Juvenile Diabetes - resources for the newly diagnosed

My 6 year old nephew was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes type I this past week.  He was fine until a few weeks ago when he started drinking and peeing a lot. Thankfully his mom, my SIL, is a nurse and got him tested right away. A quick trip to the fabulous children's hospital yield lots of helpful information and practice at shot-taking, blood-testing, food calculating, and monitoring for the whole family including grandma.

Feeling useless I started to at least sort out some resources to help in these early whirlwind days of adjusting to the new reality. Here are some things I found that might be of help to other families with kids:

Getting oriented -- information, support, help, and resources



Children with Diabetes: The online community for kids, families and adults with diabetes. Online support, tips and product information, etc.





Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International: Dedicated to finding a cure
Get your "newly diagnosed" kit with Rufus the Bear, find local chapters for support, how to help with fundraising, getting involved in clinical trials, up-to-date news on research toward finding a cure.
    
Diabetes Stinks: Tips and thoughts on living with diabetes at home and at school from 8 year old Bailey who was diagnosed at age 6.



Nick's Simple Wins - Nick Jonas of "The Jonas Brothers" teams up with Bayer Diabetes Care to fight diabetes. Read Nick's blog, enter contests, find product information.




Medical Identification Tags
Personalizing your devices with changeable covers (skins) and other features

1 comments:

naturalmom said...

Sending thoughts and prayers to your nephew and his family. My nephew was also diagnosed at age 6, so I know how it shakes up the family to have so young a child get a diagnosis like that. The family adjustment takes time, but my nephew is now about to turn 13. He's a happy, healthy kid with an insulin pump that lets him lead a pretty normal life. I think he got the pump when he was about 9. He was a spokes-kid (formerly known as "poster child") for JDRF for a while, which was not a bad gig -- he got to go to things like sports events and get backstage passes and stuff. Fun!

That said, in another sense my nephew is heading into the "danger zone" -- the age where he is needing to become more and more responsible for his own diabetes management, combined with the teenager's sense of invincibility. It's a little scary, but so far, so good.

Wishing peace and strength to your brother and SIL as they make the adjustment and to your nephew as he deals with all the new routines and pokes. :o(

Stephanie Charlot

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