Diabetes
Diabetes
Diabetes
Successful self-management will help you feel better and can reduce your chance of
developing complications including heart disease, dental disease, eye disorders, kidney
disease, nerve damage and lower leg amputation.
Diabetes is also a very personal disease. Upon being diagnosed, it's not uncommon to
feel a certain amount of fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear about how your lifestyle may
change. Fear that you will experience life-threatening complications.
A key member of the diabetes management team, a diabetes educator will help you
learn how to take care of yourself — guide you through your treatment and help you
with any fears, issues and problems you encounter along the way.
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What advice would you share with those living with T1D?
A. For a parent this is a very stressful and upsetting time. Your whole world is
different but it is manageable. I would tell parents they don’t have to start
completely cutting sugar from their child’s diet but they need to learn how to
count carbohydrates and should teach their child how to as well. Parents need
to learn the groundwork early on in order to help their child properly manage
their T1D.
Being active is vital to the health of someone living with T1D and parents need
to introduce exercise to their child early on so that it becomes a part of their
daily life, just like brushing your teeth. If you make exercise a part of your
daily life you will be able to live a long life without complications. You need to
make sure you always have something on hand to treat a low while exercising
as it is always safer to be a little high than low.
A. A common misconception about T1D is that the person with the disease
can no longer consume sugar. Everybody always seems to think it’s about
sugar when really it’s about carbohydrates. Sugar is just one component of a
carbohydrate. If you learn how to count carbohydrates properly than you can
still have sugar.
Q. Is there any other information you can offer the JDRF community in
your capacity as a diabetes educator?
A. I’d like people to know that with diabetes, nothing is a stupid question!
Sometimes things just don’t make sense and that’s normal. Having diabetes
takes discipline but if you can manage it properly it is a very livable condition
and diabetes research has come a long way. When I was growing up with
T1D, I used to have to sterilize glass syringes to give myself multiple and
often painful injections. Now I have a pump! With the help of JDRF I believe
we will have a cure in my lifetime.