Hi, my name is Jason Roelofs. I live in San Antonio, TX; work in software and I’m a diabetic. At least I used to be. I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in March of 2015. I remember going to see my doctor with a small issue. I had a bug bite that wasn’t healing. I had experienced these a few times. Some small sore or bite that just got worse rather than getting better. I was overweight and had been for a long time. In my mind, I was just your typical dad with a deskjob. Sure, I’d packed on a couple pounds *cough cough*, but I’d always been a big guy, besides I had a wife and three growing kids that demanded all the energy I had left after my workday. And it wasn’t like I was as out of shape as a number of people I could tell you about. In the end, none of that mattered. I was sick. I’d been given a death sentence, that sentence was that I would die before I wanted to unless I did something about it. (One of my life’s goals is to know my great-grandchildren.)
I won’t get into all the actions and encouragement I had along the way (that’s what the blogs for), but I was able to go back to my doctor six months after I was given my DS (diagnosis/death sentence) and was told that I was no longer diabetic. In fact, I wasn’t even pre-diabetic. I was “cured”. I was on cloud nine. Time to party! Bring on the pizza, ice cream, soda, etc! Well, I wasn’t that stupid. For the next few months I continued to lose weight and improve my bio-markers. Unfortunately, just before the 2015 holiday season I had a nasty fall, tumbling head first down a concrete driveway. I ended up with injuries to my arm, shoulder, ankle and knee. I had to wear an arm immobilizer and walking boot for nearly a month. I’m sure you can guess how this went. I was feeling sorry for myself and unable to find much enjoyment other than the comfort foods I had regularly eaten pre-DS. Besides, it was the holidays! (said every backsliding carb addict ever…) I did improve things marginally after the holidays, but I was on that slow road back to where I’d been.
Fast forward another year and the new wardrobe I started buying myself pre-injury just wasn’t fitting. I had been monitoring my blood sugar every once in a while and it wasn’t getting out of hand like it had before, but I did have spikes here and there that raised my eyebrows. I had changed a number of my food “norms” during my first recovery so there was no need to panic, but I could tell I was making progress (just not in the right direction!) I was introduced to the idea of a ketogenic diet by a tech community here in San Antonio called Geekdom when they brought in Richard Morris and Carl Franklin from the 2 Keto Dudes podcast. These were two guys who were diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes, worked in software, and had overcome their DS, like I had. I decided that it was time to stop my slow crawl back to sickness and adopt a keto diet. I’ll be sharing my experience with this as well. Nearly 13 pounds lost in the first week! (mainly water weight, but still…)
So now that you know a little about me, I want to share why I decided to start this blog. I named it “not2long” for a couple reasons.
- I want to encourage others dealing with diabetes, pre-diabetes and insulin resistance. To make known that you don’t have to be a diabetic long if you take the right actions to reverse it. There is hope for those given a death sentence!
- Contrary to this About page, I plan to keep my blog posts of the shorter variety (i.e. not2long). I know how busy we all are and desire to post daily against a theme. So I’ll be keeping things as short as possible.
- While I may have avoided my Type 2 death sentence, my original death sentence still stands. I, like everyone else, will someday leave this earth. I, like everyone else, don’t know the day or the hour when it will occur. I do know that even if it’s sixty years from now, that’s not2long. As such, I’ve chosen to follow Christ and let His Holy Spirit empower me to deal with life’s struggles. While I plan not to be overly-preachy in my general posts. I am reserving Sunday to speak words of encouragement that have helped me, sourced from God’s word.
Since I’m writing this on a Sunday, I’ll end by sharing one of my favorite verses that has encouraged me throughout this process. It comes from John 11, where Jesus is being told that Lazarus is deathly ill by Lazarus’ sisters.
3 So the sisters sent to him, saying, “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” 4 But when Jesus heard it he said, “This illness does not lead to death…” John 11:3-4a
THERE’S HOPE. THIS ILLNESS DOES NOT LEAD TO DEATH! Feel free to message me if you would like me to pray with you or would simply like to know more about the man who raised the dead and heals the sick. God bless!
P.S. The picture in the header is of me near the peak of Camelback Mountain in Phoenix Arizona a little over a year after my Type 2 DS. In it, I was nearly 70 pounds lighter than when I was first diagnosed and had achieved something I’d never dreamed I could do. I climbed a mountain trail rated Extremely Difficult in a place even hotter than South Texas. By God’s grace, this is just the beginning of the new heights I will explore!
not2long 