Teens With Diabetes: Freedom Is Their Secret Drug

 

When I walked into my kitchen to do one of the many things I feel like I have to do every day of my life, I was stopped short by how I felt when I saw what was on the counter. Look at strips were used. There are three. Not in the garbage, and not put away. Before you watch I'm a neat freak, keep this in mind: the rush of emotions I felt turned out to be pure, undiluted joy. Because the test strips that were all over my granite countertop were proof of the most beautiful style I could ever think of. They showed that my daughter was getting better at checking her blood sugar. You might be wondering why this makes me so happy when she has had diabetes for 13 of her 18 years on earth. When the total number of finger pricks she's done is definitely in the 40,000s? Because, as you've probably noticed, she's a teenager who has had diabetes for more than ten years.

 

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And while I'm still trying to wrap my head around it, this has meant, more often than not in the past five years, that I haven't checked her blood sugars for days or weeks, let them rise to stomach-churning highs, "forgotten" to bolus for snacks (or even meals) for her, and have been in a constant state of fear, anger, and sadness. I'm telling you this because I think it's time we all stood up and admitted what's true in a lot of homes: our teenagers, even the brightest, smartest, funniest, and most driven ones, have a hard time taking care of diabetes' daily needs. I've seen it for myself. For many years, my daughter was the "model patient." Just a few weeks after her kindergarten test, she started giving herself shots. She knew how to do the math for bolusing before she knew how to spell the word "algebra." She went on the pump because she was the youngest child in the Boston area at the time to do so, and she did it like a champ.

 

 

 

She was seven at the time, and I can tell you for sure that I've never done a site swap myself. She put on a CGM even though it was big and uncomfortable (unfortunately, it didn't last long) because she knew what it was for. She is the head of the student council at her high school. She was in court for homecoming. Her classmates chose her as the one with the most school spirit. She has been on the tennis team for four years. This year, her college facts show has been nominated for an Emmy award. She has talked in front of Congress twice and was a speaker at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. When he was still alive, she had Senator Ted Kennedy's cell phone number programmed into her phone. So far, she has been a good fit for every school she has applied to. She is pretty, that's for sure. So, one might think that pricking her finger six or seven times a day to check her blood sugar, counting her carbs, and pushing a few buttons on her pump shouldn't be such a big deal anymore.

 

 

 

It's something that has to be done, so that's it, right? Think about it again. Because my daughter's only problem is her diabetes. Constantly. It began in the summer before she turned 13 years old. I had told her to check her blood sugar from across our membership pool, but she just wasn't in the mood to do it. She did something "new" instead. She messed around with her meter for a while and then yelled back to me from across the pool, "I'm 173!" I told her to be right, nodded, wrote it down in her color-coded logbook, and went on with my day. She told me a few months later that was the moment she finally got over the "drug" she had been struggling with for years. The name of that drug is "freedom." That day, she found out that I trusted her so much that she could almost do or not do anything she wanted. The idea of not having to check became so appealing to her that she says she still wants to know what drug addicts go through when they try to quit.

 

Click to order Diabetes Freedom now from the official website at the lowest price.