Sugar Syndrome
Before a certain age Diabetes was not a pressing concern of mine. It was one of many vague hazards in the background. When acquaintances of about my age were heard to complain of it, I listened, took notice of their tone of desperation, and raised the threat level to just below maximum. A cursory review of the published facts on the syndrome confirmed my heightened awareness. I heeded the published advice to eliminate consumption of sugar entirely, reduce as far a possible the simple carbs, and monitor control of other contributing factors.
Recently, one such casual acquaintance—who had disclosed to me that he had been diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes—offered to me an update on his progress. He had just been “released,” as he put it, from six days of hospitalization to reduce his blood/sugar level. I did not say so, of course, but I found it absurd. Never mind the cost. Give thanks for the most generous—as well as the very best in every respect—medical care in the world. It was the first case of “rehab” for sugar abuse in my experience.
A friend died of it. I attended the funeral. I noted the relief on the faces of the family members present. It is a long, slow decline, without dignity, draining resources—material and emotional. During the perfunctory memorial for the deceased, I silently recalled have chided the individual for consuming pastry and other confections, after diagnosis, far into the physical suffering stage. He, like all diabetics, simply could not stop—not for me, not for anything.
In addition to having a personal aspect Diabetes is a behavioral matter—philosophically. I will never understand how a reasonable adult can gobble a nutritionally void desert—followed promptly by a booster self-injection of insulin. I have tried in vain to point-out to such persons the implicit contradiction. It, for me, a quick IQ test, for classifying on a personal scale further discourse allowing for circumstances. Henceforth, for me, it is as if talking to a child.
It is literally a matter of behavioral psychology. Not being a blood relation, the psychoanalytical root of the problem is beyond my scope—tact between friends. As friends we are not in direct competition and, so, I cannot help but marvel at the friend's inherent weakness for reward. Candy is offered to children as inducement. It is valid—for children—as motivation, teaches goal-seeking, how the world works. As an adult, the reward motive is presumed to advance beyond the symbolic character of candy, sugar, and sweets, replaced by money and what it buys.
An astute social critic might see in the personal contradiction of Diabetes the hot button issue of class struggle. Capitalism is incentive-ism (as everyone knows). Everyone, that is, who has successfully transitioned from reward behavior predicated on candy, to that of labor, wages, and ownership. As a matter of public concern, we may assume children discover at some point in their development that the motivational process may be circumvented, by taking—without permission—from the cookie jar. If caught in time, and corrected, the circle is complete. It is the children who are never called to account for pilfering cookies who may grow into adult Capitalists.
The graphic art of Brian Higgins can be viewed at: https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/8-brian-higgins