Diabetic people injecting at the meal table whilst people are still eating?

[KatieWatie]

I'm not sure if I'm being unreasonable about this or not. I haven't said anything or done anything, but I'm a bit about it. I don't want to get accused of being unsympathetic.

It is my BIL, who I can't stand and he likes to make a big show of his various ailments, so maybe I'm being really unfair because of how I generally feel about him anyway. It's not done in a quiet way, he gets his wife to come round the table to do it and insists on showing off the needle, talking about it etc.

What do other diabetic people do?

I'm due to (reluctantly) go on holiday with them in a few weeks and I'm dreading every meal time (dreading the whole thing tbh but that's another story). My mum suggests I just walk away but then I think I would get thought of as precious.

[Rapaccioli]

Not saying it should be hidden to the extent that the person should be banished to the loo. It just seems that the OPs DB is making an issue of it. I'm the world's most unobservant person - a diabetic could inject next to me at the table and if they did it with neither fuss nor mention, I wouldn't even know.

If they waved the needle around and made a song and dance about it, they'd know all about it!

[ClaireDeLoon]

MIL is insulin dependent diabetic and I've never seen her inject herself when out for meals but maybe his is a different type of insulin and needs to be administered more immediately after food?

YANBU to think he should do it discreetly, but then if it needs doing when he is eating then it needs doing so you can't really object to it being done at dinner table at all. On the whole though YANBU he sounds like a show off arse.

[lunar1]

Just remind yourself to be grateful you are not diabetic. YABU

[Kallista]

YANBU. Insulin should be injected before a meal anyway, so he could take his blood sugar and inject in the lounge before sitting at the table. I have to take tablets with food but am very discreet. I know many diabetics / tablet takers and they prefer to be discreet too.
Certain people use illness as a way to show off - not sure why!

[fearnelinen]

I have teenage friend who has tailored all her clothes with discreet little pockets (she's a fashion student) and holes so that she can inject at the table with no fuss. Often we'll be 1/2way through and meal and I'll screech OMG - your INSULIN!!!!!!!!! And she's quietly pointed out that she's done it already!
My mum does it in front of me, but not my DH - she'll slink off if he's (or other men) around. When we're out, she'll do it at the table discreetly because people are usually engaged in chatting e.t.c. and she says it's more discreet than going to the toilet where she feels like a smackhead if she get's 'caught'!!! (She's new to it and has no idea how one uses smack!!!)

I think he IBU in making such a fuss, just ignore it as you would with an attention-seeking child.

at suppositories!!!

[tangarine]

My DS has had type 1 diabetes since he was 5 years old. We've brought him up to inject at the table, on the basis that he didn't choose to develop diabetes, but people who don't like to watch can choose to look away. Now that he is in his teens he prefers to inject in private anyway.

Eglu, there's every need to do it at the table, as sometimes you don't know how much insulin you are going to need until you see the portion size.

OP, I can understand how you feel and I would probably have felt the same was as you do before diabetes came into my family's life. Is it a relatively recent thing that he's still coming to terms with, which is why he's making such a big fuss?

[LordOfTheFlies]

Oh and apparently now you don't say diabetic its have diabetes.
Its a condition not something that defines the person/
EG have disability not disabled.
I work in NHS and they are soooo up on their Diversity and Equality,makes my brain hurt.I mean is someone likely to be offended if i ask "
"are you diabetic" rather than " do you have diabetes"
Does it also mean having pregnancy rather than being pregnant

[Rapaccioli]

Knitter, chances are that you and I have been at the same dinner party or next-door tables in the same restaurant and I've been blissfully unaware. No problem with your attitude, wish you didn't have to inject though. :(

[tangarine]

Sorry - there were only two replies when I started mine!

[lynehamrose]

Yanbu- its just bad manners to make a big show of something and force it in peoples faces.

To those people who say 'but why shouldn't people with a disability be treated like everyone else' - exactly. Being treated like everyone else means not making a massive show of it- brandishing the needle and giving a running commentary. Sounds like he wants it both ways tbh. Nothing wrong With administering medicine appropriately at table (and by inappropriate I mean things like anusol!) but everything wrong with making a song and dance about it. He sounds like a right PITA

[onadifferentplanettoday]

My daughter,discretely injects at the table and no one we know has ever had a problem with it. I don't see why she should have to hide away in a toilet to do it.

