No Retinopathy... YET

I don't know why the damn eye specialist must do this to me every time. My worst nightmare is being rendered blind by the damn sugar. It does not stop me from hogging everything in my sight BUT still... it raises that uncomfortable "I should not..." in my mind.

So my routine 3-monthly-extended-to-6 eye check is something I dread. My doctor always begins with questioning me about how my sugar levels have been and I usually try to evade it by mumbling something and ending with a barely audible "mostly-decent". It is always a lie and I am surprised, no VERY VERY THANKFUL and NOT COMPLAINING-surprised that I am quite OK after 11 years of sugary highs and lows. I I usually spend the long minutes when the nurse puts those drops in my eyes praying to God to let me scrape by this time. Actually bribing is more like it. The things I have promised to Him could make me a flawless, super human if were to be kept. While He has kept his side of the bargain through the years, I have mostly not. The punishment for the is in the form of my eye-specialist.
The damn doc seems to take pleasure in my torment and very palpable fear of finding out I have done smth to my eye by eating too much. He examines my eyes at length and then sighs and ponders for so long I feel he should be one of those reality-show hosts that take 10 breaks and crack 20 stupid jokes before revealing the winner.

He invariably concludes my unbearable wait with the baap of all torture- by asking me if my parents are around. What is that supposed to mean? Why would your doctor, who has NEVER met your parents and who knows if your eyes have some irreparable damage in them ask you if your parents are around? WHY WOULD HE LOOK SO BLEAK AND GRAVE AND ASK ME WHERE MY PARENTS WERE? I always pray he is being his usual weird-self when I ask "Why? Is everything OK?". To this, he looks up with one raised eyebrow and says, "Why? Hasn't your sugar been in control?" and I start the mumbling routine again.

Then finally he takes a pen, scribbles my name and age, draws a weird wiggly line from under my name to the end of the page where he writes, almost in a disappointed scrawl the following blessed words: No diabetic retinopathy-followed by an ominous- YET. The 'yet' is a way of consoling himself maybe. Else why would he write YET.

My eye examine is tomorrow, btw. Yeah, I am not looking forward to it. Sigh!

Last 2 years at school

But though Dickens did not show this in Great Expectations, human emotions cannot last very long and back to the same school in standard 11, I happily settled down with my friends again. Fancy boarding school or not, I had college to look forward to. We spent class hours passing notes, worried over the future prospects after every dismal test result, talked over the phone for hours, dated somebody for a while, broke all rules, and rebelled against the system- u know; normal teenage stuff. Final year at school started soon and passed even sooner. Delhi University was where I was going and St. Stephens College was where I would study English to become a journalist. It was all decided and the world conspiring together couldn't change it. My friends were obviously coming with me, and Soni, Aaku, Syapa Singh and I had everything chalked out. The type of flat we would rent, who would cook on which days, how we would divide the other chores- it was all planned and decided.
Board exams came. My invigilator, a dear old paranoid piece of hanging skin put his frail arm up to block the entrance of the examination hall as I walked in. He pointed at the white powder in a plastic box and the strange instrument I was carrying with me and gestured for me to leave it outside. I tried explaining to him the life-saving status that the glucose and glucometer held in my world and when he wasn’t convinced, I asked him to write and sign a letter stating that he would take full responsibility if I were to drop into a coma during the middle of the exam due to low blood sugar and that he would finish my exam and ensure I get a 90 per cent plus. The old skin was not amused and after making me stand on one side while he consulted our school teacher, he finally let me take the exam.
The give-in-writing technique really works. I have used it for carrying sasta alcohol inside a disc and for carrying aloo paranthas inside a PVR in Delhi. With pickle.
Back to school, the exams flew by without any serious diabetes incident. Before I could say “school is almost over”, school was over. We cried and got sentimental at everything. We filled in slam books and signed each other’s t-shirts. Results were declared and I was sure I would get through Stephens. It was all going by the plan. I was 18, about to begin college, looking forward to being on my own with close friends and away from home and parents to grow out of the protective shell and learn who I really was.

