This time of year always brings back memories of Fall 2002. Memories that find their way into the very back of my brain and then the leaves start changing colors and the September air starts to get a chill to it and those memories are forced to come back out. Of course all of you on here know what I'm talking about, though your story will be different than mine. Its the memory of one of the biggest moments of my life...the day I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes.
The summer of 2002 was like every other summer. It was normal. I spent the summer hanging out with my friends and family. We went camping, we took vacations, I was at Cheer Camp and practiced all summer with the girls on my squad. School started of course in September. Around mid-September I went to my doctors office to have get a physical for my Drivers Permit as I was turning 16 at the end of September. The day is still fresh in my mind even though it was seven years ago. I went in for the physical and thought everything was normal. The nurse asked me to wait for the doctor to come in so he could talk with me. I thought that this was out of the ordinary as I've had many physicals in my life before and they are normally in and out situations. The doctor came in with a nurse assistant. They then went ont o tell me that my blood sugar was high from a urine test. I was told I needed to come back in for some tests to confirm the diagnosis of diabetes. At this point in time, they told me that I should be able to control this disease with exercise and diet. I then proceeded to leave. I got out to the car and completely broke down. I remember going to a local convenience store and buying as much candy as I possibly could and ate all of it. I figured if in a few days I was going to have the confirmation of diabetes that I was going to eat as much candy as possible...and I did.
A few days later I went back to my doctors office where they preformed some tests. The first two tests preformed indicated I did not have diabetes. The doctors office told me that normally if those two tests came back negative that I would be okay...needless to say I think they had wrong information. A few days after this the final test result came back and I had the confirmation of my disease.
About a week later I was checking my blood sugars but for whatever reason I was still not taking insulin. One day I had gone shopping with my parents and when we got home that night my blood sugar raised to the upper 300's. My parents panicked and called the doctor who then told them to get me to the hospital. I spent about a week in the hospital where they finally put me on insulin and started to get my blood sugar under controlled.
Two days before my birthday, I was released from the hospital and went home to start my journey with Type 1 Diabetes. Seven years later...I'm going strong!