Thursday, February 7, 2013

Warning! Post contains profanity directed at glandular organs

So...Joe just stopped by my office to chat and he asked, "You're on Facebook poem, what, 30? How many Facebook poems are you going to do?" to which I responded "I'll keep doing them until people get tired of it and quit posting responses." Then there was this awful thought hanging around in my brain...what happens when people get tired of it and quit posting?

I'm going to put that one away in the deal-with-it-when drawer because, as I've said before, this experience has been great. I'm learning, growing, all that neat stuff. And because sometimes, like lately, my solo, only-in-my-head-poems want to go something like this:

An Open Letter to my Daughter's Endocrine System:

Go fuck yourself.

Which isn't really helpful or thought-provoking, and really leaves little to no room for revision. So, yeah. I'll keep writing them as long as my Facebook friends will indulge me.

My daughter is fine; she's wonderful. Smart, funny, beautiful, creative. And she still has type 1 diabetes. Always will. And right before, I mean the day before, I left for my last MFA residency, I got a letter from her endocrinologist that said her blood test was positive for antibodies indicating Hashimoto's disease, a disease that affects the thyroid's hormone production. She will have to be "monitored closely until after puberty" which means she will have to have blood drawn at every diabetic appointment from now until whenever. That's every three months. I haven't told her yet.

When A was diagnosed, she had to have an IV. Not at all a good experience for her. So every time she had to have blood drawn, she screamed and cried and kicked. Not that I blame her. Last year, we finally found a solution. I lay on her and cover her face. Then she gets a sticker, we go out to eat wherever and whatever she wants, and I give her her shot. Diabetes sucks.

Maybe I'll write a poem about A's thyroid someday when I'm not so angry and frustrated. How it looks like a butterfly at her throat. She would like that image. Until then, I'll continue writing poems with my Facebook community, continue getting out of my own head.

If you can, please donate to JDRF, Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. Our team name is Aurora's Royal Court out of Greenville, NC. One day, there will be a cure.