The number's black magic.

He is a magician. Freakishly tall, sleek and smooth. He has that wry smile that makes us feel little. He has power...control...a regalness to his gait.

He cowers over us swirling his wand in the air, making the numbers dance in dark clouds around our head. They are dizzying. Captivating. All encompassing. We shirk in powerlessness...we get overwhelmed.

It is hard to function in such a state. We let the numbers rule. We let them control our actions.

I can see the image so vividly in my head and it makes me so angry. He sickens me.

And yet I let him get the upper hand sometimes. I GIVE him the pleasure of my miserableness and bow to his evil ways.

It is just wrong.

I need to fight it.

WE need to fight it.

We may need to physically take our own hands and turn our own heads away from the numbers. We may need to consciously walk away from them. I think sometimes it just needs to be that deliberate.

Sometimes we are fortunate enough to wake up to a sunny day and be able to see vividly the blessings and the meaning of this life in front of us...but honestly most days it takes effort to make the most of it all.

It is so easy to be hypnotized by diabetes. It is so easy to give in to the swirling numbers and to live our life by fear.

But fear never moves us forward. NEVER.

There is a quote: “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear.”

Fear will always be there...but the knowledge that our children are more important is paramount.

If we let the fear control us, our children will certainly follow our lead. We need to find a way to break the spell of the magician. We need to find a way to make the numbers stay on the meters rather than swirling around our being, constantly obstructing our view to the "real" important things in life.

Because as it turns out, the magicians aren't real.


They are all smoke and mirrors. They make us feel like helplessness is our reality...but it isn't. We have the control to take one number at a time and fix it.

And then move on to the next.

We need to take that step away from it and let our kids be kids. They only have one childhood...one chance at navigating the teenage years. If we don't let them make mistakes, how will they ever learn anything?

I'm physically and metaphorically lifting my head up right this moment. I'm taking it all in, and dismissing the number's black magic.

It is the only way.

(I want to thank my dear friend Raisa for inspiring this post. I was blessed to watch her express her feelings about numbers and her diabetic life through dance. The performance made me think, and brought my complex emotions to the surface. This will wrap up day 12 of National Health Blog Posting Month in honor of Diabetes Awareness Month.)