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Diagnosis: Diabetes
Children Get Diabetes Too
By Paul Hartwick
Bernett, too, is driven by learning and sharing information (and lending support to others) about "this insidious disease," doing much of it through the Internet. "I find that focusing on negativity saps me of psychic and emotional energy that could be better channeled into doing all that I can today to ameliorate the lives of those who live with diabetes, so that they avoid joining the ranks of those who died from diabetes," the former high-school teacher says. "As I tell my daughter, when the day comes that diabetes is cured, we want her not only to be healthy enough to benefit from it, but also to feel pride in having been a part of the efforts to achieve it."
The Bernett and Hitchcock families are far from alone. About 20.8 million people, or about 7 percent of the population, have diabetes. About 14.6 million people have been diagnosed, and it's estimated that 6.2 million are undiagnosed.
Diabetes is a disease in which the body doesnıt produce or properly use insulin, the hormone needed to convert sugar, starches and other foods into energy. Hitchcock uses a colorful analogy to describe the disease. "Imagine that you drove a car without any kind of fuel gauge," he says. "When filling up, the hose would never stop if it were too full, and when driving, you'd never know when you were about to run out of gas. Furthermore, your fuel consumption varied greatly from day to day, so you couldn't just watch the odometer. The only thing you could do was stop the car, turn off the engine and measure the remaining fuel with a stick. That is life with diabetes."
Diabetes is manageable through tight control of blood sugar, keeping levels in the normal range as often as possible by regulating diets, physical activities and insulin dosage.
Today's recommended diets for diabetics are in synch with dietary guidelines for all Americans, perhaps surprisingly, because they've changed in recent years, says dietary expert Hope Warshaw, author of Diabetes Meal Planning Made Easy and The American Diabetes Associationıs Guide to Healthy Restaurant Eating, two books published by the ADA.