In a healthy person, the pancreas produces insulin, a hormone that regulates blood sugar. A Type 1 diabetic like Mary, however, produces no insulin at all and must inject insulin to prevent her blood sugar from becoming too high. (In Type 2 diabetes, the more common type, the body produces some insulin but not enough.)
For Mary, that meant being aware of every single carbohydrate she put into her body—whether a piece of bread, a carrot stick, or a glass of juice. All carbs are sugar, and all sugar will raise a diabetic's blood sugar levels.
So for every meal or snack Mary ate, or every favorite cocktail she imbibed, she had to consider how many carbs she was consuming, and inject enough insulin to keep her blood sugar at a healthy level. And this was no easy task: At home, you can read the nutrition information on the back of the box, but guessing how many carbs there are in a bowl of penne puttanesca at your favorite Italian restaurant is hard. Really hard.
That's why diabetics have to constantly test their blood sugar levels, to make sure they've used the right amount of insulin. This is done by pricking a finger with a lancet, drawing out a drop of blood, and placing it on a special "test strip" that is in turn placed in a device known as a glucometer, which can read blood sugar levels.
If a blood sugar reading was too high, then Mary would have to take more insulin to bring down her blood sugar levels. If it was too low, she'd have to consume sugar to bring them back up. (I'll admit that this part wasn't always awful, because sometimes it meant Mary got to have her favorite candy!)
But testing blood sugar levels, like administering insulin, is also a difficult process—and an expensive one. Insurance will often only pay for three test strips a day, but to remain in good control of their blood sugar, diabetics must test more often. Mary was fortunate that she could afford additional test strips on her own, and she tested her blood sugar levels constantly, but many diabetics cannot.
And if a diabetic's blood sugar levels are too high for too long, that's when long-term complications can set in, like kidney disease, nerve damage, loss of eyesight, and the amputation of limbs. Conversely, when a diabetic's blood sugar is too low, she can become disoriented, feel "shaky," and even pass out. Sadly, it appears that Mary suffered from an incident of extreme low blood sugar which she was not able to treat on her own, leading to her tragic death.
But new technologies that the JDRF is helping to develop will in turn help others avoid this terrible fate. In particular, clinical trials are now underway to develop an "artificial pancreas" that would regulate both high and low blood sugar for Type 1 diabetics. Mary was hopeful that one day she'd be able to benefit from that technology herself.
Sadly, she won't, but others can, and she would want them to. Mary once told me that diabetes suffused her life so completely that even in her dreams, she was still diabetic. But it was also her dream that we'd one day live in a world with no diabetes, and it's a dream I share.
So if you would like to help make this dream a reality and do a great honor to Mary, please contribute whatever you can:
Please contribute here to the JDRF.
Though we decided last year we were no longer going to remain together as a couple, Mary and I never stopped loving one another, and I will never stop loving her. Now that she is gone, I will cherish her memory forever, and I'll do anything I can to help people like her. It's what she would have done.
P.S. To find out if your employer matches donations to the JDRF, please click here.
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
Comments are closed on this story.