Myths about Diabetes!

Amy- Here's what I think: there are a LOT of misconceptions about diabetes! Especially type 1, due to the fact that the vast majority of diabetics have type 2. sooo, today I am going to dispell some of those notions!

Notion #1- People get diabetes because they eat too much sugar.

Wrong! Absolutely, totally, and completely WRONG! We don't know why juvenile diabetes occurs. Some statistics suggest that it can be hereditary, or that certain viruses can later cause the body to kill the islet cells that produce insulin. But we don't know anything for sure. Ate a lot of candy as a child? That does NOT cause diabetes! It doesn't matter what you eat, or how much you weigh, some of us are just lucky enough *not* to get type 1 diabetes. In fact, Hannah was 54 pounds when she got diagnosed with diabetes, and I weighed 114 pounds! So you can see that though neither of us was overweight, there was a VAST difference in our weight!

Notion #2- People with diabetes can't eat sugar.

Diabetics can eat anything they want. All that's necessary is to take insulin whenever you eat carbohydrates! True, sugary food has a lot of carbohydrates, but just as long as you know your carb-to-insulin ratio, you can eat whatever and simply take enough insulin to cover the carbs you ingest!

Notion #3- (mainly children believe this :) ) Diabetes is contagious.

This is kind of laughable! But when I got diagnosed with diabetes, and I'm sure it happened to Hannah as well, lots of kids were afraid that being near me would make them "catch" diabetes. As I said before, we don't know for sure why some people develop type 1 diabetes, but we DO know that it is in no way shape or form contagious!

Lots of other notions, but I'll let Hannah talk about some more in her next post :)