It’s been quite a week of sharing, reading and commenting for Diabetes Blog Week and I just want to give a big shout out to Karen Graffeo for spearheading this wonderful project.

Lets wrap up the week by sharing a little more about ourselves, beyond the chronic illness we or our loved ones live with.  Share an interest, hobby, passion, something that is YOU.  If you want to explore how it relates to or helps with diabetes you can.   Or let it be a part of you that is completely separate from diabetes, because there is more to life than just diabetes!

Yes there is definitely more to me than diabetes! I’ve worn many hats throughout the last 51 years. As a young girl, teenager and young adult I was a disciplined dancer with a heart set on being a professional one. I studied ballet and modern dance and spent hours and hours in studios refining my craft.

Eventually I  became a choreographer, danced professionally with companies in Queensland, Sydney and Tasmania and was the head of dance at a small dance college in NSW.  While all that dancing was going on I also took up yoga. I took my first yoga class at 17. And started getting serious when I was 23. I’ve been teaching and practicing yoga for over 30 years. Phew! When I look at that number I can’t believe it.

Besides my absolute passion for yoga and movement, I am also a musician. In fact a singer songwriter. I kind of keep that part of me on the QT. But I have produced three CD’s of devotional music. If you want to check out a music video I made of one of my songs I’ve posted it below. In it I share another passion; creating geometrical patterns out of flowers. In yoga they are called yantras and I have travelled all over the world facilitating workshops for people to create these.

Besides yoga, dance and music?

I’ve taught in the Steiner education system (Waldorf schools) in Australia and NYC, made kids yoga videos and been a performance poet.

I’m also a mother to a 23 year old son who lives in Melbourne and married to a yogi, South African who makes my heart melt.

I also live between South Africa and Australia…which means lots of travel, time zones etc. which does play havoc with a life with diabetes but somehow I’m still standing. Must be the yoga!

Oh and I am also a total nature freak! I try and spend every day in the forest, by the beach whatever I can manage.

So that’s me in a nutshell… most people don’t know me as someone who lives with diabetes. They pretty much forget most of the time because for 6 years I didn’t really let anyone know I had it. The last three years I have become way more public and involved and have started advocating for diabetes and sharing how  yoga has supported me personally to manage my health and how I am convinced it can help others. I’ve spent the last two years writing a book which will be published in the U.S on October 10, 2017.

So I am also a writer.

With my life so very full of all the different hats I wear to express myself creatively I have to work hard to chillax (thats what my Italian friend Carlo Alberto calls taking a chill pill) and that’s exactly what I plan to do once this week of diabetes blogging is over.

In the mean time i hope to read everyone else’s blog today so I can find out more about what you love and who you are beyond your life with diabetes!

Have a great weekend!

Rachel

If you’d like to find out more about how yoga can help you manage your diabetes each and every day check out the rest of my blog and if you’d like to get the first chapter of my book for free go here