Despite the fact that temperatures here in the Valley of the Sun (or as my brother likes to call it The Actual Sun) continue to hover around 100 degrees, it's technically fall, which means that flu season is upon us.

I don't think I ever got a flu shot prior to getting diabetes. I was healthy for the most part and likely didn't understand what the flu really is. And even four years into the disease, last fall was the first time I got the shot since being diagnosed.

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"I noticed that you're diabetic," D. said looking over the patient information form as I was nursing the flu-shot-injection-site on my right arm.

"Yes," I said. Geez, I thought to myself, that's usually one of the first things I mention in a situation like this. I can't believe I didn't say anything up front. Could have been because I was the last in my family of five to go and I was busy comforting my children. (No. 2 volunteered to go first!) Interestingly, I wasn't looking forward to the shot. Actually kind of dreading it. I knew it was going to hurt. I've almost passed out in years past from shots in my arm. It's not the injection, it's the medicine -- it stings.

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