Fab Five Fridays: Word To Your Mother Edition

Let’s clear up any potential fallacies right off the bat: I never was a Vanilla Ice fan. At the time he was popular, I wasn’t even living in the United States. When Ice Ice Baby filtered up to Montréal, he had reached “let’s totally make fun of him” status with his shaved eyebrow and his white boy moves. (And the fact he sampled Queen and David Bowie’s masterpiece, Under Pressure, to this day makes me cringe.) Yet, I still find myself busting out two particular phrases from this song (this blog post’s title being one of them…), and so… Welcome to this week’s edition of Fab Five Fridays!

Mr. Ice may not be fab, but these mothers (And two dads, but there are no “word to your father” lyrics.) are the bomb. If you haven’t been introduced to these individuals yet, allow me the pleasure…

“Check out the hook while my DJ revolves it…” (I’m so sorry. So, so, so very sorry.)

1. Leighann Calentine of D-Mom.com – Prolific and filled to the rim with great information, Leighann recently wrote KiDS FiRST Diabetes Second: tips for parenting a child with type 1 diabetes. Her blog should be bookmarked for all PWDs, not just parents. She’s got a great page dedicated to the carb counts of snack foods and a great section for the newly diagnosed. Her daughter, Q, was diagnosed in 2008 at the age of three.

2. Lorraine Sisto of ThisIsCaleb.com. This woman is everywhere and I mean that in a good way. Lorraine is an advocate, co-hosting Diabetes ‘Rents at DSMA with another fab parent. She’s also an administrator over at TuDiabetes.org and an active member of Diabetes Advocates. She also has some crazy mad skills with her daughter’s hair, which makes me want to be adopted by her family just so I can have her do my ‘do. Her son, Caleb, was diagnosed in 2007.

3. Wendy Rose of CandyHeartsblog.com. Wendy’s daughter is not just Type 1… she’s also celiac, which means anyone who ever mentions celiac disease to me gets pointed straight over to Wendy. She’s the mom expert on this, as far as I’m concerned. Know what I love? She shared her daughter’s 504 plan online to help others. Hells, yes. I had the opportunity to meet her during a social media session at Friends for Life (and I use the word “meet” in the sense that we shared the same “careful what you name your blog” moment during the session.).

4. Mila Ferrer (and her husband, Jimmy) of Jaime, mi dulce guerrero rocks it for the Spanish speaking population. While I do speak other languages, Spanish is unfortunately not one of them. However, what I do know is that they have dedicated themselves to speaking up for the Type 1 community on a national level and give a beautiful voice to this disease. One of my regrets at Friends For Life was not having the opportunity to meet them. (And they have put “learn a fifth language” on my bucket list.)

5. And then comes Bennet Dunlap of Your Diabetes May Vary. I’ve mentioned him before, but I have a secret to share. Bennet was the first parent of a Type 1 that I met as an adult (my parents notwithstanding…) – and I was in my late 30s. (Yes, I babysat a Type 1 girl when I was in my teens, but we never sat down and talked about stuff…) He opened my eyes to the parent side of things and for that, I’m eternally grateful. The fact that he and I share the same type of sarcastic humor helps. His blog gives us insight on what’s going on in the FDA world of diabetes and he is tireless and relentless in the fight to stop the stupidity of diabetes management whenever he finds it. A co-host of Diabetes ‘Rents, member of the Diabetes Advocates, has a Masters in Health Communication, two phenomenal kids with Type 1, the catalyst behind Strip Safely, and one of the coolest peeps I know. I am honored to call him a friend and very glad that he is on our side.

Pick one. Or two. Or them all. See what they have to say. Share their blogs with others. I have only one other request for today…

Please don’t shave your eyebrow. Ever.