LYD1A KERR

Living with Type 1 Diabetes can have big emotional and psychological impacts. It’s relentless, and can lead to stress, anxiety, and burn out. In spirit of Mental Health Awareness Week, I want to talk about it!

Stress

Operating as your own pancreas is a full time job. Constantly managing your own blood sugar levels can be incredibly stressful, especially when your life is on the line, literally.

And you guessed it – stress can impact our blood sugars too! So sometimes it feels like an endless loop of being stressed about diabetes, having blood sugars go high, then being stressed because your blood sugars are high.

It’s important to acknowledge that diabetes can be stressful, and be proactive in managing the stress as it arises. Easier said than done, but it’s important to have protective measures in place to prevent this stress from making things worse. Do what works for you – rest, exercise, go outside, anything!

Anxiety

The potential complications that can occur as a result of having Type 1 Diabetes are always at the back of my mind, and can often cause anxiety. To be honest, I rarely post or speak about complications because I’m too scared to. Although, I imagine that this anxiety is quite common among us with T1D, albeit to different extents.

Fun fact – the reason I have an insulin pump was due to extreme fear of low blood sugars. I constantly checked my blood sugars, micromanaged myself to extremes, and was just all around anxious about what my blood sugar levels were, and what that meant for my future self.

Thankfully the accurate doses and closed loop technology with my insulin pump have reduced the occurrence and severity of hypo’s – which I am incredibly grateful for!

I even received cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) during my final year of uni, which was also my first full year of managing this condition. It was a very intense time of my life trying to balance everything, so I was extremely grateful that my hospital immediately referred me to the diabetes psychologist once they saw how many times I was scanning my flash glucose monitor every single day (it was A LOT).

This is your sign if you are also constantly checking your blood sugar and micromanaging, pleeease ask your local diabetes team to refer you to a diabetes psychologist! It may be the help you don’t even know you need.

Diabetes Distress and Burnout

Diabetes distress is REAL and can lead to burn out over time. Distress can be described as feeling sad, overwhelmed, and generally rubbish about the fact that you have T1D. If these feelings aren’t addressed, they can lead to burn out, where you are past the point of caring, and feel like you’ve hit a wall.

I definitely get waves where I think “omg this is for LIFE” and start to feel extremely overwhelmed, but thankfully I don’t think I’ve hit the full extent of burn out. I’m not quite sure how I’ve avoided burn out to be honest, so head to Diabetes UK who have a great post on how to recognise the signs and tips to try and prevent burnout.

In an ideal world, everyone would just accept their chronic illnesses like T1D for what it is, and move on. But that is far from reality for many people, including myself.

I won’t lie, the majority of the time I can quietly manage it and go about my day, but sometimes it all gets a bit too much! And that’s okay! I find speaking about it with others helps so much, even if it’s just writing about it, or posting what happened to my blood sugar to my instagram story, and someone who know’s the feeling replies!

Of course my boyfriend, family, and friends are huuuge sources of support to me and I am very grateful for them and everything they do to help me out. It doesn’t go unnoticed!

Thank you for reading, I’m absolutely not an expert on this matter at all, in fact this is the first time I’ve discussed it in the three years of running my T1D insta!

So please take my experiences with a pinch of salt, because diabetes is so different for everyone. But I hope this has helped you feel like you aren’t alone. Feel free to reach out to me at any time.

Love, Lydia x