Who was I kidding?

The best boarding school in the country that is not open to diabetics...

I switched school in class 9 and found it quite nice and relaxed. I was able to be myself there. I did not make a big deal of my diabetes and hence nobody else did. I made wonderful friends. One time, a friend of mine retorted to a sarcastic remark by saying that if I bothered him anymore, he would shove an entire packet of sugar down my throat! So it was all good. I was a diabetic but I was their friend first.

I had thought of joining the best boarding school for girls here in Dehradun for intermediate or +2, if I scored well in class 10 boards, and when I did, I was elated. The woman at the school’s admission office was elated too, and said among all applicants, my scores were the highest so I would get a scholarship. Life was perfect. I submitted my form and documents. Went back home and got a call an hour later from the same, elated woman. Except that now she sounded sour and not very happy. “I am sorry but we can’t offer you a place at the school, Ms. Kakkar.” What? I wasn’t sure if we were close enough to play pranks on each-other. “Why?” I asked. “We cannot take responsibility of a diabetic at the boarding school.” I realized what hysteria was that day. I demanded to meet with the principal immediately and the woman, guessing that I would start tearing the world apart, relented. I went to the school without bothering to inform my folks. As I entered the reception area, I said I wished to meet with the principal. There was another woman there now, and she looked at me and asked if I was the diabetic? I looked at her angrily and said yes, I am the diabetic who is the highest scorer among all applicants.

The principal was an educated, respectable old woman as most ignorant, abiding-by-the-rule-be-it-right-or-wrong people in the world today are. I remember the exact conversation as I remember the dialogues of my favourite movie.

“So Shweta”, she began. “I am very impressed to see your grades and would have loved for you to be a part of the school. Believe me, it is the school’s loss in rejecting your application but we absolutely cannot take responsibility of a diabetic child. It is not you, it is your diabetes.” “My diabetes and I are not separate things”, was all I could say before I left.

I was hurt and angry. I did not fight, I did not argue. I just could not. I was not sure if I would ever be allowed to do what I wanted to, to fulfil my dreams and to be a student, a professional and a person along with being a diabetic. It was a bitter experience, one that I am not over till today. It was unfair then and it will always be unfair.

The issue of equality in schools is being discussed and debated over fervently today, but even then this particular school, ranked amongst the best in the country continues to discriminate. My parents later went to speak with the principal and even went so far as to offer to give in writing that the school would not be held responsible if something happened to me. It may not seem like a wise choice to offer something so dangerous but they took this desperate measure because I was completely and absolutely broken.

There are certain things that you can never laugh about, down the line and this is one of them.

The nemesis... and the new beginning thereafter

My 8th standard result was terrible and that is when I hit rock bottom. Flunked chemistry (and I suspect it would have not been different for this subject, even if I were the personification of good health)and ranked at the very bottom of my class.
The worst bit was that I was not rebuked by my teachers. I had been a very good student- always among the top bunch, and the slightest drop in my marks would have the teachers warning and cautioning me. But this time, they almost averted their eyes when I came in.
Quickly dig out the report card of a somebody, who could have done great but cannot because of an unfortunate disease. They murmured and nodded when my mother said I will improve gradually.

And then it happened. I got the standard, unbearable look of pity from my favourite teacher. The same woman who had, in the past sent flowers to me through my cousin when I pretended to be ill due to a strange reaction of diabetes. Who showed faith in me and asked me to paint prepare the class chart on time-table for our inter-class chart competition despite the fact that I was hardly coming to school.
I then remembered I had faked another headache on the submission day just to sleep a little longer. I also remembered being told later that a few of my friends had to quickly prepare the chart on that day and that our class did not win.

I realized that the only person to blame here is me. It was I who chose the easy way and chose to cry over my misfortune rather than make the best of what I had. It was I who chose to cling on every unfair episode, every cruel remark and every sympathetic gesture. And it was I, who forgot that I am special- not because I am a diabetic but because I am me, with all my inherent capabilities and strength.

