Passing Through

I was approaching my 37th birthday, and slowly killing myself. At just under five foot eight, I weighed almost 400lbs and was a “Bad Diabetic,” as my elderly mother declares, as if there were any other kind. When I was diagnosed in 1988, Diabetes education was all but absent from medicine and Diabetes was not the national epidemic it is today. I did little to address the disease and eventually was taking more than the maximum doses of oral anti-diabetic medication and insulin injections, and my blood sugar levels were still abysmal. I was suffering from the effects of uncontrolled Diabetes. After a revelation in 2003, I changed my lifestyle. Through common sense weight loss and the pursuit of fitness, I not only beat the disease, I changed my life in unexpected ways. After walking off more than 125 pounds, I was able to discontinue all the medications. My blood sugar levels became perfectly normal, better than normal. The success I achieved is typical of the majority of overweight Type 2 Diabetics who make similar changes in their lives. “Carl's honest account of his weight loss journey is phenomenal. He literally saves his own life by changing what he eats. His nutritional advice includes proven methods for weight loss along with practical ideas for planning healthy meals and snacks. He shows that dramatic improvements in health are possible with better nutrition and increased physical activity. Inspiring and motivating!” -- Amy Pope, MS, RD, LD, CDE “Passing Through, Carl Moore’s memoir of his struggle with and on-going triumph over diabetes, is vivid and compelling and painfully honest. With the narrative energy of a page-turner, here is a story that left this reader much more informed about not only the disease itself, but also dieting strategies that work and those that don’t. I gasped, I cried, I laughed out loud. I could not stop turning the pages of this beautifully written book.” -- Cathy Smith Bowers, Poet Laureate of North Carolina “Carl’s is a poignant story of his personal struggle with the demons in his life. His story from diagnosis of Type 2 diabetes and subsequent love affair with food as an addiction is a lifelong journey. Food quieted the inner voice of not okay. The internal respect he gains from achieving professional successes plus love from family/friends leads him to accepting responsibility for his health management. Re-learning health habits of many years - for example not eating a bag of “orange cocaine,” or Cheetos, in his hourly commute from a city an hour away - was not easy. Patience with oneself as small strides are made toward reducing weight through physical activity and portion control is a reminder that it takes years to put it on and years to lose it. Carl has been an inspiration to my patients and me.” -- Elizabeth Todd Heckel, MSW, CDE - Lived with Type 1 diabetes for over 44 years. Camp “mother” and now “grandmother” to the Carolina’s largest overnight camp for children with diabetes, Camp Adam Fisher Everyone is touched by Diabetes in some way and everyone is affected by the growing drains on our national health care system. So much of it is preventable and reversible: “Although the genes you inherit may influence the development of Type 2 Diabetes, they take a back seat to behavioral and lifestyle factors. Data from the Nurses' Health Study suggest that 90% of Type 2 Diabetes in women can be attributed to five such factors: excess weight, lack of exercise, a less-than-healthy diet, smoking, and abstaining from alcohol.” The New England Journal of Medicine, Diet, Lifestyle, and the Risk of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in Women, 2001 Passing Through is about fighting a disease – Diabetes – an ongoing, daily battle fought with a fork and walking shoes. This is a story about losing weight -- and the advice will work for anyone – but this is not a typical how-to weight loss book. The wisdom of “Diet & Exercise” holds true even in our Starbucks and McDonalds society. For the swelling ranks of Type 2 Diabetics, this is a battle that can be won. Doctors, celebrities, and drug company representatives cannot deliver this message as effectively as someone who has faced mortality and returned alive and well. Passing Through is a message of truth and hope from someone who has lived it, someone who has faced the mortality of a terminal, debilitating illness epidemic in modern society.