Carry that Weight
Scott Benner
I can feel myself getting older, at least I think that's what this feeling is - I can't really tell. Sometimes my head is so foggy that I can't envision accomplishing anything in a day beyond fighting with diabetes. I do have moments when I think that all I need to do is push a little farther, jump back on a treadmill perhaps, retune my body. Then the fog surrounds my day and I run out of time, energy or the will to push myself.
I have this recurring thought that tries to sneak into my mind when I get tired like I am right now, but I don't allow myself to concentrate on it. I wonder if you know what I am talking about? It's a thought that I can see it in my mind's eye and I know what the entirety of the thought is. That is, I know what words I would hear in my head if I allowed my mind to settle on the idea and consider it - but I don't let myself do that. I never think about how much I look forward to the day that I can sleep, exercise or concentrate on myself because those thoughts feel like giving up on my daughter. I know that's unreasonable, but it is how I feel.
It's no great secret why I don't think about those things or why I imagine that I won't be able to do them when the day comes that Arden leaves for college. How would I do that? How could I possibly do that when Arden can never get away from diabetes. I don't like thinking about diabetes as an attachment to Arden. I want to feel sad on the day that Arden grows up and goes off on her own, that good kind of sad that tells you life is progressing in the way that you hoped.
That's why I'm trapped in a maze with no exit, we both are really. One day, a door is going to open and I'm going to be invited to walk through it, but I can't imagine walking through that door and leaving Arden behind to wander this unrelenting maze by herself. Moreover, I don't want to feel relief when Arden moves into the next part of her life. I want that happy sadness, I want hopeful, I want future - not relief.
“Boy, you’re gonna carry that weight
Carry that weight a long time
Boy, you’re gonna carry that weight
Carry that weight a long time
I never give you my pillow
I only send you my invitations
And in the middle of the celebrations
I break down
Boy, you’re gonna carry that weight
Carry that weight a long time
Boy, you’re gonna carry that weight
Carry that weight a long time”
I am as hopeful about life with type I diabetes as anyone that you'll ever meet but some days, and maybe it's just these long sunless winter days talking but, some days feel like we are surrounded on all sides by a unstoppable force intent on our destruction.
I don't say that life needs be fair, but it would be nice to be able to imagine an end game.
It would be easier to fight on days like today, if it didn't feel like we were only fighting to get to tomorrow... so that we could fight some more.
I don't mind carrying the weight, I never expected being a parent to be easy, but I can not accept having to pass that weight to Arden one day, like a weary baton carrier. I can't spend the end of my life watching her shoulder that burden when I know how heavy the relentlessness of diabetes feels to even the people who are living well with it. I imagine that we all feel like this sometimes, know that you are not alone. But we have to leave those feelings behind us and continue to move forward. There has has to be an answer somewhere out ahead of us. We can fight one more day, and another if necessary. I believe in us even on cold, grey and dank days. I believe in us when the sun feels like it's behind a thousand miles of heavy clouds. I even believe when diabetes weighs more than I can carry - I believe because the men that wrote this song, are the same men who saw the sun coming. I know that we can carry more then days like this lead us to believe.
I've never said this before but, I want a cure and I think I want it as much for me, Kelly, Cole and all of you, as I do for Arden.