Cycling for Diabetes Awareness
When the California to Atlantic City Race Across America bicycle race arrives in Atlantic City after 3,052 miles this Sunday, June 17, the defending corporate team champions should be the favorites to win it all. That team, Team Type 1, is a group of elite cyclists who all have a medical condition that can terrify any of us who have been given the diagnosis. They are type 1 diabetics. Instead of living with self-imposed restrictions, these talented athletes prove that living with diabetes doesn’t have to be a life lived in fear, whether you have type 1 diabetes (formerly known as juvenile diabetes) or type 2 (adult onset) diabetes.
Riders in Team Type 1 have a collective total of 161 years managing Type 1 diabetes, and have taken more than one million finger sticks and hundreds of thousands of insulin shots. However, they haven’t let this stop them from achieving their goals.
This is important to know, especially for young people who have just found out they have the disease, or for the many diabetics who don’t test their blood sugar because they can’t be bothered. Testing your blood sugar and taking your insulin or pills can prevent the major complications of diabetes. Those complications, like amputations, kidney failure and blindness are not inevitable. You can do something. I was first diagnosed in January of 2003 after I went to my eye doctor because my eyesight had suddenly gone blurry. My fasting blood sugar was 500 (it should be 120 or under). I didn’t want to lose my eyes. It took me about a year to get my blood sugar under control, but I’ve kept it under control ever since.
The members of Team Type 1 are an inspiration to everyone living with diabetes Come on out to the Atlantic City Boardwalk this Sunday to cheer them and the rest of the riders of the Race Across America. Learn more here.