Peter J. Nebergall Diabetes is a serious disease. Its consequences can be major, even life-threatening, and it can kill you quickly if ignored. We know this. But there are still many people, folks with diabetes and folks around them, who do not take the condition seriously.
Denial is the psychological state in which one feels exempt from reality.
But if you have diabetes, denial, used as an excuse to NOT practice good self-management, is about as subtle as drinking slow poison. There are many reasons, most having more to do with a person's self-image and psychological state than with the nature of the disease. Like the onset of grey hair and arthritis, the demands of diabetes remind the sufferer that he is not eternal. Some folks don't want to hear it, and tune it out. Some people get mad.