All injections and lanclets put together would not hurt as much as the result did. And even the news of a cure would not have brought so much relief as the realization did.

Also, it brought out the best in me.

Taking insulin shots at school

Taking insulin at school was a big problem since I had to get up in the middle of the class, walk across the entire room, jump over bags and poke and nudge my classmates in the process and then ask the teacher if I could leave for you-know-what (and here I would mumble so low I wonder if my teachers ever figured out where I went). During the first few days of school, my headmistress had arranged for a room where I could go and take my shot in peace.

Now, this room was next to class 8-A, the sworn adversaries of my class- 8-B and there was a connecting door between the 2 rooms with a tiny window on the top. Any kid standing in the 8-A classroom could easily see what was going on in the deserted room. I remember one day when I went there and was spotted by a few guys in the other class I was bolting the room from within. Naturally their curiosity was raised and despite the fact that there was a teacher in the class, they spread word and so everybody got up to see what the fat, dumb was doing. I saw them too and asked them to go away through rather rude gestures. When they did not relent and continued to crane their necks (I was getting used to a lot of craning of necks), a brilliant idea struck me. I dragged the chair I was going to sit on right next to the connecting door so the idiots would not be able to see anything. Smart girl! But then they were smarter and stood on their chairs to see what was going on.

Meanwhile the teacher was in a boiling rage but since it was difficult to handle 60 children, she figured it would be easier to handle the one kid on the other side of the room. So when I came to her class to tell her what I was doing, she gave me piece of her mind about whatever I was trying to do in the room by bolting the door would land me into trouble and so on and so forth. When I finally managed to tell her I was trying to take my insulin shot she said ‘Oh!’ A non-apologetic, non-loving, indifferent bitch of an ‘Oh!’

And as if that wasn’t enough, she then turned to the class and said- “It’s all right, she was just taking an injection!"

I thought then, that I would rather die than stand there and take all the mumbles and stares, even as I hoped God would hear my wish and maybe grant it. But God isn’t so relenting,.

Later, when I told the headmistress, she gave me another option. Now, I had to choose between either taking my shot in the same room or in the headmistress’ office. Yikes! I chose to use the toilet instead and spent a great deal of time in the bathroom and still more time outside of it, trying to figure out how I could inject myself if I held the vial in one hand and the insulin box in the other.

Finally, I stopped taking my shots at school. I would rush home and administer insulin with the darned novopen then. Meanwhile, I would also fight the voracious hunger that engulfs every child as soon as s/he enters the house after school as I waited for half an hour to pass before I ate my lunch.

It didn’t do much good to my diabetes but who cares about sugar control when you can get back to being an insignificant nobody again?

The power unleashed...

School resumed soon after and I left from home on the first day in my new avatar, armed with syringes, a vial of 30-70 insulin, and some spirited cotton swabs, glucose and so on and so forth.

And I was late! As I stood in a single file with fellow late-risers, I felt different from the others. I remember THAT point as the first conscious realization of my diabetes. I knew I could not just do things on my own whims and fancies anymore. I was chained by certain factors that I must take care of, at all times. It won't take a break while I am school, and so neither can I.

These thoughts, of course won't do you any good and you don't need a degree in psychology to know this. So while I was wallowing in self-pity, a snobbish and alarmingly large prefect turned up before my eyes and gave a dramatic flick to her neck towards the playground. I assume this meant we had to start running, since the first person in the file started doing just that.

We followed his lead as I tried to make sense out of the protest signals that were being sent back and forth from my nerves to my dull brain. And somewhere in the middle of my huffing-puffing, I remembered what Mum had told me- do NOT run around in the sun if you haven't eaten anything before it.

So, in an incident that was much like Oliver Twist asking for more soup, I went to the prefect and said "I cannot run like this". She looked at me from head to toe, smirked and said "Of course you can't!" Which, of course offended all the lard I was carrying in my body. I don't remember the dialogue that ensued, but I was, after all a small, insolent fry before the class 12 prefect and she was naturally insulted by the fact that I dared speak up and leave the line without her permission.

