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Feeling guilty

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casswill88

New Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Parent of person with diabetes
My daughter was diagnosed end of may with type1. went onto pump end of August. my question is how do you cope with the guilt if you have any. I'm really struggling with it. I feel like I should have know she had more than flu/viral infection. she would have been diagnosed quicker. I feel guilty when she's high/low.
 
casswill88 said:
how do you cope with the guilt
Click to expand...
Hi & welcome to the forum....

Why the guilt, you have done nothing wrong, T1 is an autoimmune condition & can strike anyone at any time for any reason..... Best to focus on getting her control right & supporting her as she learns to cope with D.
 
Hello, and welcome to the forum. Martin is right, there's nothing you could have done differently to prevent your daughter developing diabetes, and getting her treated sooner would not have affected the outcome in any way.
 
There are many doctors who do not diagnose diabetes straight away so there is definitely no need for you to feel guilty.
 
Well - if you'd noticed the symptoms a week before, that wouldn't have changed a thing as far as her future is concerned, would it?

She'd still be stuck with diabetes end of story. The only important thing now is how you help her, isn't it? and that is FAR more important than you feeling bad about something that happened and which neither you nor anyone else can change. Whatever it was - it happened. She got help - she's still here ! It's all water under the bridge and if you can't shrug it off and put it behind you - I'm afraid you'll be no help to her because she's going to have to learn to deal with it AND shrug it off, isn't she? As we all have to, frankly.

I'm not unsympathetic actually though you might think so from what I've just said - and though it was 30 years after my own diagnosis that I was pointed to this, it explained the feelings I had in the early 1970s for the first time and I was mighty relieved to find there was a reason for me feeling so helpless and hopeless at times - so you might actually find the following website helpful !

http://www.businessballs.com/elisabeth_kubler_ross_five_stages_of_grief.htm
 
Hi Welcome. I know you must be so worried for your daughter.
Please don't get me wrong, I am not a hard nosed so and so and I really feel for you and your daughter. Even if you had taken your daughter to the doc the very first day she became ill , ok she may have felt better sooner but nothing else would have changed. You could not have prevented your daughter from becoming T1, nor did you do anything to cause it!!! My understanding of T1 is that it is auto immune, for some reason the bodies defence system mistakes certain cells in the pancreas as foreign bodies and destroys them.
Thankfully diabetes is a manageable condition. The problem with youngsters is , you have growth spurts and hormones to deal with that makes control difficult.
I hope we can help you through this grieving period and help you feel better in yourself , as I know only too well (for different reasons) no amount of being told you need feel no guilt actually works, you need to see it for yourself and if you give us a chance we can help with that.
 
casswill88 said:
My daughter was diagnosed end of may with type1. went onto pump end of August. my question is how do you cope with the guilt if you have any. I'm really struggling with it. I feel like I should have know she had more than flu/viral infection. she would have been diagnosed quicker. I feel guilty when she's high/low.
Click to expand...
It is not easy to say or see your child has diabetes unless you know. Just do your best & well done for getting a pump 🙂
 
I think many parents feel like this, certainly ones I have spoken to! I could smell ketones on my daughter's breath for at least a month before she was diagnosed, but on its own it didn't seem like much to go to,the doctor about. So I thought I'd just keep an eye on her. I was suspicious that she might have diabetes, and I know that drinking loads is one of the classic symptoms, but when she started guzzling apple juice like no tomorrow it just didn't click, we thought she was just being greedy! It was only when I put her in the bath one night and noticed that she was all skin and bone that I started to get really worried, then shortly after that we were at a family party and she started necking glasses of water faster than she would normally during apple juice (unheard of for her) and that's when alarm bells really started ringing. I've always felt slightly guilty that I should have spotted it sooner, but I think it does creep up on you, and the part of me that was trying not to be neurotic kept hoping that it might be something else (less serious) wrong :(
 
I think all parents with a type one child will feel guilt, and it probably wont go away, but it will likely subside into the deepest part of your mind....

I think with any traumatic event there is a process, grieving you could call it, which you will go through until finally your living life as normal....
 
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