Nearly every movie I have ever seen with a character with diabetes was awful verging on dangerous.
The typical scenario is some major event is going down e.g. a planes crashes in the desert where the is no water and certainly no carbohydrate, and everybody is desperately trying to find the insulin to give to the 'hypo' diabetic... argh.. it would kill them quite quickly by hypo seizures, coma etc.
As I say to my friends and colleagues, if you find me in difficultly give me carbohydrates, if I perk up in 15 mins then all is well if I don't then the slightly higher sugar can be dealt with later. Don't ever give me insulin or let me take it without testing my blood.
Don't the medical advisers to these corporations know anything about diabetes.
Then a month or so ago a close friend who also works with people with disabilities asked me to watch the British film "Broken" as she wanted my opinion.
At last a great film with an almost accurate portrayal of diabetes.
The story is quite simple with the portrayal of 'normal people in normal life' and an 11 year old insulin dependent diabetic girl called 'Skunk' (newcomer Eloise Laurence) who lives with her brother and single parent father (Tim Roth) in an english cul-de-sac. Like all of us we don't get to pick our neighbours and Skunk is living next to the school bullies. Skunk also has a neighbour with a learning disability who she treats with kindness and respect, so what could go wrong?
I found the movie gripping, its portrayal of how normal life is for Skunk despite her diabetes was really positive, and the local boy with other difficulties is no harm to anybody. But then lies and discrimination from the bullies and ignorance and intolerance cause everything to rapidly spiral out of control with devastating consequences.
I thoroughly recommend this as a film.
Here is what Amazon UK
and Amazon USA
This video deals with some adult themes so you may not be suitable for younger children, so I suggest adults watch it first before showing the kids.
Please let me know what you think if you watch it.
Malcolm
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Its only worth while me spending time on blogs If I know they are being read and it is not easy to know. So If you have taken time to read a blog entry then please leave a comment or question. Thanks Malcolm