Limitations

A popular saying is that *insert illness/problems here* didn't stop me doing anything. But sadly for some diabetics that is the case because our pancreas doesn't work properly, as one of my friends so cheerfully reminds me, we are limited in our job opportunities. We cannot have a job in the: Armed forces, Fire service, Ambulance Service, Prison service, Airline pilots and Airline Cabin crew, Air traffic control and Offshore work.

The reason that we can't do these jobs is so that we could put other people at risk if we were to have a hypo. I fully understand why we can't do it but a lot of people have great control that wouldn't have any sort of problem and would be fine in those jobs. It's not every job in those fields jut some of them.

Other limitations we face include, and I am generalising here, the DVLA. The regulations they have set for diabetics are insanely unrealistic. For example if you have a hypo you can't drive for 45minutes afterwards. How an earth do they expect people to wait almost an hour to be able to drive. For example you have an exam that you have to get to and you have a hypo okay so you've factored in time to get to you're exam and have time to get prepared once you're there. But by following the DVLA's guidelines you are definitely going to be late. I'm fully with them on the fact that you should NEVER drive when you're low it's the same as driving drunk.

I understand where the DVLA are coming from but it does beg the question about who exactly they consulted with when writing the regulations. I read somewhere, and don't quote me on this, that the panel for the regulations was made up of two diabetics, two DVLA officials and two independent people. So these two diabetics managed to make sure that the rest of the diabetic community are really stuck if they have a minor hypo and have an important thing to get to.

Of course there are ways of getting around this but I would never encourage you lot to mess around with the official regulations, not at all.

Rhona x