Miss X vs. Diabetes: and this time, it's oh so personal


Hypos and type 1 diabetes in general can be quite a nuisance, particularly in the school environment. Sometimes, because of low blood sugars launching surprise attacks, I need to eat during class. Teachers at my school are well aware of this, including substitutes, with my face pinned up in every single staffroom in the school (worst photo ever might I add) with big black letters stating DIABETIC. Now, I could take one standpoint one that, I don’t want to be known as ‘the diabetic’ but hey, if it’ll help these people remember then stick the word on my forehead if you have to!

As a rule, my teachers are brilliant and incredibly supportive of me and my diabetes. But sometimes well, sometimes you get the idiots that think they know more about it than you do and need to ‘lay down the law’ in their classroom. Obviously you didn’t get the memo, I’m one of the quiet kids, go attack that one in the corner that won’t stop talking during your lessons.

One day, we had a new teacher for a subject, let’s call her Miss X. Now, Miss X wasn’t the best teacher, but giving her the benefit of the doubt, I tried to give her a shot. During her lesson, my blood sugar went low, and I needed to eat some jellybeans quickly to get it back up. To do this, I tend to be as quiet as I can when testing my levels and eating, so that I don’t disrupt their lesson. Of course, she heard me and immediately snapped that I shouldn’t be eating in class. Now, if you refer to my last post, my brain isn’t all there when I’m low, so I tried to explain that I was diabetic. Sure, that’s ok I can handle it if she had have accepted it and moved on, but no. This woman was on the war path.

She repeated her statement, and again I said I’m a diabetic, and my blood sugar is low. After this second exchange I was getting a little annoyed, all I wanted to do was bring my blood sugar back up…. You know, being conscious is always a bonus. But what sent me over was this statement ‘Well, I believe you. But thousands wouldn’t.’

….

Well then.

I was in shock and beyond angry, I dived into my bag, bringing out my wallet and shoving numerous cards at her displaying my medical status as a diabetic, getting lower and lower because I STILL hadn’t been given the opportunity to eat! The look on her face, well that was priceless. She left me alone for the rest of the lesson as I sat there, finally getting my brain functioning again.

But that wasn’t the end. Oh no, not this woman.

Miss X was my teacher for a while, and each time I went low in class (my lovely diabetes usually picked her classes… joy) she would repeat the same routine, not believing me or claiming to have forgotten. HOW HARD IS IT! Each time I felt more and more embarrassed and annoyed, it was drawing attention to my diabetes, and at the time I hadn’t had it for very long. But the ultimate tipping point was yet to come. She had informed me that I would be receiving zero for an assessment task.

Why you ask? I handed it in late.

Why? I was in hospital, being diagnosed with diabetes. Oh Miss X, you’ll never learn will you?

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