[LordOfTheFlies]

tangerine brownie points 4U

[ipswichwitch]

my sil uses the dial-pen injector thingy ( i thought most diabetics did TBH), and she does have to do it pretty quick after eating, but it's done so quick it's more of a blink and you'll miss it. i don't think it's U to use these devices at the table, as you can't see anything anyway, but it's a bit ridiculous for him to make such a song n dance about it. also why can't he just do it himself??

[tangarine]

Sorry LOTF, I don't understand.

[whathellcall]

Catch yourself on Rapaccioli, have you actually seen the pen diabetics use nowadays? Your great granny may have had a syringe, but nowadays you can barely see the tip of the needle on the pen used to inject insulin. My husband is diabetic, and when we were first going out for meals he used to go the toilet to inject, until I told him he'd no call to do that. It takes two seconds to use the pen, and there is really nothing to see. Sounds like the OP has a general problem with her BIL, which may be fair enough for other reasons, but it doesn't excuse making out that a diabetic taking their insulin is in someway offensive or disgusting .

[GeekCool]

Why shouldn't he mention what he is doing? Maybe he has issues with his illness, diabetes can be extremely dangerous and perhaps this is his way of coping.
I don't see how contact lenses are comparable with a need for insulin. I don't see why he should have to be discreet so no needle or flesh are seen, however yes a modicum of his respect for others at the table would be useful.

[KatieWatie]

Wow I didn't expect to get called "horrible" for asking the question - thanks for that cravingexcitement. For the record I have said nothing about the injecting though made it clear that I don't want to look when he is flashing the needle round the table and telling everyone what its contents are. I don't think this makes me 'horrible'. I'm not expecting him to go to a toilet ffs. I just want him to realise that not everyone is fascinated by his medical paraphenalia.

EvenLessNarkyPuffin is correct - it's not the injecting that bothers me at all, I totally understand this. It's the big production and what I would term attention-seeking.

And yes I know it's odd to be going on holiday with him but I had very little choice due to my FIL's death last year and a desire on the part of my DH and his sister to take my MIL away somewhere this year, which is fair enough really.

Thanks for the input everyone, it's useful to get other people's views.

[lynehamrose]

To sum it up: he is Behaving in a way which shows he defines himself by his disability- 'look at me, I have a disability, look at the needle,' etc
The irony being that people who bang on about it are then the first to complain when they feel others are seeing the disability first, and not the person.
There are thousands of people living quietly with disabilities who don't ram it down peoples throats or make it central to whatever activity is going on.
I get the feeling thats all the op is saying . Not that she objects to someone administering essential medicine, but just making such a bloody big deal of it

[springbokscantjump]

Most of the diabetics I know do it at the table but in a really discrete manner - if you weren't paying attention, you'd miss it. I'd be irritated by someone making a big deal of it too.

[Miggsie]

Pray he never has a colostomy bag fitted...

[8Ace]

I don't see the big deal about it. He's not like he's injecting smack into his cock veins at the dinner table!!

Maybe you would see it differently if you relied on an injection to live.

[Rapaccioli]

what, that's the point - there is no need for the great show that the BIL is making, yet still he does it, to the discomfort of fellow diners. It's a bit like needing the loo or whatever - you do what you do discreetly, with consideration for others.

[AlpinePony]

YABU.

My mum does this (very discretely).

Do you know anything about diabetes? The insulin has to be taken at a specific time. If my mum goes in to the ladies before/after she's ordered she has no idea when the food which actually arrive on the table and the consequences if she's already taken her insulin can be dire - in extreme cases (although unlikely in a restaurant) this would be coma + death.

It's not like chowing down on a fucking antacid!

[lynehamrose]

8ace - I know several insulin dependent diabetics. None of them make a big deal about injecting. I don't see why the op would see it any differently. I imagine if she develops a condition which requires life saving medications, she would simply administer it without calling everyone elses attention to it

[lynehamrose]

Has anyone else noticed the op didn't mention injecting in the toilet- only people who are slating her! How odd to suggest people should go to the loo to administer meds.....