Arden on General Hospital?!
Sometime in August I received this heavily blurred image from a Juicebox Podcast listener named Kate Hall…
The image was a call sheet from an upcoming episode of General Hospital.
Click to enlarge
When I was young I would get home from school everyday at 2:55 pm where I would find my mom getting ready to watch GH. Mom would have a hot cup of coffee and be settling in on our ugly sofa as I arrived. One year the show had a storyline about Luke and Laura that was a cultural phenomenon. It stole the attention of everyone with a television, including me. My memory tells me that Luke and Laura had to “hit the road” to find the left-handed boy. I remember a freeze ray that threatened the city of Port Charles. For a time the show became what mom and I did for an hour after school and into the summer where we would run home from a community pool to see the show. There was even a parody song on the radio about the story. You see kids the radio was a thing that…. never mind. But I should at least explain that TV shows happened on a schedule and you had to be near a TV to see them. I digress…
Back to Kate
Kate is a writer on General Hospital (she’s actually a famous soap scribe), she is also the mother of a little girl with type 1 diabetes. And Kate, as fate would have it is a pretty big fan of the Juicebox Podcast.
And that’s how a character named, Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Arden came to be during a recent two-day story arc. ADA Arden is named for Jennifer (Jenny Smith from the Pro Tip episodes of the podcast) and Arden.
Huge thanks to Kate (who will be on the podcast next year) and to General Hospital for the years of entertainment. Here’s a 60 second video of ADA Arden in action (WITH Tristan Rodgers). That’s right, Robert Scorpio! Sorry… my inner child got jacked up there for a moment.
The only thing left is to get one of you to name a baby after me… 🤣
Diabetes Dance Dare
Dancing is way better than dumping ice on your head...
This is Arden and her friend Nadia doing the Diabetes Dance Dare for the American Diabetes Association. The ADA does so many great things fort he diabetes community including providing legal counsel for children who are being treated poorly at school. #DiabetesDanceDare
I can't dance so I enlisted Arden...
Make your own video today, share on social media and tag #DiabetesDanceDare, @amdiabetesassn and dare three people to make a video of their own.
I'm daring you!
Contest: Guess Arden's New Puppy's Name
Arden has been asking for a puppy forever and today she got her wish when her Christmas present arrived at the airport.
Arden spent the past weeks thinking of names for her new best friend, she took suggestions from family and friends, looked through baby name books, but in the end she decided on a name all on her own - and it's a diabetes centric name.
So the first person who can guess what Arden named her new puppy wins three pairs of blue circle shoe laces. The contest runs until someone gets the name correct. If more than one person guesses correctly I'll give three pairs to the first correct guess and one pair to each of the others but the contest will be shutdown twelve hours after the initial correct guess is made.
Puppy is three months old. He's a mix of French Bulldog and Boston Terrier. They call him a Faux French, he's such a cutie!
Okay, I'm exhausted from driving to the airport at four in the morning (he missed a connecting flight) so I'm going to take it easy while you try to figure out his name. Remember, it's diabetes related... good luck!
Only two rules: All guesses must be made in the comments of this post. Open to US and Canadian residents only for shipping cost reasons.
Arden named her new puppy Basal...
I Wonder Why Diabetes Picked Me
There I was sitting at Arden's little desk for back to school night wondering if I could be home in time to eat dinner while it was still warm.
The teacher spoke about class culture, math and the bell schedule... pretty standard stuff. While nervous parents asked questions I looked through Arden's desk and wrote her a note about my excitement for her upcoming school year.
It felt like the evening was drawing to a close when Arden's teacher said, "The children wrote a poem from writing prompts, I'll pass them around so you can read them".
When I grasped Arden's in my hand I immediately recognized the format from a few years prior when my son Cole was in fifth grade. I smiled because he filled in the first line almost identically to Arden.
The first prompt is, "I am"
Cole wrote athletic and smart. Arden said, athletic and funny.
My eyes moved to the second line with proud anticipation.
"I wonder..."
I don't remember what Cole wondered about in the second line of his poem, but I can tell you that Arden's query about life was, most certainly, not the same.
I wonder why diabetes picked me as it's target, Arden asked.
A fist sized lump formed in my throat as I picked a spot on the wall to stare at while I collected myself. I won't lie, I had to bear down hard to stop from crying. I quickly slapped a fake smile on my face and kept reading, scared of what other diabetes related thoughts Arden harbors – but there were none.
When I was finished the poem I snuck a peak at some of the other kid's work. One girl wondered about zebra strips, another why recess was so short - whimsical thoughts from the minds of ten year olds. There was a small second when I could have indulged the pity that I was feeling and I almost did.
Then I thought, "Is it really that bad if Arden wonders why she got diabetes when so many others didn't? The simple answer was no. I found myself feeling proud that she wonders about her life and reminded myself that her writing didn't focus only on diabetes, in fact the poem was nearly thirty lines in length and this was the only mention. Arden saw herself as funny, athletic and confident about her future. She watches nature with curiosity and though Arden prefers quiet when she works, she doesn't judge others who don't. She didn't say she was sad, burdened and everything else about how she sees herself was intensely positive. There was absolutely no reason why I should allow myself to feel like her curiosity about diabetes was anything but that, curiosity. There are so many joyous aspects to who Arden is, she was celebrating them and she deserved for me to do the same.
I choose to be happy about all that Arden understands about her life and proud that she can reflect on her type I diabetes without wallowing. If she can do it, then I can too.
Arden won't know this for a long time but when she wrote that poem, she unwittingly added to my diabetes community with support that buoyed me. And so today I share her words with you in hopes that they will do the same.
The lesson that I took from my little girl's poem is a simple but profound truth.
Diabetes sucks but it isn't who we are. I decide when, where and how it makes me feel.
My name is Scott. I am a writer, a father, a husband and though sometimes I wonder why diabetes choose my daughter, I wonder a little less today because of her clarity and wisdom.
