Featured
Highlights from ADCES 2024: New Orleans Edition
Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler, friends! The Children with Diabetes team had the opportunity to attend the Association of Diabetes Care and Education Specialists (ADCES) Annual Conference in New Orleans, Louisiana, and we can’t wait to share some of our highlights from the event with you. This year’s annual conference was held at the Ernest N. Memorial Convention Center in New Orleans. It featured four days of continuing education, keynote speakers, hands-on workshops, and a giant exhibition hall. Grab your café au lait and a crispy beignet, and let’s recap ADCES 2024! ADCES brings together diabetes care and education specialists […]
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The Relationship Between Diabetes and Sleep
I’m sure most of us over 30 feel we always need more sleep and cannot catch up on the missing zzz’s. My friends with diabetes and I talk a lot about the “diabetes hangover” that can occur after a night of highs or lows due to missed sleep. The role that diabetes plays in sleep and sleep plays in diabetes is still being studied across the globe. Here’s a rundown of what the recent research shows. Diabetes causes missed sleep. I know this is obvious, but there are a lot of reasons that studies have found diabetes causes missed sleep: […]
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Recapping ADA 2024
The Children with Diabetes team just returned from a steamy hot Orlando and the 84th Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association. As we unpack our bags and start our laundry from the trip, we can’t wait to share this recap of our time at the conference. Grab an iced coffee, and let’s get ready to recap Sci Sessions! The American Diabetes Association’s Scientific Sessions is described as the world’s largest meeting on diabetes, offering educational sessions and networking opportunities for those in the diabetes community and industry. There were over 11,000 in attendance who represented over 115 countries. The […]
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The Impact of Friends for Life
How do you measure the impact of an event? How do you quantify something that is difficult to explain to someone who has not experienced it? Studies about diabetes camps have shown how much peer support benefits children with diabetes. One study showed that many adolescents with diabetes learn about safety related to high-risk behaviors and type 1 diabetes at diabetes camps or Friends for Life (FFL) conferences. But these are just tiny glimpses into the vast expanse of what Friends for Life is. What is Friends for Life? As mentioned above, it isn’t easy to fully describe FFL. Children […]
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Stepping Back While Moving Forward
My daughter has had diabetes since she was three years old. It was unexpected and unwelcome. It changed our lives and nothing has been the same since this diagnosis. We’ve had the highest of highs…literally. And, we’ve had the lowest of lows…also, literally. We’ve moved from multiple daily injections to three different types of insulin pumps. We’ve learned to sleep with one eye open constantly focusing on a number on a continuous glucose monitor that lights up our bedroom like an airport runway. We’ve counted carbs and responded to alarms and done all of the things. We’ve also ignored the […]
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Mother’s Day: The language of loud sighs and quiet tears
It’s been a week, and it’s only Wednesday. It feels like there are 4,567 days of school left in this school year, but, in reality, we only have 8 days left until summer break. We’ve dealt with the unexpected “combo meal” of food poisoning and diabetes. A potential teenage suitor made a negative comment about my daughter’s diabetes and her twin brother’s autism all under the guise of flirting and an apparent lack of awareness that words can truly hurt. A mom and I got into a disagreement about our parenting styles, and a great friendship was halted before it […]
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Guiding Growth: Parenting for Diabetes Autonomy
Parenting is one of the most difficult jobs people experience. You want to be kind but not too passive, supportive but not an enabler. You want to give your children the world, but not spoil them. When you add a chronic disease, that means their life will be different than most of their peers, making it challenging to enforce all the added rules. As a person with diabetes, a nurse, and a diabetes care and education specialist, I’d like to discuss what I’ve been seeing more lately with families. My experience First, a big acknowledgment that I am NOT a […]
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When it’s more than T1D
Many people know that type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune condition, but what you may not know is that autoimmune conditions sometimes come in multiples. Some are more commonly associated with type 1 diabetes than others, but most can affect blood glucose levels – especially if undiagnosed. Here are some of the most common conditions that coexist with T1D. Hypothyroidism Hypothyroidism is when the thyroid gland, found in your neck and responsible for metabolism, among other things, does not make enough thyroid hormones.1 Symptoms: Weight gain, fatigue, cold intolerance, body aches, thinning hair, dry skin, depression, and even slowed heart […]
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Rights in the Workplace for PWD
In general, people with diabetes feel like diabetes should not stop them from living an everyday life (whatever that is). Since diabetes is ever-changing, it keeps you on your toes, which means that you may need accommodations to care for yourself appropriately and work or study as you desire. Definition of a Disability The legal definition of disability, according to the U.S. federal government is “an individual is considered to have a disability if they have a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities. Major life activities include caring for oneself, performing manual tasks, […]
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Our Visit to UFDI
At Children with Diabetes, we believe in providing care today while we await a cure tomorrow. As we focus on caring for and supporting people with type 1 diabetes, we anxiously await news on the next big breakthrough in research. Our friends at the University of Florida Diabetes Institute have been at the forefront of diabetes research since the 1970s and continue to make strides every day that are leading to better treatments and an eventual cure for type 1 diabetes. On March 25, I had the opportunity to tour the UFDI with our friends at Macey’s Believers. We began our […]
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