Goodbye, DiabetesMine

"As one chapter closes..."

A decade ago in 2012, I had the privilege of joining with my friend and fellow diabetes advocate Amy Tenderich at DiabetesMine. At that time, my journalism career evolved into one that could be combined with my passion for diabetes and my own life with type 1 diabetes. I'd been personally blogging since 2007 and had been actively involved in the DOC (Diabetes Online Community) for a handful of years at that time, attending various conferences and forums with fellow advocates looking to "do good" in the world.

I've been proud to be managing editor for so many years, covering this community and doing advocacy journalism there - before and after we became part of Healthline in 2015.The time has come, though, for my career page to turn to the next chapter.

Healthline made a decision that it's time to close down DiabetesMine. We first heard about this decision-making in early 2022, and by mid-March the final decision had been made by the higher-ups. The final details materialized from there, with April 22 becoming the final "official" day for the DiabetesMine site on HL and no more editorial content being published on the site.

This wasn't a big surprise, as the writing had been on the wall for a while.

Still, it's bittersweet for us both — especially Amy as this has been her "baby" for 17 years since February 2005. I'm proud of the work we've done together to inform, educate, impact, and advocate within the Diabetes Community and beyond.

While we won't be doing this in the same way professionally at DiabetesMine any longer, I'm excited for what comes next. Amy will continue the DiabetesMine Innovation Project events - aka D-Data ExChange and Innovation Summit. These events have been game-changers in many ways for our Diabetes Community, not the least of which was being the birthplace of where #WeAreNotWaiting crystalized into a movement.

These are some of the proudest times of my career, in being able to be a part of something for an entire decade that rarely felt like "work" but a privilege I've had in doing what I love. I've met and covered some of the most amazing people, and I'll cherish those moments and continued relationships wherever I go from here.

Mike Hoskins, Amy Tenderich, Wil Dubois

Personally, I am staying on at Healthline in a different role on a different editorial team, where I will be doing editor tasks that probably won't touch on diabetes very much.

Though I am staying in the health information field, this new role also helps re-establish that line between my "personal" and "professional" sides — so that diabetes isn't front and center, all day all the time whether I am thinking about my work or not. That is something I've said for awhile, that my next chapter would likely take the diabetes out of that professional work. For me, this is the best time for this to happen.

That being said, I am planning to continue my own diabetes writing and advocacy on a personal level in my spare time.

So that's the latest. Here's to moving forward on the next chapter.