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My Dad, My Hero

Posted on June 18, 2022June 18, 2022 by thediabeticjourney.com

Jaime McCurry

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In honor of Father’s Day, I wanted to recognize my diabetic hero, my dad.

Growing up, all diabetes was to me was the fact that our house was always stocked with Diet Coke and hearing my mom always check with my dad to make sure he had “his stuff.” I never really knew what that meant but I knew my dad had diabetes and one time when I was in intermediate school we even did a walk to raise money for the American Diabetes Association.

I also remember reaching a point in my life where I started getting worried about what having diabetes meant and I even asked my dad if I would ever have diabetes. Being supportive, loving, and always protective dad he is, he assured me I had nothing to worry about.

Fast forward to February of my sophomore year of high school.

We were coming up on the end of a week long February vacation and I was scrambling to finish a project I had barely started. Over the past couple of weeks, I had started to become very thirsty. I was finishing off gallons of milk on my own and drinking two gatorades before my recreation basketball game even started.

I was going to the bathroom…all the time. But to me, I thought this was normal, I mean I was drinking so much so it only made sense I spent the rest of my time peeing it all out right? Then I started waking up in the morning feeling like I just chewed juicy fruit which was bizarre.

I shook it off and thought I probably forgot to brush my teeth the night before. It wasn’t until my vision started getting really blurry that I brought it up to my mom and she put all the pieces together. She had been dating my dad when he was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, so all the symptoms I was having reminded her of what he had gone through.

She told me to have him check my blood sugar when I got home but the stubborn teenager I was shook it off and figured she was exaggerating. Three days went by and I started feeling worse so I finally approached my dad and had him check my blood sugar. The reading was over 500. I looked at him and said, “Is that normal?” And I will never forget the look on his face as he told me it wasn’t.

As I’m sure you can guess in the next 48 hours my official diagnosis followed and my new life with diabetes began.

As I mentioned earlier, I didn’t know much about diabetes because my dad never really talked about what it was like. He kept his life with diabetes very private and most people outside of our family didn’t even know he had it.

Everything he did was “normal” in my eyes growing up and diabetes was really just a word. When I was diagnosed, my dad was with me every single step of the way. When I was too afraid to give myself injections, my dad was there (even though I was 16 years old).

He’d drive to the house I was babysitting at, to my basketball practice, or a friend’s house I was sleeping over just to help me give myself my insulin. For the first two weeks, he made every single meal for me and for the first couple months helped me count the carbs for every single thing I ate.

He was there for me for my first real meltdown and “why me??” moment following my diagnosis and sat there and let me cry and be mad about it because he understood.

Every single day my dad shows me how to not only be an extraordinary person but how to live beyond my diagnosis.

He’s run a half marathon raising thousands of dollars for diabetes research in the process, he’s started a support group in our town for families affected by Type 1, become a mentor for newly diagnosed families, and volunteered with JDRF on numerous occasions.

He encourages me to do anything I want and supports me following all of my crazy dreams. Although our choice in managing our disease is different, the best part is he realizes that my diabetes is different than his.

Many people diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes don’t even know anyone else that has it for months or even years following their initial diagnosis date. I feel so privileged to have my dad there for me through every single high and low and as a role model to never let diabetes get in the way.

Happy Father’s Day to all the dad’s out there thriving with diabetes, raising strong diabetic warriors, and loving their diabetic partners/other family members and friends. I think I speak for all of us when I say we love you and we wouldn’t and couldn’t do it without you.

Having a Brother With Type 1 Diabetes Means Being Patient

Posted on June 10, 2022 by thediabeticjourney.com

Patient.

By: Meredeth Aponte

It is what I have to be even though I am not actually the patient.

That’d be my big brother, Daniel. He was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes more than 3 years ago, so he’s usually the patient. But since we’re brothers, we’re a team and that means I have to be patient. But I’m still just 4 years old and that can be tough.

Every time we sit down for a meal or grab a snack, I have to wait for Daniel to test his sugar, count his carbs, and dose. I have to wait in the doctor’s office every 3 months while Daniel gets his A1C checked and my mom and dad talk with the endocrinologist about how things are going.

