetes 24/7/365. I wish I could love my body more and hate myself less for being a person with diabetes. I wish my blue eyes were shining from happiness and that smiling didn't mean anything less than enjoying life, like a child only knows who to live its' life!



I wish no more children, no more families, would have to go through the ordeal of the heartbreaking moment you hear that your child is diagnosed with Diabetes and that disease doesn't go away. I wish I wouldn't have to see another devastated parents going through their silent suffering for the diabetes of their children. I wish no more human beings would suffer from the complications of the disease and would have to live the rest of their lives amputated, blind, aching, going to dialysis, loosing their senses due to acute hypoglycemia, been sick, lonely and sad because their diabetes has not been easy on them.



I wish the Nine Plagues of Pharaoh in our times, would go away in terms of Diabetes Treatment. I wish one fine day a scientist or more would come up with the Cure, unrevealing the secrets of the malfunction of the pancreatic beta cells in our bodies. I wish that no more kids, no more youngsters will grow up to become obese, malnutritioned, hypertensive people with diabetes because of their daily food consumption.

I wish I will remain a little girl deep down inside remembering how I used to be while I was 10, for as much as I feel like and still hoping for the Cure to be found... because I want my life back, I want my future back, that's all I'm asking!

Marialena, World Diabetes Day, November 14th, 2007
(because this very day is dedicated to courage and hope for a better future)

Links:
World Diabetes Day
World Health Organization: Diabetes
American Diabetes Association - Diabetes News
What is diabetes and its' complications? from Metindia.net
Diabetes Mine: an insighter's look on diabetes
World Diabetes Day Highlights by VOA News
Inspired by Diabetes
SUGARFREE - The Greek Diabetes Portal