Illness Narrative: Chronic Diseases

Illness Narrative
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Illness narrative
Introduction
Chronic diseases are essentially those diseases which are incurable and effecting even modest improvement requires a physician to understand the social and psychological aspects of the disease (Kleinman, 2010). The person I interviewed is a 37-year-old African-American woman, Maria Trenton, who is a married mother of 3 girls. She was first diagnosed with type 2 diabetes mellitus roughly 2 years ago. Prior to the interview session, I clearly informed this person that the interview is anonymous and that I will not be using her real name and I will not provide any other details such as phone number or address that may compromise her identity. Thesis statement: this person characterized getting diabetes as unavoidable because of family history and her unhealthy eating habits. Since her diagnosis, she made changes to her diet and now consumes more healthy foods and closely monitors her blood sugar levels. She believes that diabetes has robbed her independence and fears lower extremity amputations and kidney problems when she gets older.
Narrative
When this patient was asked what she thinks caused her diabetes, she identified strong genetic history of diabetes along with eating unhealthy foods as the main cause of her diabetes. She noted that poor diet, especially a diet with a high content of refined sugar, may have contributed to her getting diabetes. She pointed out that she used to consume a lot of fried foods all the time and a lot of sugar and butter sandwiches and chicken fried, and believes that this, along with family history, is what actually caused her diabetes.
Maria Trenton stated that her diabetes began when it did approximately two years ago since she experienced the symptoms related to undiagnosed diabetes, for instance unexplained weight loss, frequent urination and excessive thirst. She had consumed unhealthy diet for a very long time – has been eating unhealthy foods since when she was a teen – and in fact, she was not very surprised when she was diagnosed with diabetes because her 66-year-old mother also has diabetes. Apparently, Maria Trenton assumed a certain inevitability with regard to getting diabetes herself. After her diagnosis of diabetes 2 years ago, this person started to make healthier choices and changed her established eating habits. It is notable that a diabetes diagnosis is a major life event which causes the patient to re-examine his or her life, behaviours, as well as future options and plans (Miller, Akohoue & Brooks, 2014).
This person stated that what her diabetes does to her is that she had to change her diet very much. Following the diagnosis, she started to make healthier choices and changed her established eating habits. Prior to her diagnosis, she desired large portions and consumed foodstuffs high in cholesterol, sugar and starch. These days, she consumes smaller portions and has considerably reduced her consumption of foods and drinks rich in sugar. When asked about the severity of her diabetes illness, Maria Trenton pointed out that she experiences glaucoma and at times her blood pressure is high, but her diabetes is not very severe. However, she has not had a...