BR>
Before you continue… You really need to see THIS if you have diabetes
(will open in new window)
The End of Diabetes: The Eat to Live Plan to Prevent and Reverse Diabetes
Looking for something special ? Find The Lowest Price Right Here
It’s Diabetes Awareness Month, an occasion that doesn’t seem quite right without Wilford Brimley. The celebrated actor and diabetes supplies spokesman passed away last year, in the summer of 2020. He was 85 years old and struggling with kidney disease, a diabetic complication. Few have brought as much attention to diabetes.
Brimley’s career as a diabetes advocate blossomed far beyond anything he could have imagined when he first took a call from free will Medical Supply. As a paid spokesman on national television, Brimley was practically the face of diabetes for Americans. But that was just the beginning of his impact as an influencer. Years after the ads had stopped running, Brimley was rediscovered by internet users, his face and peculiar pronunciation spread far and wide across the web. And while for many he was used as fodder for cheap jokes about bad diets and poor health, to the diabetes community he became a kind of beloved mascot, embraced with creativity and affection.
Brimley’s influence has outlived him, and will continue to do so.

A sticker for sale at the Diabetic Designs storefront on Redbubble.
The gruff, mustachioed Brimley was a celebrated character actor that reached his height of success in blockbuster movies like The Natural and Cocoon. But he was perhaps best known for his participation in two long-running national television commercial campaigns, the first for Quaker Oats oatmeal (“it’s the right thing to do”), the second for Liberty Medical’s diabetes supplies. It was these latter ads – and especially his unique habit of pronouncing diabetes as “diabeetus” – that would ensure his enduring fame in the diabetes community.
Younger readers may have no memory of the Liberty Medical Supply ads, but they were seemingly ubiquitous on television in the late 80s and 90s. As a child, I could not have told you what diabetes was, but I knew damn well that men and women with the condition should, per Brimley’s advice, “check your blood sugar, and check it often.”
Brimley was and still is the butt of many mean-spirited jokes. He’s used as a pejorative symbol for those that ignorantly associate diabetes with gluttony and sloth. Nevertheless, he was warmly received by people with diabetes, and is an icon in the diabetes online community. Wilford Brimley-inspired art is popular, and diabeetus memes haven’t gone out of fashion yet. A quick search online will bring you to Brimley t-shirts, stickers, hats, mugs, and aprons. You might also be shocked at how many people have gotten “diabeetus” tattoos inked.
Why was Wilford Brimley so well-suited to the cause of diabetes awareness? Why, for example, was this crabby old coot adopted by a younger generation of internet users with type 1 diabetes? I think his personality was somehow most appropriate for it.
As an actor, he specialized in characters that were cantankerous but sincere, crusty old cowboys with hearts of gold. In many interviews he explained that he didn’t really realize how to act, and that in every function he played he was fundamentally himself. It was a personality almost perfectly calibrated to represent diabetes, a disease that demands both grit and humility. In the typical Liberty ad, Brimley would exhort the viewer to take their condition seriously, while acknowledging his own failures: “I’m not perfect.”
In 2018, our writer Sysy Morales wrote about what Wilford Brimley meant to her and her sister, both of whom have type 1 diabetes. Her sister Ana is a painter, and has painted at least one tribute to Brimley, stating that “For me, those Liberty Medical commercials are my earliest memory of seeing or hearing about diabetes on a platform that reached millions of diabetics and non-diabetics alike.”

“Wilford” by Ana Morales.
Brimley had a great attitude about his diabetes celebrity. On his Twitter account, he promoted diabetes charities and shared stories of others with the condition. In one of his last tweets, he joked that his pro wrestling name would be “The DIE-A-BEASTUS.”
Brimley far outgrew his position as a paid spokesman; he embraced his role as a national diabetes role model. In 2008, the American Diabetes Association presented him with a special award in recognition of his advocacy.
Brimley was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in 1979, in his mid-forties. I encourage you to listen to Brimley discuss his condition in detail in this long-form video produced by Liberty Medical. His characteristic and compelling blend of toughness and vulnerability is on full display. When speaking of his diagnosis, he says: “I was scared. A man doesn’t like to admit he was scared, but I truly was.”
And then there’s “diabeetus.” There’s just something about Wilford Brimley’s ridiculous pronunciation – a pronunciation that he clung to for his entire life, as far as I can tell – that pricks the balloon of diabetes. Diabetes is such a stressful and all-encompassing condition, requiring nearly constant mindfulness: a little levity is extremely welcome. The word “diabeetus” makes everyone smile. As Brimley himself said, “One of the things I’ve learned to do is laugh at myself, kinda loosen up, kinda relax about the whole thing… people do learn to live with this, and along the trail, you’re gonna find some things that you oughta be laughing at.”
For me, Brimley’s face conjures up an instant story of a tough, reticent, and indelibly American man – he was literally a cowboy in his youth! – humbled by diabetes, forced to confront his own fragility, and doing it with good humor.
“The more diligent you are, the faster you’ll get better, and the better you’ll feel.”
“Do the best you can with what you got, and be thankful that you’re in no worse shape than you are.”
Looking for something special ? Find The Lowest Price HERE
The End of Diabetes: The Eat to Live Plan to Prevent and Reverse Diabetes