Jingle bells, Batman smells

By | 14 December, 2011

Like buying noisy, irritating toys for nephews and nieces who don’t live near you, Christmas is traditionally the time of year for your favourite diabetes websites to discuss the misery of the festive season and the difficulty of dealing with food and booze as we celebrate a chilly  winter solstice.

However, here at your soaraway Shoot Up we don’t subscribe to that point of view. This Xmas I have every intention of consuming my own bodyweight in duck, roast spuds, sprouts, trifle, stilton, port, stilton, more port and – oh, go on then – just another little glass of port.

The reason for this is that I don’t really see any difference between Christmas and any other time of the year. As always, it’s all about balance isn’t it? Balancing your carb intake against your insulin and adjusting for any weird stuff – I find the single-handed consumption of the European stilton mountain requires a dual wave bolus that last for hours. But it’s all do-able with plenty of testing and correcting.

In my overly simplistic view, life is for living regardless of whether you have a chronic condition or not. I like stuffing as much stollen and Glühwein down my gaping maw as the next man and I’m not going to let diabetes get in my way, dagnabit!

So as the year draws to a close, I’m stocking up on three zillion spare units of insulin, 5 gazillion test strips and we’ll worry about the kidney and heart failure in the New Year! Woo hoo!

18 thoughts on “Jingle bells, Batman smells

  1. Alison

    Couldn’t agree more. The assumption that Christmas is so different only works if you live off porridge and cheese sandwiches for the rest of the year and always know the exact carb count of every meal you eat. As I don’t, Christmas is just another day with a bit more insulin, a bit more testing and a bit less exercise than usual.

    Good to know I’m not the only one who seeks out excectionally noisy toys for my godchildren mainly for the irritation it causes for their parents!

    Reply
  2. Tim Post author

    I’m glad you agree @Alison – if nothing else because I said “However, here at your soaraway Shoot Up we don’t subscribe to that point of view” without actually consulting you before I said it. Not very good co-writer etiquette. 🙂

    Reply
  3. Janie Leigh

    I can get on board with that view! Why should we miss out on all the fun because we’re pancreatically challenged? 🙂

    Reply
  4. Lesley from INPUT.me.uk

    I couldn’t agree more! And as I’ve just finished a 10-hour fasting basal check, I’m ready to eat as much as I can right now!

    Reply
  5. Annette A

    I like Christmas meals. There tends to be a greater variety of veg dishes (and yes,I like sprouts) at this time of year and I pretty much live off veggies. So it suits me fine. I don’t like mincepies or icing,so I don’t miss out on anything. Christmas all year!

    Reply
  6. Scotty

    Before my pancreas packed in, the only thing different I used to do at Christmas was to eat an entire 1kilo box of Thornton’s Special Toffee and 3 Cadbury selection boxes in the space of 2 days.

    Reply
    1. Scotty

      Rough estimate 1000grams of sugar at 10g/u is 100units. Not even a full insulin pen.

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        1. Mike

          With the added excitement that if you bolus up-front you have to race to down the chocs before unconsciousness kicks in!

          Reply
  7. Martyn Pridmore

    I completely agree with this! I’m usually pretty good at winging it with alcohol and excessive mince pie intake… I often find one balances out the other actually… no mid-morning alcohol hypos for me!

    Reply
  8. Tim Post author

    Of course, now that I posted this I then had some difficulty with my office party – too much booze and too much dancing – a 2.6 at 3am then another bounce-back hypo at about 11am on Saturday. Curse you liver – you must be punished!

    Reply
  9. Diana Maynard

    I have to say that unusually, I kind of disagree here… I’m in favour completely of not letting diabetes stand in the way of anything you want to do, which includes alcohol, eating weird and wonderful foods and so on.

    But WHY do people see Christmas as a time to forget all the healthy living stuff and eat and drink too much and do no exercise? It’s a very dangerous mind set, in my opinion, because it’s easy to end up with the “it’s OK if it’s only once in a while” attitude. Which is of course fine if it’s only once a year, but it can also be the start of a mental slippery slope to the “I have to suffer because I’m diabetic / I want to lose weight / whatever” vs the “I’m living healthily because I want to feel better” mentality. I’ve been down that route too. It’s such a ridiculous overhype by the media, even by diabetes organisations who as you say promote the whole “how to have Christmas and not miss out on all the fun everyone else is having getting drunk and eating too much.”

    OK I’m just feeling smug because I’m off trekking in Peru for 2 weeks over Christmas and New Year, with not a mince pie or a gluhwein in sight. Can’t be doing with all that sitting around eating chocolate, drinking too much and pretending to be nice to your family, life is for getting out there and pushing the boundaries! 🙂

    Reply
    1. Tim Post author

      @drdeath – a fair point! To be honest there’s only so much chocolate orange I can eat in one sitting!

      Reply

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