JDRF Walk to Cure Diabetes

When I was younger, one of my proudest accomplishments was raising over $3000 for juvenile diabetes research.
The event was something that my parents had heard about through a friend of theirs interested in raising funds aswell. Me and my brothers were given an envelope and told to get as many sponsors as possible. Now, if you know me and my twin brothers, you would know that we are all very competitive, especially with each other. This assignment quickly turned into a competition, with me and my brothers racing around several neighbourhoods, knocking on doors and collecting money in every spare time we had. My brother Jeff ended up winning, which was to be expected. He was always the most socially expert of the three of us. Me and Brad were a bit more cautious with strangers.
The day of the walk, handing in that money... it was one of the best feelings in the world. Knowing that because of our efforts, they were closer to finding a cure for my disease was absolutley thrilling.
Seven years later, my family continues to participate in the walk annually. If you are looking for an event to fundraise, look into the Telus JDRF Walk To Cure Diabetes.
Here is the oficial website for the walk.

Anorexia, Bulimia, Binge Eating... And Now, Diabulimia?

Yes, you read that term correctly. Diabulimia is the latest fad amoung young juvenile diabetics, and involves the restricting of or complete neglection to admitister their required insulin doses in an effort to lose weight.
Lack of insulin in the body leads to hyperglycemia, or high blood sugar. The body is essentially in a state of starvation, and begins to breakdown muscles and fat and convert them into ketones, which leads to subsequent weight loss.
This process puts diabetics at a very high risk of developing a life-threatening condition known as diabetic ketoacidosis, and also could result in permanent complications such as circulation issues and diabetic neuropathy.
Diabetics, female youth in particular, do not realize that they are putting not only their health but their lives on the line to lose weight.
For more information, click here.

Weight Loss, In the Most Unhealthy Way

I have recently begun to see the effects that University living has had on my health.
For the past few weeks, I have been eating enough food each day to feed about five full-grown adults, and the last time I weighed myself I had lost seven pounds.
This is coming from a five-foot-two person who has remained the same weight for over three years now.
Now, I could be wrong, but I think it has something to do with my diabetes. I haven't been taking the best care of my health while I am away at school, and I think this is one of the repercussions of it. Before school started, I was a fairly straight-edged kid. I partied, but not on a regular basis. I didn't go out every night. I had the time and the motivation to take proper care of myself.
Here, I am out with friends partying and attending various school events on a regular basis, I end up going out at least every other night, and have little to no time for myself and my diabetes.
I got into this mind-set of "I have better things to do than test my blood sugar and eat proper meals," and this has finally caught up with me and my health.
The post above is about diabulimia, which is when diabetics do not give themselves the proper amount of insulin in order to lose weight. While I do not intentionally neglect to give myself insulin, I have become increasingly more and more notorious for forgetting to give myself insulin after I eat. And I have been eating alot.
Which evidentally leads to higher blood sugar levels for increasing periods of time, and subsequent weight loss. I have really got to start taking better care of my health. Not only is my massive food intake and weight loss detrimental to my health, but it also uses up a lot of money that I don't have to spare in added groceries.
So this week I am making a resolution to practice better diabetes management. I am going to test my blood sugar on a regular basis, administer insulin after I eat, and limit my nights of fun to once a week, if that. I hope I hold true to my word.

Attention All Medtronic Insulin Pump Users!

I have recently come across a really cool insulin pump accessory- Insulin Pump Skins.
These 'skins' for the Medtronic insulin pumps act as stickers to encase your pump, so that instead of your pump looking as if it belings in a science fiction movie, it can be colourful and unique to you. There are thousands of these sticker-skins available, ranging from sports teams, world flags, music, holiday, and zodiac themes, among many others.
There is also an application that allows you to create your own personalized skin, where you can include pictures, text, clip-art, and more.
These skins typically cost about $20 and can be ordered through the Medtronic website. Click here for the link.

This is just one of the skins offered through the site, and features crayons.

They Really Need to Make Something Like This For Wii

I have just discovered something truly spectacular. A diabetes video game. Launched in 1995 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Packy and Marlon are two diabetic elephants who have to remember to take their diabetic medications and eat healthily, and was designed to help children and teens improve their diabetes management.
For more information about this video game, click here.

Mommy, Will You Be Here In the Morning?

Recently, the CDA (Canadian Diabetes Association) launched an email campaign entitled "Mommy, Will You Be Here In the Morning?"

This is what it said:

If you are having difficulties reading this, a bigger picture can be found here.



This fundraising email deeply upsets and offends me because it depicts a person living with diabetes as not only unable to live an independent lifestyle, but that it is a disease that completely defeats you.

Not once in my life have I gone to sleep with the fear that I will never wake up. And I do not require 24-hour guarded supervision. The campaign is really embarrassing for people living with the disease. I truly hope my friends and family never happen to see it, I think it would scare them and give them a false sense of what juvenile diabetes really is.

While it is true that there are SOME diabetics who choose to let the disease control their lives, this is completely untrue for most people living with the disease, myself included.

I work too hard to keep my blood sugar in control to see a fundraiser telling people that the disease in uncontrollable and devastating.

I realized today that I haven't even informed my roommates about the signs, symptoms, and treatments for hypo/hyperglycemia. It never occurred to me to do so until we were eating lunch and I was having trouble focusing on what they were saying because my blood sugar had dropped.

