OPINION & EDITORIAL
Diabetics’ only limit is ignorance
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Thursday, January 31, 2002
Wisconsin’s Mike Echols has great stopwatch speed and character and was rated as the No. 1 corner by one scouting combine this past spring.
Unfortunately, he is only 5-foot-9 … He also is an insulin-dependent diabetic who must take shots regularly. While he has never missed a game at Wisconsin, it is still a major concern.
-Joel Buchsbaum, Pro Football Weekly talent scout for the NFL Draft
Buchsbaum knows more about pro football than I do. He is a respected evaluator of football talent; I am just an avid fan. His draft guides sell thousands of copies; my armchair advice to NFL teams has yet to find a wide audience.
But I do know more about diabetes than Buchsbaum does. Like Echols, I am a diabetic, and because I am, I feel qualified to say the following:
Joel Buchsbaum is full of it.
I have never really felt the “obligation of the cured” to raise awareness of the disease—first, because I refuse to acknowledge that we are different, and second, because it has not been cured. I feel there is a disproportionate amount of research and money being spent on treatment rather than a cure, when this cure seems so much within reach. Ever since I was diagnosed with the disease at age 10, I have heard experts say a cure “is only a few years away.” But a widespread cure has not been found, and this failure has only embittered me toward drug companies that seem to sacrifice the greater good of a cure for the greater profits of lifelong treatment.
But in this case, I cannot help but defend Echols from the ignorance of this NFL analyst, particularly because it may be highly damaging to Echols’ hopes of being a high draft choice. It also challenges the very principles I have applied in dealing with the disease.
When I was first in the hospital after being diagnosed, my doctor gave me a speech that has always stuck with me: He said diabetes cannot keep me from doing anything I want to do.
I listened to him. I always played organized sports, had overnighters at friends’ houses and took cross-country trips without my parents. My parents were great about it, so unlike many other parents of diabetics who refuse to let their children do anything that might pose a risk—like play football.
There is a risk; I will not deny that. Physical activity can lower diabetics’ blood sugar levels to dangerous depths, sometimes to the point where they pass out or have seizures. I have been there, and it isn’t fun—the looks of horror and fear on people’s faces as they try to pour orange juice down your throat are just as bad as the physical feelings of being out of control.
But that never has to happen on the playing field if diabetics are careful—if they monitor themselves often and take precautions. Echols clearly does this: he checks his blood sugar several times before and during the game, and if it is questionable he eats carbohydrate-rich foods or downs sugary sports drinks. If it is too high, a condition that can cause fatigue, he can take some short-acting insulin to bring it down to normal. This is all it takes; if Buchsbaum knew that, he would have realized that one of his fears—that Echols might miss games due to diabetes—is almost laughable.
I could understand his concern if there were documented evidence that diabetes disadvantages athletes, similar to his concern over Echols’ diminutive height at a position that often demands it. But diabetes did not get in the way of Jackie Robinson. Or Hall-of-Fame pitcher Catfish Hunter.
Or gold-medal swimmer Gary Hall Jr. Or Cubs third-baseman Ron Santo.
In football, it never held back 19-year veteran quarterback Wade Wilson. Or nine-year starting tight end Jonathan Hayes. It does not bother Poison lead singer Bret Michaels, rapper Q-tip, or Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee, all of whom get serious workouts on stage (not to mention Lee’s other, umm, athletic pursuits).
If anything, a player’s diabetes should be seen as a strength in the eyes of NFL scouts. It requires total discipline, total responsibility and complete self-reliance—the kinds of qualities that any adult success demands. In dealing with diabetes as a football player, Echols also shows his determination; after all, doesn’t his desire to play despite the hassle of constant monitoring show his dedication to and love for the sport?
But Buchsbaum doesn’t see it that way. He sees diabetes as a “concern” rather than a show of strength and maturity, and this characterization flies in the face of everyone who tells diabetics that their disease cannot hold them back from anything they want to do. Our only limits are set by people with the ignorance of Buchsbaum, who, by the unsubstantiated fear that we will not succeed, discourage others from letting us prove what we already know:
Diabetics’ potential, like everyone else’s, is limited only by the depth of their desire.
Matt Lynch (mlynch@badgerherald.com) is a junior majoring in English and political science.
