Diabetes: My Battles & Please Donate to the Walk (PLEASE SHARE THIS)

Juvenile Diabetes is not only the biggest challenge in my life; it is a way of life.  As many of my readers know, I was diagnosed in 1997.  You can read about my struggles with those early days in a blog I wrote in January of 2013, My First Week with Diabetes. I also have written about my most recent struggles with peripheral neuropathy and that can be seen at this link written in November of 2013: I Have Peripheral Neuropathy. I have written in this blog about my diabtetes, but in all honestly those of you who truly know me, understand that I don't like to talk about it.  I don't make it a big deal.  It may be a way of life but it is not MY LIFE. I don't want pity.  In fact I'd rather be treated like everyone else.  I try not to let it slow me down.  I try to hide my disease from the public so I don't get sympathy.  I don't want it.  I just want to live normal.  That has been my wish since than infamous day in February of 1997.

When the insulin pump was introduced to me as a senior in high school, it gave me flexibility.  It gave me the ability to not have to eat on a set schedule and a limited number of carbohydrates (which probably made me fatter but oh well). I have a set amount of insulin streaming into me from a pager- looking device and when I have a meal I can program it in and the pump will give me a set amount of insulin to cover the carbs I am taking in.  Without the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), this device could not have been possible.  They help raise money for Juvenile Diabetes research and are helping to find a cure, and in the mean time help us diabetics live a more normal life than we normally could.  The pump has flaws, however.  I've had three models and they improve each time but there are times when I forget to program things in and it causes me to get high blood sugar levels which eventually causes long term effects of my body such as the peripheral neuropathy that I have been dealing with lately. The nerve pain is strong and it hurts.  It is not life threatening but I will live with it every day until I die, even if a cure for diabetes is found.

Picture of me with my 3rd generation insulin pump in Dec. 2013

My doctor at Children's Hospital once guaranteed me back when I was first diagnosed that a cure for diabetes would happen in my lifetime. With the help of the JFRF, this can really happen.  Research is getting close.  I feel it coming.  I am not only writing this for me.  I am writing this for my friends, Jonathan Stefanopoulos, Brandon Berne, and  Devin Daley.  They all have type one diabetes and they need a cure just as much as I do.  I do it for Jay Cutler and Adam Morrison, both athletes with type 1 diabetes  (even though I don't like them).  I do it for Ray Allen's son and that Jonas Brother.  I do it for the millions of others with diabetes.  

Ray Allen of the Miami Heat with son who has juvenile diabetes

Without having diabetes, it is hard to explain the impact it makes on your everyday life.  It's as bad of a disease as cancer it just slowly eats at you every single day.  You have to control and when your sick you can throw the rule book out of the window. Life is hard with diabetes. I'm not going to lie.  All I have wished for is a cure.  How would I survive on a deserted island? The answer is I wouldn't be able to.  I could never be on Survivor.  If there was a zombie apocalypse, no one would want me on their crew because I would have to slow them down raiding all the pharmacies for insulin and needles which I'll need every day.  

I'm writing all of this to ask that you please donate to the JDRF Walk to Cure Diabetes.  I will be participating June 7 at Kings Island.  I have in the past during my childhood, but this is my first time as an adult.  My sister, Sarah Brooks, has been pushing me to do it and I really think it helps in finding a cure.  I don't have anything to give except maybe a few more years added to my life.  Maybe that's a good thing.  Please follow the link to donate : http://www2.jdrf.org/site/TR?team_id=153294&pg=team&fr_id=3349. I really appreciate anything you can give and I try not to ask for much but this cause is near and dear to my heart (literally) so please share this link to any friends and I appreciate all of you out there who help my cause.