What should you Know about Diabetes

What is diabetes?

Diabetes is when your blood sugars, or blood glucose, is to high.  Your main source of energy is blood glucose, which comes from the food you eat.  Your pancreas creates a hormone called insulin.  Insulin helps all the glucose from the food you eat get into your body's cells and use it for energy.  But in some cases, the body doesn't create enough insulin, sometimes the body doesn't make any insulin at all.  If this is the case, the glucose stays in your blood and can't reach your cells.

  If you have to much glucose in your blood, it can cause health problems.  Diabetes has no cure but there are ways to maintain diabetes.

There are a couple types of diabetes. The most common diabetes we hear about are, type 1, type 2, and gestational diabetes.  With type 1 diabetes, your body does not make insulin.  The body's immune system fights and destroys your pancreas' cells that make insulin.  People who are diagnosed with type 1 diabetes have to take insulin everyday to stay alive.  Type 2 diabetes either your body doesn't make insulin or doesn't use it well.  Type 2 diabetes can be developed at any age, but is most common in middle-aged people.  Then gestational diabetes is most common when a woman is pregnant.  In most cases, the gestational diabetes goes away after giving birth to the baby.  But if you have been diagnosed with gestational diabetes, you have a higher chance of getting type 2 diabetes later in life.

How is the disability diagnosed?

First off, some of the factors that could mean you have diabetes is, you're overweight, previously had gestational diabetes from a pregnancy, someone in your family is diagnosed with diabetes, or if you have high blood pressure.  These are just a few of many causes of diabetes.  Anyways, there are certain tests doctors make you take to see if you have diabetes.  One of them is, Fasting Plasma Glucose, someone will take the test in the morning and they shouldn't have eaten anything 8 hours previous of the test.  If they have a level of 126 mg/dl or higher and it's been that high before then it usually means that someone has diabetes.

Casual or Random Glucose test is a blood test.  The difference between this test and the fasting plasma glucose test is that this can be done whenever during the day, and you don't have to fast!  If someone's glucose is at or over 200 mg/dl it may mean they have diabetes.  If someone takes one of these tests, it is usually preferred to be re-tested on another day to confirm the diagnosis of diabetes.

What role models with a disability do you know of?

My aunt and my grandpa both have diabetes.  My aunt has type 1 diabetes, she was diagnosed at the age of 17.  She's now in her thirties and she manages her diabetes really good.  Her kids and her husband all have this app on their phones that will notify them if their mom has low or high blood sugars.  If they get notified they will usually go check up on her and make sure she is doing what she needs to do to maintain her blood sugars and insulin intake.  She has 5 kids, which she gave birth to four of them.  It was very dangerous and with her last boy, she almost passed away.  She's my role model because she is always positive and open to talking about diabetes.  My grandpa has type 2 diabetes and was diagnosed in his forties.  He is always so positive and makes anyone laugh.  He is always good at getting his blood tested and needing insulin if he's low.  He's one of my other role models because he works hard and puts his mind to anything and will finish it no matter how difficult the task is.

What are the educational/classroom considerations for individuals with the disability?

Every child is different when it comes to having diabetes. Sometimes kids will have low blood sugar, or high blood sugar.  There are different things you would need to do in those scenarios.  Some students will need to eat snacks during class if they have low blood sugars.  They eat the snacks to raise their levels up to a regular blood sugar.  Don't make it obvious or let the whole class know a student has diabetes, the student could be a little intimidated or doesn't want everyone to know.  Treat them as if they are like every other student who doesn't have diabetes. Don't draw attention to the student and let them get a drink of water or eat a snack if they have to.

You will also always want to be prepared in case your student has low blood sugars because it can occur at any time.  Which means always have a snack that the student can eat that will help get their levels up.  Never leave a student alone with low levels, it could be extremely dangerous. So always have a buddy system or be with them.

What are the symptoms and characteristics of diabetes?

These symptoms are very common, but some people with type 2 diabetes often don't notice the symptoms since they can be so mild.  Some of the symptoms are, going to the bathroom a lot, very thirsty, very hungry, extremely tired, vision is blurry, weight loss, and numbness or pain in the feet and hands. It is also common for someone to lose weight unexpectedly even if they are eating and maintaining their consumption of food.

Do I tend to think people with disabilities always need help?

I don't necessarily tend to think people with disabilities need help.  I will always ask anyone if they need help, but sometimes people want to do things on their own without help.  Also, people with disabilities are just like other people without disabilities.  We shouldn't assume that they always need help or assurance with something.  Majority of the time they want to be independent.

What kinds of discrimination do people with disabilities face?

Some things people with disabilities face with discrimination is harassment, hurtful words, judging, and direct discrimination.  Direct discrimination is when someone treats another person who has a disability differently and they aren't as nice to them because of their disability.  There will always be someone who can not be nice to someone with a disability and thinks they are better than them, but in reality it is just plain out rude and disrespectful.  Everyone deserves to be treated equal and should be accepted.

What misunderstandings do people have about disabilities?

Most people think that since a person has a disability it defines who they are as a person, which this is not true because everyone is equal.  There is a slogan that says "Label Jars, Not People".  This shows that we shouldn't label someone just because of their disability. People also think that people with disabilities are in pain all the time.  Yes, some people may suffer but it's just like if we got sick from the common cold or flu.  But people with disabilities are commonly not in pain because of their condition.

Some other misunderstandings are, people with disabilities need to be treated differently,

or that we need to pity them.  Again, everyone is equal and needs to be treated just like anyone else.  Their disability does not define them or who they are as a person because some people with disabilities are some of the coolest people you'd ever meet.

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