Thank You!

A much cheerier update after yesterday- a few days ago this blog broke 10k views, which is just unbelievable for a little niche blog like this!

I had a look at the audience stats over the years, and following my own country (Australia) the next largest viewership is in the US, followed by Russia.
How it ended up with so many views in Russia I’ll never know but hello Russian readers!

I started this blog in 2013 as a place to talk about my diabetes, mostly because I was starting a major work for my HSC about public perception of t1 and t2 diabetes, and to what extent the media influenced that perception. I saw so much negativity in the media that I decided that I wanted to contribute something positive, even in a little way. I also got to do the most self-absorbed thing ever and cite myself as personal reflection in the work. Don’t judge me, they asked for a personal touch!

Over the years my blog garnered a reputation for mostly being a venting space of “what’s pissed Bec off this week?” (Yeah… that’s a direct quote).  Which wasn’t a bad thing considering I found a lovely online community of people who could relate. It also had the perk of subtly telling everyone that saying stupid things wasn’t cool and it would be awesome if they could stop that asap.

But besides my hypo stories and lists of stupid people (I’m looking at you Mr. Oliver) this blog has become an educational platform, which I think is the most exciting element. I’m an educator, I always have been. I love teaching and to have the opportunity to do that on a bigger scale is really exciting. I love questions because asking lots of questions often means lots of thinking is going on. Lots of thinking is exciting.

This little blog has opened up so many opportunities for me. I got a role as a Youth Rep for Trapeze initially through my blogging. I’ve been able to talk to people across the globe with many years of experience with type 1. I’ve also been able to continue my blogging at Trapeze as well so that another audience can connect and share their experiences with me.

I’ve also become more assertive and vocal in diabetes advocacy. When I first started blogging I didn’t talk about my diabetes in too much depth to anyone other than my immediate friend circle. Now I have absolutely no hesitation to answer questions about t1. I don’t care about people seeing me check my sugar or use my pump. It’s easy to talk about now because I write about it so much.

So thank you for reading my stories/rants/open letters/general whinging over the years. I’ve been blogging for roughly half of my time with t1, and hopefully that continues in whatever form this space takes on next!

As usual, let me know what you'd like to know/read about. I get some interesting questions (this post comes to mind) but I'm sure there's plenty more where they came from. 

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