Sweet and Sour- The Type 1 Diabetes Rollercoaster

It’s National Diabetes Awareness Week here in Australia. I had absolutely no idea. That’s a worry when even the diabetics don’t know… Hope someone sends CrossFit a memo. Apparently, in Australia, there’s 120,000 Type 1 Diabetics. That sounds like a large amount, but considering the population is something like 22 or 23 million, it’s a tiny percentage. Diabetes as a whole however (including type 2 which makes up ~90% of diagnoses) is highly prevalent. The media seems to be focusing on Type 2, which is fine because it’s way more common and sometimes you can actually do something to prevent it. But they don’t differentiate between Type 1 and 2. They’ve released this scary video: Uplifting right? These complications also happen to Type 1s if blood sugars are very erratic for very long periods of time. But I think they’re just here for a scare tactic. I hope another video is released that actually teaches something. In the meantime, have some facts: - T1 is caused by ge...

Yesterday I wrote a post about Cross Fit's twitter page. Today I want to add a second part. Like many others, Cross Fit associated coke and diabetes. And you know what? There is a connection.                             Cans of coke saved my life last night. Around 20min after writing that post I tested my level and was 2.9. I'd already been low earlier in the day and this one felt bad. I had 4 hypo tablets (16g carbs) and waited. I became increasingly light headed and had some coke (21g carbs). At this point I waited 15min and tested again. 2.6. Add another can of coke, stacks of jellybeans, juice boxes, hypo tablets and lots of crying. I treated it so much because I couldn't get it up much higher for an hour. Whenever it came up it crashed back down. Luckily I was at home and both my parents were consoling me that if I were to pass out they'd be there. I got to the point where I was crying because...

I was going to be really good and let it go when I saw Cross Fit’s post on diabetes "Make sure you pour some out for your dead homies.” alongside a bottle of coke saying “open diabetes”. But then I saw the rest of their twitter page that is full of tweets defending themselves. This is despite major backlash from the diabetic community. Most of these things have made me angry in the past, but when I saw that page I burst into tears. I have never seen such disgusting attitudes toward diabetes of either type in my life. They just don’t get it, and I’m so tired of it. We as a community fight so damn hard to spread awareness. Nothing seems to work. Everything I do feels redundant. However, I think the only time you fail is if you don’t try. So I’m going to try again. Point 1: No one should be shamed for having an illness. Ever. Type 2 diabetes is not solely caused by over-consumption of sugar. In some individuals there is a very strong genetic component that predisposes ...