My diabetology check-up is coming up. It’s not that I’m scared, but I think most of us “sweet ones” would gladly skip that part of the week. Still, the results are good, the labs are fine, and the pump shows about 80% time in range. If I got as stubborn as I was when I had the 780 on loan, I could probably reach 99%. Or… maybe not.
Whenever my blood sugar goes wild, I always think of my mom. When I was first diagnosed, she searched for every possible natural way to help me. I drank teas and even ate leaves to bring the sugar down. She mastered the world of flora so well, but the sugar just wouldn’t budge.
This year, I went back to olive leaves myself – picked them on Pašman island, brewed cooled tea, and hoped it would help. Maybe the tea did something, or maybe it was just my 780 endlessly firing corrections.
During check-ups, the doctor keeps mentioning that I don’t count carbs precisely enough. Weighing food is not an option for me, so I rely more on technology. And it doesn’t help that little bites sneak in while I cook – my passion.
Inspired partly by fellow diabetic Goran Kočiš being on the MasterChef jury, and partly by my own love for combining foods and finding worthy replacements for the carbs diabetics “hate”, I’m trying to balance my meals. My daughter – a student at a science gymnasium with an interest in nutrition – helps me a lot, and we often plan menus together.
After my mom passed away and my dad moved into a nursing home, my husband and I took over the family house and garden. Even though I can’t dig as much as before due to another illness, I still feel a deep satisfaction when I harvest what we’ve grown ourselves. It’s not just physical activity – it’s a connection to the soil that heals both body and soul.
We eat part of the harvest fresh, and the rest I preserve for winter. From tomato passata and salsa, to pickled beets and cucumbers, to jams and fruit spreads – I always try to invent new combinations. This year we’ll have aronia–fig jam, elderberry–apple, blackberry–apple, vineyard peach–apple, pear–peach. Although my jams are a bit runny because they lack sugar, they never go unused in my family, and I treat myself to them too.
Diabetes requires discipline, but it also allows small joys. And I’ve learned that balance doesn’t come only from the numbers on the pump, but from everything that gives us strength – family, the garden, cooking, and the small daily victories.
Author: Petra Martinovic
