Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Haunting my sleep

We have all had dreams, even nightmares about our Diabetes. I mostly have had nightmares that I will one day awaken to the sound of Maddison down the hall having a seizure as I sleep. I have listened to other parents describe the sounds that alerted them to their childs seizure in the night, and those words haunted me every night for the first year after Maddison's diagnosis. Now as we near our 2nd anniversary of living this nightmare of a disease, that fear isn't so much in the front of my mind. Of course it is inevitable that this fear will again cause sleepless nights in the future when a random low strikes in the night. Sometimes, when she is sleeping and makes even normal sleep sounds my heart skips a beat, and for a moment I gasp, touch her sweet forehead, and then find myself running for the meter.

It isn't the fear of a seizure haunting my sleep lately. Time has brought some comfort in laying those nightmares to rest. For now my sleep is being haunted by fear of Diabetes striking again. I worry about my nieces, my sisters, cousins, anyone in my family. I even worry about children out there that are suffering without a diagnosis yet. The horror stories of children being diagnosed in DKA are so heartbreaking to say the least. I worry about my fathers failing health from the Diabetes he could never control. But mostly, I am haunted in my dreams about the symptoms I see in Hannah. My sweet Hannah. I know I have promised myself to STOP worrying about Hannah. I even came to the point that I KNEW in my mind that worrying cannot prevent anything, and that I need to let it go, and I DID. The last few weeks I have had many dreams in which I could actually feel my heartache. It was as though a precious life was taken from me and I could feel the overwhelming emotions as I slept. I've been dreaming that Hannah will soon be diagnosed.

I'm really trying not to think anything about her waking to use the restroom at night. I can't hear my alarm clock in the morning but I sure do hear her flushing the toilet at 1am. Weird. She is always hungry, very tired. Thirsty. Sunday she complained of stomach pain. This morning her breath smelled different. Maybe it is just time for a higher dose of anxiety medication. Maybe all of our other current stress is just bringing out my normal paranoid self. Maybe I am just too darn worried about her not having any health insurance right now. Knowing if she were diagnosed with something right now we would be eternally screwed with healthcare expenses. I guess I feel guilty and worried since we didn't place her on our COBRA policy. I know she is okay! I know that if she wasn't I would know immediately and not be cursed with the denial I went through with Maddison. I am planning to do some serious relaxing before bed each night to chase away the Diabetes demons that have been haunting me! I just want sleep to be my peaceful place again. I wonder if that is even possible for people with Diabetes. If it isn't being worried for Maddison, it is being worried for myself. I hate that Diabetes does this to me!

1 comment:

Scott K. Johnson said...

I too worry about my children, but like many other things in life we just can't control whether it happens or not.

I take some comfort in knowing that if it does happen we are much better prepared for it than with families who know nothing about diabetes.

Not much of a comfort, I know, but it is at least something.