by Pepper, age 8
I was diagnosed with Type 1 when I was 7 years old and I wasn’t sure how my life would change, but I knew it was going to change forever. At first, I would think about diabetes all the time. I would worry that my blood glucose number was too high or too low. I would stress about my CGM insertion and pod insertion. I would wake up thinking about diabetes and spend the whole day thinking about what I should eat and when and how much to dose.
Then I started Taekwondo and I stopped constantly thinking about diabetes. When I’m on the mat sparring, I don’t have room in my head to think about diabetes. I’m too busy punching and kicking and blocking. And even when I’m off the mat, I don’t think about diabetes all the time anymore because I think about my forms and improving my balance and competing. I still think about diabetes a lot, but not as much as before. Maybe Taekwondo isn’t for everyone, but I hope everyone with diabetes finds something they love to take their mind off diabetes.