She was very mature in handling me and shut me off as soon as I would start talking with a single statement- "Get back in line and start running". "I need to..." -CUT- "Get back in line and start running"..."I can't, I will"..."Get back in line and start running".. "But at least let me..."..."Get back in line and start running".

Then I started feeling dizzy or maybe I THOUGHT I was feeling dizzy but in any case, my mother was called and there was a crowd around me as I sat in the Principal's office eating delicious chocolate biscuits- everybody telling me to have talked to the prefect, how was she to know you are diabetic, she was just doing her job blah blah... screech screech...

And I felt everything was so unfair- how could I tell that waddling shelf of fat anything when she was threatening to crush me with all she had, and that was saying something.

My mother came and spoke with the principal. I was issued a letter from him, written in his own hand with his signatory green Pilot pen. It said that I shall not be given any physical punishments or asked to be part of any exercises if I said I should not.

That letter, to any 6th grade kid is as good as finding Harry Potter's wand. It made me feel powerful, invincible and fearless. My mother got the letter laminated and I would carry it in my pocket at all times. I would purposely waste time and be late for assembly and classes and laze around in the games period.

I would start crying every night and then not go to school the next day, so much so that I hardly attended school in the 6th and 7th grade. I abused this new power I had found, and felt that getting shots thrice a day in return wasn't a bad bargain if I could get away with things this easily.

But needles were only a part of the whole bargain- there was a lot more that I had ruined for myself by what I did in those 2 years. But I was too young and too silly to know any of this, then.

Telling THEM

So my diabetes has shaped a substantial part of the person I am today. It was during the "telling them" phase that I became a keen observer of the emotions and reactions of people.

THEM of course refers to the mere mortals who are happily worrying about house mortgages or property conflicts with brothers, which apparently are really serious problems.

Diabetes is often referred to as sugar, and since I didn't even know this fact for sure and actually thought I had diabetes AND sugar both (Dear God, why must it all happen to me), the sole reason why my parents took me along was the desperate necessity to keep me within grab-and-put-glucose-in-mouth distance.
What I am trying to say is that I was the third person in all conversations about me.

We (and I obviously mean my Mum and Dad) only told people who we thought must absolutely necessarily be told. So we went to school to talk to the principal and teachers and then went to my BESTEST friend's house and talked to her parents and gave her, what I am sure was her first lesson in emergency medical treatment.

I saw the reactions and expressions to this tragic news, and since it is always bloody boring to sit in adult conversations, I would imagine the things that they would be saying in THEIR minds.

Some excerpts of this rather interesting activity have been mentioned under

(Note: The reactions are not a work of fiction. The dialogues may not be a work of fiction either, though who can tell.)


"Our daughter was diagnosed with diabetes in these summer holidays. She will have to take insulin thrice a day and check her blood sugar every now and then. She will have to eat a snack before her games class and will have to carry glucose with her at all times and if her blood sugar drops, she will have to be administered a spoonful of this or anything sweet. But we are sure you can see she will be a normal child in every way."


Principal: Looks into his diary "Hold on for a minute, normal? Shweta? Is that a positive side-effect of this insu-whattzisname? Isn't this the same kid about whom all teachers say... anyways, FOCUS."

Teacher: Nods head sympathetically Hmmm... sad but no real tragedy really. The girl looks as good as stoned in class most of the time anyways. I wonder if I should let her play the tree part in the class drama. She has to sway at one point and it may drop her sugar.

Best friend's Mom: Looks over at her daughter Thank god it wasn't my girl. Poor Mrs. Kakkar. I must tell my daughter to stay away from Shweta. What if she catches the bloody thing?

Looks at the plates served on the coffee table Hmmm... chocolate biscuits and potato cutlets. Not good. Will have to bring up the matter of low-fat snacks at the next ladies club meeting.

Best Friend: BUZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ






---- STATIC ----

Me: Dear God, why did I chose a best friend that made me look smart? Now I am goner if my sugar drops.