Diabetes gave me Santa

Santa from the Enchanted Village

Tonight, a very special man will visit lots of homes around the world.  My parents totally embraced Santa and all he stands for.  Mostly that the season is about giving, AND that he'll give you things you REALLY want even if your parents have said "No way Jose!"  And of course, there's the year I got an orange, when I should've gotten coal (the next year I got coal).  And oh yea, every Christmas I got REAL candy in my stocking.  This was my favorite.  And I got it one day a year, after Santa left it for me.  Even if I had the  opportunity to have it the rest of the year, I never did.  I got old enough where all my peers stopped believing; and then my friends joined them.  I can remember being outside for recess and all the kids talking about how NO ONE believed in Santa anymore and it was crazy if they did.  I just ran around with them and didn't say a word.  On the way to the Pops in sixth grade, I was in the car with my grandparents, mom and best friend, and I said something about Santa coming and my friend looked at me and said, "You know there's no such thing as Santa, right?"  Rather than believe her and be heart-broken, I said, "I only get the strawberry candy once a year and it's from Santa.  Of course there's such a thing as Santa!" And she said okay.  That was it, we kept going on and my friends knew, but no one ever said a word.  They knew why, and they knew me, so they just kept going on with their lives as if believing in Santa at 12 years old is completely normal.
Sometime that next year, my parents told me that there really isn't a Santa *gasp!* and that Christmas as a thirteen year old was the hardest Christmas I had ever experienced.  But now that I'm a nanny, the magic of Christmas is back, and this time it has nothing to do with diabetes :)