Sydne Hernandez

I was part of the unlucky percentage of type 1 diabetics that was born with diabetes. I am also the only person within my entire family to have it, so it’s safe to say I have been the designated diabetes educator to my family and friends my entire life. I was one of the first infants to be put onto an insulin pump, at the ripe age of one in 2001. Just because I had a pump though, didn’t mean I did a great job with it. I didn’t have coherent parents in my life hardly ever, so this job of diabetes became my own. I chose to ignore it a lot, which I regret dearly now. While I remember being a kid of growing up with this aggressive disease, writing “I hate diabetes” in notebooks hundreds of times and sometimes on the walls, I try to look at the positives of this disorder which I can understand are very little. The diabetes community has allowed me to befriend some very kind and knowledgeable people who make me feel more normal knowing we are all fighting the same fight. It hasn’t been easy, but for the first time in my life I feel as if diabetes has become more normalized in my life and I am finally taking better care of myself.