Santa battles Heat Miser, diabetes

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Mrs. Claus reminds Santa about taking his daily insulin shot before heading out to deliver presents on Christmas Eve.

Santa battles Heat Miser, diabetes

Ellef Ringnes Island, North Pole -- According to sources, Santa Claus entered the peak holiday season confidently vowing to thwart the Heat Miser’s bid to scuttle Christmas and somberly confronting his battle with diabetes.

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m sure Mrs. Claus will negotiate an agreement with that Heat Miser to allow enough snow for South Town to enjoy Christmas,” chortled Claus from his home on the North Pole Thursday evening. “Just like she’ll help get my blood-sugar levels in line in time to deliver presents to all of the young boys and girls.”

At five feet, 10 inches and nearly 300 pounds, Claus has lived with Type A diabetes – and relied heavily on his wife to both help monitor his condition and negotiate with the Heat Miser in order to make Christmas possible – since 1999. Since being diagnosed, injecting himself with insulin has been among Claus’ daily responsibilities – in addition to his obligatory preparation for the most popular of Christian holidays.

“Yep, every day I have to suck it up and shove [a needle] in the ol’ sandbag,” said the historically jolly Claus, attempting to make light of the situation as he demonstrated injecting himself in the stomach. “Ho, ho, ho—ouch! Damn that smarts!”

Many of Claus’ employees attribute Claus’ health problems to job-related stress.

The Heat Miser, costar of the 1972 Christmas special, The Year Without A Santa Claus.

“Santa lets his work life push the rest of his needs aside, to the detriment of his health,” said one elf, Giggles, taking a break from the complicated wiring involved in fashioning an iPod for little Jennifer Stewart of Bloomington, Minn. “Every day, besides shoveling the stoop and cleaning out the reindeer stalls, he also has to keep track of the behavior of like a billion children. You should see his spreadsheet on that – the Excel file takes up over three gigs of memory.”

Giggles also confirmed that Claus was recently prescribed Lovastatin to help lower his cholesterol, which Mrs. Claus claimed to be “through the roof.”

But Santa Claus isn’t the only children’s icon to battle health issues. Friends have whispered for years about the Easter Bunny’s treatment for alcoholism, and the Tooth Fairy has spoken publicly about her 50-year struggle with bulimia.

“People just don’t understand what Santa goes through,” said Giggles. “If they knew Santa was in such poor health maybe they would shorten their gift lists just a little. As it is, as every year goes by, I wonder how in the world he does it.”

“I do it with magic,” Santa Claus quickly interjected, laughing long and heartily before calling for Mrs. Claus to bring him some orange juice as he turned ghost-white, appeared to lose his equilibrium and struggled to get to his recliner. “Oh, man, I’ve got to sit down,” Claus added.

December 2005