Local & State Headlines

Professor wins national contest

• Winning a national proze prompts an Albany playwright to open up about her diabetes condition and, using theater as her medium, increase awareness.

Barbara Rivera Holmes

ALBANY — Wendy Coleman had been experiencing symptoms consistent with diabetes for some time before her summer 2005 diagnosis. She had the thirst, the fatigue, the frequent trips to the rest room.

Still, it wasn’t until prep for a May 2005 surgery revealed a blood sugar level of 385 that the Albany resident became aware of any problem.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, normal blood glucose level are 80-120 before meals and less than 170 one-two hours after meals.

“I had been having the symptoms, but I didn’t put two-and-two together,” said the 37-year-old.

After diagnosis, Coleman kept her Type II diabetes condition a near secret, mostly, she said, out of “fear and embarrassment.” Coleman, who has a family history of diabetes, shared the diagnosis with few other than her parents.

She didn’t tell friends; she didn’t tell colleagues; she didn’t tell her Albany State University students.

“I was in denial,” said Coleman, assistant professor of speech and theater and director of theater at ASU. “I think there is a fear of it (diabetes) when you think about the extreme negative implications,” such as blindness and amputation, she said.

But now, Coleman prepares to tell the country about coping with diabetes.

THE CATALYST

Who knows if Coleman would have opened up about diabetes were it not for an advertisement she saw while flipping through a magazine in October 2007.

“I thought, ‘Maybe I should go ahead and do this,’ ” she said of the 2007 Bayer Dream Fund contest, which comes with a winning prize of $100,000.

Coleman entered the contest and submitted her idea of using theater as her vehicle for diabetes awareness.

In early January 2008, Coleman, by then one of three national finalists, presented contest officials in New York with details of her play, which she said is somewhat Dickensian in that it takes the main character through her past, present and future.

In late February, Coleman received the call. “They said, ‘Congratulations, Wendy!’ ” she said.

“I said, ‘Daddy, you cannot tell anybody,’ ” said Coleman, a native of Waynesboro, Miss., of keeping the lid on her success.

On Thursday, Bayer and Coleman broke the news that she had indeed won the 5th annual contest.

According to contest literature, the Bayer Dream Fund, established in 2002, “was inspired to help people with diabetes achieve a significant dream that would not be possible without controlling their diabetes through self-monitoring. ... Bayer established the Dream Fund to recognize truly inspirational people and to help them accomplish their extraordinary goals.”

The contest is a product of the Diabetes Care division of Tarrytown, N.Y.-based Bayer Health Care, a subsidiary of Bayer AG.

THE PLAY

The play “is based on my life, but it travels through life,” said Coleman, whose work is nationally recognized and who serves as president of the National Association of Dramatic and Speech Arts.

The original play — titled “This is Our Story: Learning, Loving and Living Well with Diabetes” — uses the fictional character of Aunt Bessie to lead the main character through the ages as she learns of diabetes’ effect on the black community.

“The play will walk through history — the ’20s with the jazz and flappers; the ’50s and ’60s — to bring in as much dance and history,” Coleman said, “while telling the story of diabetes.”

Coleman, who has written about 65 percent of the play, said she’ll cast Albany State theater students (undergraduate, graduate and alumni in professional theater) for the six or seven main characters as well as the other 10 or so who will comprise supporting cast.

The play will debut in Albany in the fall and then travels to Montgomery, Ala., in September; Jackson, Miss., in October; Daytona Beach and/or Orlando, Fla., in November; and finishes in Dallas in December.

The $100,000 prize will go toward costumes, sets and traveling expenses as well as the pay for professional actors.

Since her diagnosis, Coleman said she’s learned how to incorporate diabetes into her life by adopting a healthy diet and exercise regimen and watching her intake of sugar-laden foods.

“A lot of them (family members) had the disease and did not manage the disease,” she said.

In conducting research, she’s also learned that “the diabetes rates among Americans are increasing,” but that they are “really increasing among African-Americans.”

Through her story, Coleman hopes to reach that community with her message of living well with diabetes.

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