Hypoglycemia is a big long fancy word for low blood sugar, which means that I have too much insulin in my system and not enough carbohydrates. Usually when this happens, I become agitated, can't focus on anything, feel weak, and generally make no sense. The only solution for hypoglycemia is a fast-acting carbohydrate (i.e. a glass of orange juice) followed by a slow-acting carbohydrate (i.e. a cheese sandwich). If left unattended, hypoglycemia can result in seizures and, in very severe cases, can be life-threatening.

Hyperglycemia is the opposite of hypoglycemia, high blood sugar. In my case, I can usually tell when my blood sugar is high when my heart starts to race, I am extremely thirsty, and I am overly excitable. Hyperglycemia occurs when I have too little insulin in my system. Usually this is treated with a dose of insulin. If left untreated, hyperglycemia can cause diabetic ketoacidosis to occur, which is potentially life-threatening.

Thinking about it now, I really should stop trying to pretend my diabetes doesn't exist and educate as many people as I can about what they should do if I did have an episode. Last March I took a school trip to Rome, and an hour after landing I had a seizure outside of a Piazza. Nobody knew what to do, because I had thought "nobody needs to worry, I am in control". I ended up waking up in a hospital bed with doctors speaking Italian to me and an IV tube in my arm. If my friends had known that inside my purse, a device called a glucagon (syringe loaded with a high concentration of glucose) would have probably made me conscious before the ambulance arrived, then I wouldn't have had to wake up alone and scared in a strange hospital.

For my whole life I have tried to hide the fact that I was diabetic, so that I would just be a normal person. But diabetes is a part of my life, and who I am. I am slowly starting to acknowledge it, and am probably much safer now because of it.

Camp Huronda

Growing up with juvenile diabetes can be terrifying, confusing, and overwhelming at times. I myself had a tough time adjusting and comprehending the fact that the disease was not just going to go away. That's when I discovered the magic of Camp Huronda, a camp in Huntsville that is made specifically for diabetic children 8-15 years old. The campers stay for two-week sessions and are under the supervision of a fully-trained medical staff to keep them healthy. The camp offers such things as canoe trips, waterfront, sailboarding, fishing, beach volleyball, orienteering, overnight trips, archery, pottery, kayaking, skits, crafts (a brand new craft ship was built in 2008), horseback riding, paddle boating, basketball, mountain biking, ropes courses, climbing wall, water trampoline, as well as unique evening programs lead by a team of qualified area staff, counsellors, and junior counsellors. Another unique aspect of this camp is that over 80% of all staff are themselves diabetic. The other non-diabetic staff have either a sibling with the disease or have a storng connection to it, through their parents or friends. It is really interesting, how your perspective of diabetes changes while at Camp Huronda. Because you are in a cabin with up to eight other diabetics, diabetes seems a lot more tolerable. I've seen campers who would require the nurse to give them their injections recieve their Golden Needle award, an award given to the campers who administered their first injection without assistance while at camp. Camp gives these children a place to feel like they belong, and that they are not alone.

For more information about Camp Huronda, click here.

Another First

For most of my life, I have been known as the 'fragile' girl whose list of medical problems was longer than most people's daily grocery lists. Around the time of my eighth birthday was when everything started to happen. . Around this time, I began to constantly be thirsty. I couldn't go fifteen minutes without some type of fluid. I also began to lose weight at a scary rate. Being a naturally slim person, this was a scary sight for my parents. This persisted for a few weeks, until my mom left for a week long trip to Germany. In the course of that week, a new symptom arose: mind-numbing headaches that literally prevented me from walking. When my mom returned, she knew something was terribly wrong. She drove me to the family doctor's right away, and all it took was a urine sample to determine what was wrong with me: I had Type One diabetes. I don't remember much from that day, but I do remember hearing those words. I also remember my mom asking the doctor to take me to the waiting room. I can only imagine how devastating that would be for a mother to hear. For it was only weeks ago that she had a perfectly healthy, happy child. The next thing I remember is hearing 'we have to go to the hospital'. As a child, there is no scarier sentence in the world. I remember they tried to make me wear a hospital gown, and being the stubborn girl I still am to this day, I refused to wear it. Eventually, they gave in and let me wear my normal clothes. I stayed in that hospital for a week, each day learning more about this illness that apparently wouldn't go away. I remember them taking my blood sugar for the first time. I remember my first injection. I remember everyone telling me that I was stressed, when in reality I was just confused. I remember the look on my family's faces when they would visit me. But remember, I was eight years old. Slowly I learned what insulin was, and how to check my own blood sugars. I learned about carbohydrates and meal plans and what could happen if my blood sugars rose too high or too low. I think that is what scared my parents the most. The 'what could happens' of living with juvenile diabetes. The doctors and nurses put it into really simple terms for me to understand, so I still to this day don't know what my future holds. I don't resent having diabetes anymore, for it has made me what I am today. I am not sure that I really want to know. Ten years later, I am in my first year of University at Laurier Brantford. I have lived through my first self-given injection, my first trip to the hospital, and countless other firsts, and now I am living away from home. For the first time in my life, I am completely responsible for my own health and well being. Nobody is there to remind me to give myself insulin, or to pick up medical supplies at the pharmacy. That is all up to me now. I hope this blog helps other Type One diabetics, and any firsts that they encounter throughout their lives.