Age: 21 Year Diagnosed: 2005 Location: Newport Beach, CA
"I guess I wouldn't have a singular embarrassing moment, but rather I find it embarrassing as a Diabetic that people still make jokes about how people will obtain diabetes from eating too much sugar/anything that would deem itself "unhealthy." I get embarrassed with my condition as a whole rather than feeling my own personal form of embarrassment. I get embarrassed for all the Diabetics I know that push so hard everyday to maintain good health, for a good sum of these stereotypes that are joked about nowadays aren't even true. Thats what I get embarrassed about, it's that people don't understand. I'm embarrassed about the lack of information, connection, and understanding about Diabetes. There's only two types of Diabetes.. It shouldn't be as complicated as it is currently.
While camp counseling up at Camp Conrad Chinnock (a camp for children/teens living with Type 1 Diabetes), there has been multiple occasions when I see kids come to camp, miserable, quiet, shy, and desperately wanting to leave and go home to their families.... These kids get surrounded by the acceptance, care, love and understanding that they need from their peers. They get to have careless fun for a week or two out of each year with people that fully understand what they have to go through. And on multiple occasions, the same kids who hated the idea of this place, end up getting up in front of everyone to tell them that they wouldn't give up their diabetes for if they did, they wouldn't have met all of the people that they had met. That's an amazing moment in life to watch, and I'm fortunate to say that I've gotten to watch this personally on many occasions. Care, knowledge, and understanding goes a long way in life."