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Tuesday 19 August 2014

Some thoughts about sexual objects

There is a facebook conversation about sexual objects and men. Can men be sexual objects? The consensus seems to be that men cannot be sexual objects as women are. The conversation seems to be that when men are viewed as objects they are put on pedestal as a person whereas women are mere sexual objects. Women aren't remembered for their personality or what they do, but as sexual bodies. This discussion was brought up by the ALS challenge. Bucket of icy water is thrown over an actor or actress to raise awareness and funds for good cause. I agree that these causes are good, but I don't like the method. These are basically wet t-shirt contests for money. How is this different than a car wash with young women in bikinis? They are more widespread, I admit and lots of famous people are taking part in this. I still don't see the difference! It was even sadder, when one of the support groups I am in, were talking that we would need to do something similar to get attention and awareness to this condition as well. I don't have an issue to being in a bikini to get awareness to my cause and my illnesses but I'm saddened that to get them, someone would need to be half naked!

This ALS challenge lead the conversation to men's nakedness and how it's viewed. The attitude to women's barely covering themselves is not equal to men's. Men take their clothes off, it's alright. It's a person taking off their clothes. He still has his personality and character. Woman takes off her clothes, it becomes who she is. Is woman's sexuality and power that feared? Women have been feared for hundreds of years. We are the giver of life. We have power that men can't dream of! And when Christianity was in full force, we were deemed the deceiver who took the apple. I mean seriously!! We have come a long way from this but there is still long way to go! I don't think women's body will be equal footing with man's until the generations who were taught to believe women aren't equal have died.
There was an excellent timing with this topic. I was just doing an essay where part of the subject was women and our sexuality in specific culture. They (I can't speak about us, because I might be a woman, I'm not part of this particular culture) were very free sexwise. They could have sex with the person they chose and it was part of the culture. They had the power to choose and be free. Today and here, woman can't do that. She would get instantly stamp of being a slut! What is worse, is that men are more than allowed to sleep around! I don't exactly understand the morality of this. If men are supposed to sleep with lots of different people, are they supposed to be sleeping with other men since women are considered to be sluts if we partake in this? I think I need to cool down and get off my soap box for a while..

Update: I accidentally came across the reason for the bucket of ice water. It is a good reason and I get it but it still don't enterily like the challenge. It is a good cause and doing a stunt to raise awareness is a good thing but it's still too artificial for my taste. If anyone is reading this, you should check Sir Patrick Steward's contribution to the challenge, it's brilliant!

Wednesday 6 August 2014

On Being a Diabetic

Being a diabetic isn't always easy. There are so many things that affect the blood sugars and when the only source of insulin is external it's tricky. Things that make blood sugar crazy include weather, excercise, food, stress, and any combination of these. I started working as a cleaning lady and I was working on my feet 7 hours a day and in bad heatwave. Yeah, this is not the best combination. First week I had at least one hypo a day, that means hypoglycemic or low blood sugar. And several at home. It's not good. And it was only from the heat and work. If I had been working at winter, my blood sugars would have been more manageable but this way I had to lower my basal insulin 35% and I had to cut at least one unit from bolus insulin. Basal means long acting or with pump it means the basic dose you need to get all of the time. Bolus means a bonus insulin with pump or short acting with just injections, and that's a correction for food or high blood sugars. It's really tricky sometimes to try to predict what to take, because I need to know what's going to happen during the day. I take long acting insulin twice a day which makes it easier, since I need only to know what I will do today and I don't need to take into account for tomorrow as well, like I did with Lantus. I've got some spontanious streak from ADHD and sometimes I feel I need to do something because of the hyperactivity so the Levemir gives me better leeway with this. 
My work ended last Thursday and my blood sugars have been rising. I've been slowly increasing my basal insulin. Well I finally had some proper relaxation last night, good movie and laughing and since then I've had 5 hypos. My highs were from stress not from less excercise.. Sometimes, it's a guessing game with this condition. Some diabetics have problems loosing weight because we need to take so much extra meals because of hypos. Sometimes it's really hard to predict how much to lower basal insulin! We don't often have weight problems, or let me rephrase that: we have less weight problems than type 2 diabetics. Our condition isn't cured with low carb diet or the like. Our bodies don't make insulin at all! We'd die without any insulin!

But sometimes it is easy. Before the heatwave, every time I took my blood sugars, they were perfect! My hypothyroidism was, or is, under my control, not other way around and that helps with blood sugar control. I didn't have to worry about lows or highs. I didn't need to be religious about injections, I mean I didn't need to count the carbs with too much care. When my diabetes is balanced, it doesn't get off balance too easily. If I missed injection complitely I would be screwed for a while, but having a meal and counting the carbs slightly off wasn't big mistake. I could even eat a kiwi or similar, and not have any insulin and highest BS would get, was 12. For a short while, that's nothing dangerous. I'd just take unit or two more with next injection.