You'd give a diabetic a candy cane in Well now

It’s just damn rude.
Every year at Christmas it happens.

I don’t mind, really, when the kids and their moms drop off brightly wrapped packages of luscious home-made nibble nuggets. It’s a school, that’s what people do.
They mean well and I accept the gifts in the spirit in which they are given.
It is very kind when someone gives you a gift that they think will brighten your day.
On the other hand…

It’s the people who know me, know that I’m diabetic,
and that I struggle with my diet on a constant sugar-craving daily basis,
they’re the ones who tick me off.
During this season when I am dodging innocently gifted
fudge and macaroons and candy canes and sugar plums galore,
my friends and coworkers who know better
still give me gaily wrapped tempting dollops of my own personal kryptonite.

It’s the height of rudeness.
It really is.

They even tell me they know it,
that sugar is slow poison for me,
but they try to rationalize me into eating it.

“It’s okay at Christmastime.”
- No, it’s not. My endocrine system does not get miraculously fixed for the holiday season.

“You can have just a bite or two, right?”
- No. I’m incapable of taking just one bite. I always have been.

“I made it with brown sugar, that doesn’t count.”
- Uh, did you hear yourself say the word sugar. Sugar is sugar.

I do not love certain of my “friends” at this time of year.

Please, if you know a diabetic
and you feel the absolute need to give her a token gift,
Be kind.
Give her the candle someone else regifted to you.
Her teeth won’t be gritted when she thanks you for it.

VVV
VVV
VVV

Small edit

The new PB set-up just threw a sidebar up on my screen - a new feature that directs the writer (and maybe reader, I don’t know) back to the entry written one year ago today.
I had to shake my head.
A year ago today I wrote an entry on the exact same subject, in almost the exact same structure.
(Disappointingly, it was a much better essay. My writing skills seem to be on the wane,
other than that…)
Some things never change.

Last updated January 29, 2017