My Diabetes Diagnosis story *dramatic music plays*

Amy- Sooo, you, whomever may be reading this, get to see the oh-so-interesting story of how I got diagnosed with diabetes!

I was 14 years old and in my community theater program, playing Lucy in "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown." Somehow I managed to think that it was normal that I was crying every time the director criticized me, drinking several bottles of water per rehearsal and still hoarse as heck, peeing oh....maybe 10 times a night? Oh, and guess what my dinner was one night? Three, count 'em THREE Big Mac's! But did I gain weight? Noo, I lost 10 pounds!

But here's the interesting part: my brother, Matthew, has type 1 diabetes! He's had it for 11 years! My mom didn't believe that two of her children could possibly have type 1 diabetes, so she thought that the symptoms were simply stress. teen angst, etc. My grown siblings, however, convinced my mom that I was not acting normal, so one morning after I woke up 12 times in the night to go to the bathroom, she checked my blood sugar on my brothers glucometer. The results? I was 549, and upon checking for ketones, I learned that I had a large amount!

So off I went to the nearest children's hospital, which happens to be 15o miles from where I live! I was admitted to the emergency room, where they scared me half to death by telling me that I possibly had diabetic ketoacidosis! DKA is very bad- potentially fatal! I didn't have it, but I ended up staying in the hospital overnight, on an IV and learning how to give myself shots and count carbohydrates. The diabetes education was rather brief, however, because the doctor assumed that since my parents had dealt with my little brothers diabetes for so long, they pretty much knew it all.

I went back home, feeling quite like a pincushion after all the shots administered in the past 24 hours, and armed with all sorts of diabetic equipment. I was relieved to be released from the hospital so soon because I had to perform "Charlie Brown" just a couple of days later! It was kind of a pain in the butt to return to life because absolutely everyone had question after question about my diagnosis, and all sorts of-erroneous- advice to offer me! "Oh, I guess you ate too much candy!" was a comment I heard more times than I can count!

However, theatre was a godsend because as it turns out, a girl who was in it with me was type 1 diabetic, too! Guess what her name was? That's right, HANNAH! Hannah, the co-author of the blog! An awesome friendship developed because each of us didn't know any other diabetics even near our age! Well, other than my brother :)

Sooo, 3 and a half years later, here we are trying to make the awesomest diabetes blog ever!