My Real Life with T1D

If you’re like us, as a parent of a child who has diabetes you have wondered how growing up with this dragon will impact your child as an adult… will he be okay with it all? Will he be angry? Depressed? Empowered? Motivated to make a change in the diabetes community, in the world?

In parenting our kids, with or without diabetes, we are bound to be imperfect. We do the best we can with what we know. And it just may be that the more we know, the better we do.

Dan Poole, diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at the age of eleven, shares his perspective on what it was like to grow up with diabetes and how its impact (both positive and negative) followed him into adulthood. His journey from diagnosis to advocate (as a member of Team Diabetes and as the Canadian Diabetes Association’s Volunteer of the Year 2013) is one that may be familiar to young people with T1D today. Taking a peek into the emotional life of someone who has been where our kids are, just might help us parents know more, so we can do even better at helping our kids grow up healthy.