Valley residents learn difficulties of living with diabetes

Published online on Saturday, Feb. 14, 2009

Ramona G. Marquez, 60

Background: Ramona G. Marquez, of Calwa, a mother, grandmother and great-grandmother, learned she had diabetes about 30 years ago. She worked as a telephone operator helping people place calls to Mexico. She had to stop working and go on disability.

She went to the doctor because "I was shaking all the time," she said.

When she was younger, she used to carry around a bag of cookies in the car instead of eating regular meals during the day. Her mother and father had diabetes - both died of its complications about 20 years ago - but she didn't worry about it for herself.

What diabetes has done: She is on dialysis three times a week due to kidney failure. She has lost eyesight in her right eye. Nerve damage in her legs makes them go numb and hurt. Most of the time, she sits at her kitchen table, where she can watch her sons fix cars in the driveway.

On an afternoon earlier this month, she was at the table. "I can't sweep, can't vacuum, can't make my own bed," she said. "The only thing I can do around the house is wash dishes, but I have to do them in episodes."

What she does to control her diabetes: Marquez has to give herself four shots of insulin a day. She hates needles and does a finger stick only once a day - each morning - to check her blood-sugar levels. She agreed, though, to check it on a recent afternoon. The reading was high: 482 milligrams per deciliter. A normal range after lunch would be 180 mg/dl. She knows why it's high, she said. She had forgotten her insulin shot 30 minutes before lunch because she got a telephone call.

For about the past three years, she has gone to Community Dialysis in Fresno from 5:15 to 9:15 a.m. three times a week. It used to depress and terrify her. "I cried day and night," she said. She accepts it now. But the fear returns when someone she has met at dialysis has died or someone has an amputated leg.

She said the thought is hard to avoid: "When is my turn going to come up?"

What help she gets: "I don't have anybody to take care of me," she said. Her husband is disabled from a brain tumor. She has Medi-Cal and Medicare insurance.

Juan Blancas, 47

Background: Juan Blancas, 47, a Visalia mechanic, doesn't know how long he's had diabetes. He found out he was diabetic two years ago when doctors at the University of California at Los Angeles were treating him for cirrhosis of the liver and hepatitis. He drank alcohol for 18 years, five of them chronically, he said. He has been sober for 15 years.

What diabetes has done: He got a bacterial infection in his right foot last April that didn't heal. He spent 3.5 months in the hospital in Visalia. Doctors feared they would have to amputate, but were able to control the infection.

While in the hospital, he was evicted from his home. He now lives in a garage behind a friend's home.

On a day last month, he sat on the edge of his bed in the garage in a heavy sweater he wears to protect himself from the cold.

He feels weak a lot of times, he said in Spanish. Doctors told him he could work four hours a day, but he hasn't been able to find a job as a mechanic. He can't work in the fields, because exposing his feet to dirt is too dangerous, he said.

What he does to control his diabetes: He says he checks his blood sugar twice a day and takes oral medication. He tries to eat three healthy meals a day, "but sometimes I'm not able," he said. He no longer eats red meat, doesn't drink coffee or caffeinated sodas, and he has lost about 30 pounds. At 5 feet 7 inches tall, he weighs about 210 pounds.