Sometimes when we’re out shopping or at the zoo or an amusement park, I have to stop and wait for Daniel to have a fruit leather and let his blood sugar come back up. Sometimes I get even more frustrated because he gets to have a fruit leather and I don’t.

It can be hard to be patient, but at the same time, I am learning a lot about compassion and how to be loving and supportive.

When Daniel is doing a set change, I try to hold his hand. When he’s afraid that changing his sensor will hurt, I bring him his Lenny buddy to hold and comfort him. I’ve even pricked my finger to test my blood sugar just because I wanted to see what it was like and be brave like my big brother.

My mom and dad worry sometimes if I ask for extra glasses of water or if I wet the bed because that may mean I’m becoming a Type 1 kid, too, but for now, Daniel is still the only patient. And it’s up to our whole family to take care of one another and be patient.

We are a team. We pray together and work together. We pray for a cure. We work for a cure. That is the hardest thing to be patient for.

Teaching My Little Sister Everything I Know

Posted on April 3, 2022April 3, 2022 by thediabeticjourney.com

Teaching My Little Sister Everything I Know

By: Jenny Anderton

To this day I remember when my mom and dad told me that I was going to be a big sister. I was 17. Jacqui was a surprise, in every sense of the word. I remember being so excited to dress her up, teach her how to paint her nails, braid her hair, and play Barbie’s. I couldn’t wait to do all the things you’re supposed to do as a big sister and then some. I already knew I was going to be great, it was legitimately the thing I wished for most growing up.

I was trying to think of the many things that Bird and I enjoy doing together, and what came to my mind were our sister sleepovers, and swinging really high on the swing set in her backyard while trying to touch the leaves on the tree with our toes. I thought about reading princess books together and dressing up in ridiculous outfits and having dance battles in her bedroom.

I thought about all the letters, phone calls, and Skype dates we had while I was away at college. Then I thought that I better get her input and ask her what she remembers most about hanging out with her cool big sister. Her first response? “You teach me about how to take care of my diabetes.” Wow. I smiled and my heart sank at the same time.

That’s my baby sister. Bird- her nickname because she literally must do everything that I do. From how she dresses and where she’s going to go to college, right down to her finger pricks and insulin shots. She wants to be just like me. When I think back to the day that I started thinking about all the things I was going to teach her, managing her diabetes was not one of them.

I also remember when my mom and dad told me that Jacqui was diagnosed with diabetes. She wasn’t even 1 years old yet. I remember thinking how unfair it was. She is perfect. Why? I remember saying that I’d take diabetes twice if it meant that she got to be normal. A friend of mine that I was with when I heard the news simply said: “but how lucky is she that she gets to learn how to live with diabetes from someone as special as her big sister?”

What kind of responsibility is that?? How do you teach a little girl that barely walks and still calls me Nenny, because the ‘J’ is too hard to pronounce, how to manage something as complex as diabetes? Then it dawned on me. I’ll teach her by doing it myself. From having her touch and feel the lumps on my arms to understand the importance of moving sites. To letting her know the only good diet soda is Dr. Pepper, she was going to learn it all.

Jacqui is almost 10. She is getting so big and I am SO proud of her. Bird is in the third grade and loves school. She is a fantastic reader and her imagination is incredible. She loves all animals and riding g horses is her most favorite thing on the planet. I love to watch her dance and I love to listen to her talk. She is amazing. Resilient. Inspiring. My baby sister.

Diabetes is all I have ever known. It’s all she’s ever known too. I don’t know how to teach her to be normal. I don’t know life without diabetes. But enough with things that I do and don’t know. Here’s the one thing that I hope for. I hope for a cure.

And when that cure comes I believe that Jacqui will be able to tell you that the greatest part about having me for a big sister is that I can make some pretty intense blankets forts to watch Princess movies under, that I never just let her win at swings, I actually had to work at it. I’d hope she’d tell you that I taught her that the books are always better than the movies and that dancing like a fool is definitely okay and that the people who don’t are the weird ones. I’d hope she’d tell you that I was always a phone call away for whatever she needed.

Lastly, I’d hope that she’d tell you that we HAD diabetes together and that now we don’t.
I love you, Bird. #typeonetilltypenone