I'm growing tired of reading article after article written by medical professionals about diabetes empowerment.

Are there other chronic illnesses where you're considered "empowered" if and only if you perform self-management tasks? Or is that just a diabetes thing?

1/n

Being empowered is not about suddenly being willing to check your blood sugar five times a day. It is about demanding access to the supplies you need to check as often as feels right for you.

But these articles don't acknowledge that side of it at all.

2/n

These articles about diabetes empowerment inherently suggest that the only power diabetics have is over their own attitudes.
Maybe I'm just bitter, but empowerment has f*ck all to do with attitude. It is about gaining power within the oppressive systems that deny us health!
3/n

Since 2015, I've been working on a position paper that talks about the way medical professionals have co-opted the term. I'm still wrapping my head around why their misuse of the term irks me so much. But I think I now have a clearer idea of why...

4/n

The medical establishment is making no effort to change the systems of oppression we navigate as chronically ill people. They create cutsie progams to "empower" us, which insidiously identify us as the problem.

I am so tired of behavioral interventions trying to fix me.

5/n

Diabetes doesn't make me broken. & you can't empower me to "take better care of myself" because Im literally always doing everything in my power to do the best I can. Empowering me should look like giving me resources to change the system & being an ally alongside that fight.
6/n

Maybe if we can shift the concept of empowerment in the medical system, we might actually see a shift in the health of people with diabetes overall.
Louder for those in the back: empowerment is about shifting power toward the marginalized, not about compliance. Got it?
7/n

[image description: animated gif from movie "Superstar" of a white woman in a blue dress and glasses slamming a door shut]

8/8