[type1rachelle]

I was diagnosed with T1 in May 1999 - I was almost 18 at the time, and I'm almost 32 now, so I've had it 14 years.

I remember I had a throat infection first... my body must have been attacking my beta cells at that time. Two weeks later, I felt VERY fatigued, but was told it was just from the throat infection and antibiotics... then, I started becoming extremely dehydrated, always drinking a lot. I started carrying a giant water bottle around with me in school because I was fearful of not being able to drink when I felt I really needed to. I was always so thirsty. I thought at first I was just dehydrated, but I couldn't figure out why I was peeing so much as well if it was truly dehydration. Two weeks of this went by and I began losing a lot of weight. I lost about 15lbs within two weeks, and something had to be wrong because I was always so tired, it took me hours to get ready for school in the morning (I constantly felt like I had to lay down), AND I was eating SO much. I began to get extremely worried when I would wake up 5x a night to go to the fridge and drink a gallon of water to the point of vomiting.

I had no idea what was going on with me - my mom actually took me shopping because I had lost so much weight, I needed new clothes (she's totally crazy too - because she's overweight, she was very happy for me to be so thin, and she congratulated me saying "there's no such thing as being too skinny" - thanks, mom, you psycho)

I went to the Dr and my BG didn't even register on their meter so it had to be over 800. I was given an appt at the local hospital the next day where there was a whole diabetes team I could talk to. By the time I showed up there, I was near coma - couldn't even keep my eyes open, it was bad, very very bad.

I ended up staying in the ICU for a few days on an insulin drip in DKA - I was also diagnosed with Hashimoto's hypothyroidism which is also an autoimmune disease. It was funny though because here I am, a frail 5'2", 93lb skeleton and I'm being told I have hypothyroidism (a disease that's often attributed to weight GAIN).

The years that followed were bad. My parents were never much involved in my care because I was so adamant about doing it all myself, and I ended up having a bit of a mental breakdown with panic attacks and severe depression. I was put on NPH twice a day for my basal insulin, and R insulin to correct after meals that consisted of the exchange diet. This was only 14 years ago and it sounds like prehistoric times! Even then, I wondered why I was told to inject R insulin according to a sliding scale two hours AFTER my meals... I didn't understand why I wouldn't inject before my meals in order to prevent my BG from going that high. I wasn't put on Lantus and Humalog and taught how to count carbs until years later.

Eventually, however, I learned to take care of myself, and I began counting carbs, switched to an insulin pump (8 years ago), sticking to a mostly plant based diet and exercising everyday and I've never felt better in my life.

Now I don't see the disease as a death sentence in the least. It's just a pain in the ass - I have to manually do what everyone else's body does automatically - I can deal, it's not like I'm immobile or seriously ill. Diabetes CAN be serious, but it really doesn't have to be at all as long as you're somewhat on top of staying healthy.