Tonight I celebrate my twelfth consecutive year of hosting monthly Divabetic podcasts. I am grateful to our listeners, guests, podcast team, and Sony Music for helping me stay true to a commitment I made to myself in 2003. I decided to help others affected by, at risk of, and living with diabetes to ‘keep their house a home’ by offering tools, time, and the expertise of professional credentialed healthcare collaborators.

My goal was then and continues to be to help others “keep their house a home” by preventing a stroke, related to mismanagement of diabetes, from occurring. I do this in memory of my boss, Luther Vandross.

Our Anniversary podcast’s musical inspiration is Kenneth Edmonds, who is known professionally as Babyface. He has written over 250 top-10 R&B and pop hits, working with the likes of Beyoncé, Aretha Franklin, Celine Dion, Luther Vandross, and Whitney Houston.

“The blessing of being able to write music and let music speak for itself is you let the melodies and let the lyrics and the groove talk to people instead of me talking to people,” says Babyface.

What makes Babyface so great? His ability to craft a song that touches our emotions captivates our ears and aligns every word in perfect harmony. It’s a rare gift that not many people have in music.

“I would say that I’ve been lucky. Being blessed and not really ever giving up,” says Babyface.

Anniversary podcast guests include Poet Lorraine Brooks, Susan Weiner MS, RDN, CDCES, FADCES, and Collage Artist Tom Cocotos.

Thank you for allowing us to be part of your diabetes wellness journey! We’re looking forward to sharing more insight and advice on diabetes self-care from experts and peers, along with more great music in the next year!