With a little help from my friends...

Friends. They're amazing. But I think sometimes you don't actually realise how good you've got it, and how wonderful they really are until you're in it deep. And I don't just have it good. I have it great. I just don't say it often enough.

If it wasn't for my friends, I don't know what would be going on with me right now. It was one of the most wonderful people I have in my life who pushed, urged and damn near kicked me to go and see a doctor in the first place. It was my friends who sat with me in hospital til 12:30 in the morning so I wouldn't be alone. They were the ones who made me laugh til I wanted to cry, who burned me cds so I wouldn't be bored, brought me books, spent hours on the phone with me when they couldn't physically be there.

It's been my friends who've asked me loads of questions so they know what's going on, but who've also known when to back off and give me some space. Some who have sat with me and listened to me as I've cried and moaned. Who drove an hour each way to go and pick up test strips for me when I'd been a complete plonker and forgotten to put in a prescription, and was manically worried that I was going to run out over the weekend.

It's been friends that I've called when I've been alone having a hypo, and just wanted someone to know. They've been the ones who've then said that they'll call me or come and find me if they've not seen or heard from me in ten minutes. They've been the ones who've known when it's right to make jokes, and when it's not appropriate. They've not been the Food Police on me, but simply had gentle curiosity, which I'll been forever grateful for.

I've been surprised by how much people care who I perhaps hadn't anticipated to. And I've felt unbelievably humbled by it.

Now I don't want you to go on thinking that my family haven't been great as well, but though I talk to them a lot, I don't see them very often. It's my friends that are my second family - the one I chose, and the ones I live and work with every day.

So this is my small way of saying thank you to each one of them. You know who you are - I love you, and I salute you all for being completely amazing people that my life would be that much poorer without.

Thank you so much. I couldn't do this without you.

xx

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