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Short and Sweet with Karen Graffeo, Creator of Diabetes Blog Week

Karen Graffeo was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in 1979, at the age of 11. In 2008 Karen started her diabetes blog, Bitter-Sweet, and became immersed in the Diabetes Online Community. She also advocates offline and is involved with two JDRF chapters in her home state of Connecticut. Karen is hosting the sixth annual Diabetes Blog Week from May 11th – May 17th.

Living with a Diabetes Alert Dog

After thorough research on diabetes service dogs, we decided to work with Diabetic Alert Dogs of America. On February 18, 2015, our son became the handler of a diabetes alert dog (DAD), a wonderful male Goldendoodle, appropriately named Jellybean.

How to Integrate New Diabetes Technology into Schools

The school was there to figure out a way to help my daughter embrace pumping without having to leave the classroom to go to the nurse a bunch of times a day. Together we eventually came up with a plan that worked, but it didn’t happen overnight. It took time, and it also required me to understand the school’s needs, point of view and accept how they might need to come up short of what my expectations at home would be.

How to Choose Medical ID

It’s a relatively small thing, but it can be a literal lifesaver: medical alert jewelry. For people living with diabetes (or allergies, or asthma, or any other chronic condition), a simple bracelet or necklace can reveal medical information when it’s most important. And there are thousands of options for medical jewelry – from the standard stainless-steel oval-and-chain bracelet to gold cuffs. So how do you choose one?

Life As A Diabetes Poster Child - Lauren Speaks at JDRF

I Was A Diabetes Poster Child

No hospital pictures, ever. When someone is sick and in the hospital, they are vulnerable and unhappy. I don’t want to be exploited like that – especially not for the sake of advocacy.

63 Years After a Type 1 Diabetes Diagnosis

There were no meters, you didn’t know what your sugar was. The only way to know for sure was to test your urine, which was three hours behind. So I paid attention to the signs, I could tell when I was high or low. I remember that I’d eat something—a candy bar or a pint of ice cream—and I would run three or four miles.

Does Diabetes Interfere With Your Parenting?

My five-year-old daughter thinks diabetes is something she will have when she’s a mom. Like me, she’ll write stories, have brown hair, have two kids, and have diabetes. Diabetes often needs my attention just like her little brother does. And sometimes diabetes takes priority over both of them. And I resent that.

A Writer with Diabetes Creates a Character with Diabetes

Leah walks past her mother and gets the vial of insulin out of the refrigerator. After she draws the right number of units, her mother lifts her shirt and Leah makes the injection into a small roll of pinched fat on her stomach right between two small bruises. “You could do this yourself,” she says. “You ought to. They showed you how.”

A Weekend Excursion to a Type 1 Diabetes Diagnosis

“Your blood sugar was five hundred and twenty four,” whispered the doctor through pale lips, after gently pulling back the curtain that had been separating me from the reality of the situation. “I’m sorry, but you have Type 1 diabetes.” His mouth continued to move, but I heard nothing.

A Type 1 Diabetes Guide To The Universe

Many parents feel at a loss as to how to be effective parents around diabetes stuff if they’ve never heard a healthcare professional tell them that it’s okay to be parents around diabetes in the same way that they’ve parented in every other area.