Hey Everyone!
First off, thank you for all of the support on my last post. It was amazing to hear what people thought, and just knowing people in my life wanted to learn more about diabetes.
Writing about my story with diabetes is new for me. There is a lot to dissect and it has taken me a really long time to get to this point. I didn’t share it before for many reasons, most of which were related to my deeply rooted struggle with it, and the narrative that i plated in my mind that no one would care to hear it. I have learned in the past year that many others have faced similar struggles to me, and I am, and was not alone.
This post is mainly going to be my diagnosis story. Not all are this intense, but this is how my story went.
I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes in September of 2005. Only being about three weeks into middle school, there were already many changes that were happening. This was just one of them.
Just for some context, parts of this story are my experiences, and parts are what has been told to me about this time because I was not conscious.
The week leading up to my diagnosis, I was feeling very off. I was really tired, dropped a lot of weight, and was drinking a lot of water, and then using the restroom minutes after. When I say I was thirsty, I mean the entire mouth being dry, feeling like I had not had water in months. No amount of water could quench my thirst. At times, I would chug almost half a gallon of water and still not feel satisfied. Minutes after, I would run to the bathroom because the urge to pee was so intense. During that week, I also fell asleep in one of my classes, which I NEVER did. I rarely even got sick as a child so this was all new for me.
The night before I was feeling very ill, and ended up throwing up. I went up to my mom’s room to tell her that I didn’t feel well enough to go to school the next day. She hesitated and told me to wait until morning. I insisted that I wasn’t going because I didn’t feel good, and I needed to stay home.
That next morning I was unable to keep food down. I really wanted an ICEE from target (which makes sense now because my blood sugar was so elevated.) I remember laying on the couch feeling restless because I was unable to really get comfortable. I would roll from the couch to the floor and back again constantly.
This next part has been told to me many times, so it feels like I was there, but I was unconscious for it. As I was sleeping, my dad called my mom and they were talking about me being sick. I don’t really know what triggered this, maybe it was my dad hearing my breathing, or my mom being unable to wake me up, but somehow I ended up being taken to Urgent Care.
My mom went inside to check me in and my dad was trying to get me out of the car. Being as I was very out of it, he was pounding on the car door to get me to unlock the door, which eventually I somehow did. He carried me in and begged for a doctor to help me. Eventually, someone came to look at me, and within seconds they could smell the “fruity breath” on me, and told them to put me in an ambulance, blaring sirens and flashing lights and all, to take me down to Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis.
I remember waking up once or twice in the ambulance, and seeing people above me. I was somehow still mumbling that I wanted an ICEE. When I was denied that, I asked for Subway. Then I promptly fell asleep again.
I then woke up in the ICU of Children’s. I had now realized where I was, but didn’t know why I was there. I got out of the hospital bed to go to the bathroom, even though they had put a catheter in. I still lied to go use the restroom. I was extremely dizzy, weak getting out of bed, and felt really disoriented.
I was then moved out of ICU, to what was probably progressional care or something of that sort. I was laying in bed and I overheard my mom and a nurse talking about notifying my school and mentioning something about diabetes. That was the first time I had heard my name associated with that word.
The full concept of diabetes was foreign to me, but I had heard of it. One of my good friends had it, and there were four kids just in my grade alone who had it. I knew they all wore insulin pumps and occasionally they would ask for some sort of sugar to raise their blood sugar. It happened at my house a few times, so I knew that part of it.
A day or so into my hospital stay, I was transferred to Children’s Hospital in St. Paul. They had a better endocrinology department there. I remember very little about my time there, not because I was unconscious, but because this was so long ago. I remember getting calls from friends asking me how I was doing, my dad giving me a cell phone, and just being completely overwhelmed with everything going on.
I was thrown into classes teaching me how to give insulin shots, test my blood sugar, count carbs, and giving me a general education about diabetes. That is pretty much the extent of major diabetes education we were provided. To be honest, I was completely unaware of the lifelong battle I was about to be up against.
On top of all of this madness, I had a provoked blood clot in my leg from my blood sugar being so high, causing my blood to be thick. They didn’t end up having to use this line, but ultimately it gave me a clot in my leg…another thing to deal with. I ended up having to take blood thinner shots twice a day because of the clot.
I was constantly overwhelmed by doctors, nurses, lab techs, and others while I was there. At one point, I had about 9 people in my room, all wanting to do different things. My dad could sense the terror in my face and just how overwhelmed I was; I started crying. He then politely told the employees to fuck off and come back later if what they were doing wasn’t urgent. That right there was the highlight of my stay.
I was so excited to finally leave the hospital. I was there for about 5 days. I was in more shock than anything. In my mind at the time, I just was thinking this was my new way of life. What was weighing heavy on me was the stress I could feel from my parents. Leaving the hospital, my mom was crying to my dad. She probably didn’t know that I saw, but from that moment on, I started to feel the guilt and shame from having diabetes.
I could feel the stress my mom felt trying to do everything absolutely perfect. I could feel how hopeless my dad felt in knowing he couldn’t do anything to change this for me. My mom constantly put a guilt trip on me if my numbers weren’t perfect. She would constantly make me aware that this was all costing a lot of money. Between the ICU stay, ambulance ride, insulin, and health supplies, I don’t even know how much that was costing. My mom was frugal with money, so the weight of the financial strain of diabetes was constantly weighing on me too.
This was where the shame and guilt was born for me. Which is where my next post is going to start.
I want to leave all of you with the signs of Type 1 Diabetes, so if you start to notice them in yourself, a kid, or loved one, you can catch this earlier.
Symptoms: Increased thirst, frequent urination, increased hunger/eating a lot, fatigue, and blurred vision.
Some may experience: Nausea or vomiting, fast heart rate, rapid weight loss, headache.
While diabetes can be hereditary, it didn’t run in my family. So just because it doesn’t run in yours, doesn’t mean that your relatives or children are in the clear unfortunately. Also, even though this is known as “Juvenile Diabetes,” it is becoming more and more common to be diagnosed with Type 1 over the age of 18. So if you have these symptoms, consult your doctor!
Thanks for reading along. Up next: The shame and guilt around Diabetes.
xo,
Katlynn
Forever and Always, Katlynn 