Type I Diabetes: A Short Story

June 18, 2009, a beautiful, summer, rainy night, the clock reads one after midnight and instead of waking up in my bed, I woke up in a hospital bed, wearing a hospital gown, and nurses huddled over me injecting needles into my bare skin. A million questions rise in the back of my mind with fear in my eyes. The last thing I remembered was eating a chocolate bar in my living room. I hear my brother across the room shouting, “Dad, she’s awake!” My father rushed over to me with joy in his eyes, “Hi sweetie, you fainted and I rushed you over to the hospital, you’ll be okay”. One of the nurses then explained to me that I have been diagnosed with type I diabetes. I could not have imagined that my life would make a complete turn at such a young age.
I was lying on the hospital bed, hooked up to a bunch of machines, the strong smell of antiseptic in the air making my stomach turn as I was trying to wrap my head around what type I diabetes was. The clock reads four in the morning, “ beep… beep… beep” the sound of the medical equipment keeping me up throughout the night. I turn my head to my right shoulder; my grandpa scrunched up on the hospital couch beside me peacefully sleeping, while the nurses walked in and out of the room, pricking my bruised fingers every hour throughout the night to check my blood
The clock reads six in the morning, the sun beginning to rise filling the room with light. I stare at the beige colored ceiling hoping to get to go home. Hours pass by, I hear a knock at the door, “good morning Rida, my name is Dr. Thomas” as the kind man shook my hand. “My nurses and I will be starting you on a Medtronic insulin pump”, said the doctor. “A Medtronic insulin pump replaces the need for frequent injections by delivering doses of insulin daily” said the doctor; the doctor and his nurses then walked me through the process of the Medtronic insulin pump. After the long talk I had with Dr. Thomas and his nurses, I was finally able to go