Everyone has their ways to deal with pain. Be it with silence, overwhelming emotions, or creative outlets like music, art, or poetry. When I was diagnosed with type 2 DM, quite the time went in grasping what was happening to me and my body. Unlike a physical wound or a surgery, the pain wasn’t tangible. It was all happening inside with my glucometer being the only 'visible' indicator. And even that was just numbers. Due to the stigmatic upbringing of society, speaking was not encouraged, leaving me to deal with my emotions by myself. All the mood-swings, the questioning phases, and troubling thoughts in me found a way out through art.
Over the years, I slowly started opening up about my condition by creating imagery of co-existing, hoping that, by visually seeing a happy/confident version of me, the real me would have someone to look up to. At that time, I had broken my personality in me into 2 half’s – The ‘perfect’ girl who made everyone happy and worked hard on being ‘ideal’ and the other who just felt like doing what she wanted to do, for instance, dying her hair red and getting a tattoo. She was all ‘unconventional’. And by unconventional, she was the personality who had diabetes and the perfect girl didn’t. While this topic will need another article on its own, the reason why I had to bring this up was for how I viewed myself. I was at a point where I had to start loving myself and accept that the unconventional girl didn’t need her own personality to exist. This led me to write my first love letter to myself, who was facing diabetes every day.
The imagery I drew is of a red-haired girl growing plants inside a heart of blue. The pink here could be taken as blood or just love. The plants signify growth within me as I start learning about myself and my condition, slowing making peace and accepting it with my heart.
I also didn’t want to change the emotions I had at that moment, so feel free to read the original text I wrote alongside the artwork. You can also see this as an IG post on Instagram
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4.02.2019 My Valentine
‘Finding a guy for you is hard’ ‘You are diabetic’
These are the words I have heard for a long time. You are fat, you don’t do anything, you won’t get a guy. Same words hurt less. Why is my illness a cripple? Yes, it’s hard. It’s been way harder. I have been single all along and I don’t think I need to blame my illness for it. Moreover, It’s the thing I struggle with, I don’t understand it, I rebel and then make peace with it? Sounds so much like a relationship ey?
So this is my love letter to you, I really hate you. I really don’t like how you control my life.I hate that I have to be possessive of you and keep you in check. I was ignorant. Took us for granted and now I am at a rocky stage with you. But then, you were also a wake-up call to me, who was down the path of devastation. You made me drowsy, mad, irritated, and anxious. All the signs to tell me ’Something is wrong, we ain’t working out’ Cut to all these struggles, the dark hours till the year 2019.I met many like me, many different and same. Everyone had it hard but is making peace to co-exist. Instead of the possessiveness, I decided to mature up and look at you again. I was running away, and now I had to face you, once again. And yes, You were indeed my wake up call. And I am glad I answered it.
I’m a little late but this rocky path made me realize that for us to work, I had to start loving myself first. Take control of myself to control you. I am so jealous of how others seem to have it easy and we fight so much. Always high, randomly low. But hey, you took years from my life, and guess what, I am adding them back. We are dependent on food, yes, but ey, which relationship isn’t. Sadly, I have no romantic story, miracle love partner but hey, Probably I was aiming at the wrong thing all along. Need to sort my current relationship and then move on to the next. So to the single me, It’s okay to be jealous of how people find their significant other. It’s ok if tinder doesn’t work out and above everything… It’s okay to be diabetic. It’s not your fault, Kinda is sometimes. Step by step, it’s time to figure things out and embrace me as I am.
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PS: I did manage to break my shell and impulsively colored my hair red.
Not the bright red as I thought it to be, but with some friends and drug-store brought dye, breaking out of the mold was a very liberating experience similar to writing this one down.
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