He told us that how this was determined was when they tested my blood sugar which was when they pricked me with a tiny needle inside a pen type thing. It only hurt a little it felt like someone pinching you really fast. They told us that a normal blood sugar was between eighty and one hundred and eighty. And there machine that we used to test my blood sugar only went up to one thousand six hundred. And thats where it stopped for my blood sugar which meant I was over that . he said there is no reason I shouldn't be in a comma. my dad just walked away and went around the corner I have never seen my dad cry till then he didn't cry out loud he was completely silent like one of those old black and white movies with no sound. I just sat there and asked my mom what Juvenile type one diabetes meant. She said it was nothing I couldn't handle. I nodded and turned back to the doctor to listen to what he was going to say next. He told us he would give us a second to take this all in. we kinda just sat there while my mom was hugging me I asked her if I would still be able to do gymnastics and she said of course. But we will have to make some changes to our lifestyle. I asked her what that meant and she told me I will have to take something called insulin every day by giving myself a shot. Also I have to test to make sure my blood sugar is good everyday to.
I replied “well that doesn't sound that bad”
The doctor returned just as my dad did and told us we will have to take classes so we can know what we will have to do on a daily bases. Then the doctor started talking about insurance to my dad who was asking a lot of questions. I was told I would have to stay in the hospital for a couple of days. The doctor told us around three days for the recovery time. I actually had a great time staying at the Rady childrens hospital for those three days I got to sleep, get up run around, go outside where all the art sculptures were. They were made out of brass and I would climb all over them. I ate so much food and whenever I needed something I just had to press a red button that was attached to my bed and the nurse would come. I always ordered the same thing for breakfast in the morning a huge omelet with milk bacon and a bowl of fruit and the rest of meals varied. The nurses said I ate so much food and it was because my blood sugar was so high I was getting no nutrition from the food I was eating before i was diagnosed. Thats why I had all those problems like peeing alot. The only thing bad about the hospital was I did get visitors but my parents still had to work so they weren't there most of the time and I only saw them at night cause one of them would sleep over so I felt more comfortable and at home. I decorated my hospital room so much it looked like my own room.
On the last day at the hospital I was really happy to go home and take a shower cause I smelled like a hospital, which was not a pleasant smell. I still couldn't go to school or anything cause I was not one hundred percent feeling well. So the coupe days after were all lazy days we watched my blood sugar really close and did everything the doctor said to do. The hardest part was having to count carbs. Carbs are the things I have to take insulin for, and we had to know how many crabs where in everything I ate. Then we had to add it up to find out how much insulin I needed. It was really hard to get used to this and since I was so young.
I would sometimes forget but, I learned I couldn't do that.
Age eight I was now in third grade and over the summer I had learned a lot about how to handle my diabetes. Instead of my parents giving me my insulin shots, I gave them by myself and I wouldn't let them do it anymore. My school didn't have a nurse last year because there was no need. The worst thing that could happen that would need any kind of nursing was when some kid got a scrape on there knee and needed a band aid. But because I now had diabetes they had no choice but to petition the board to get a nurse for me. Unfortunately they had to get the worst most annoying and picky nurse ever.

Why couldn't they have gotten a normal nurse. The nurse they got was named Mrs.Susan and she was a tall fat white woman with a huge nose and had OCD about everything I did. She would always make the simple process of me testing and taking insulin a huge process which was done step by step. I knew what to do and could do it in like forty seconds with no problem but with her it took most of my lunch. She would always say slow down this is a step by step thing you are moving too fast for me. She would after I washed my hands, ask if I washed both of them which was the stupidest question cause how am I supposed to wash only one hand. Who does that. Anyways everytime I complained about her to my mom she would always say well she is the head of the nursing department for the san diego school district.
I would then reply “I know, but she is so annoying”
Which I know wasn't a good argument but I was like eight and in elementary school you don't learn anything besides how to count and read. They definitely don't teach you anything about how to argue why your school nurse is so terrible. so I just had to live with Miss Susan till the end of the school year. And hopefully a new nurse would come, a new better nurse. But halfway through the school year Miss Susan was going on vacation for two weeks which was fantastic news for me, and she told me I needed to behave with the temporary nurse that was going to replace her for thoses two weeks.
Finally two days later Miss Susan left. When I arrived on that cold monday morning at 6:45 I knew the day was going to be good yes it was just because I had a new nurse I mean as a eight year old it was very easy for my day to be great and be ruined. If you gave me candy I would hug you and tell you this is the best day of my life ,and if you beat me in four square I would pout and say it was the worst day of my life. So after the usual morning routine of reading and then the teacher talking for about ten minutes until we broke off in to our activities for the day, it was finally lunch time and I would get to see my new nurse. I walked into the office and saw a lady sitting at the desk facing the opposite direction of me. She heard me come in because as soon as I walked in she told me to sit down. I sat down and took out all my supplies and sat there for around five minutes anxious to she what she looked like and how her voice sounded because a person’s voice can say alot about them. But all I could hear was the typing of the keyboard. she finally stopped typing and turned around she apologized and said she still had some work to do before she could attend to me.
Her voice sounded soft and kind but she looked nothing like her voice. She looked like she was in her mid twenties she had piercings and tattoos and jet black hair with two blue streaks on either side of her middle part. Her roots were growing out blonde she was wearing a black t shirt and black jeggings and gray flats with some black beaded detail on the tip. She looked like what you would call emo. I kinda had a surprised look on my face when she told me that her name was Miss Green but I could call her Katelyn. She asked me if I knew what to do and I nodded my head and started. She watched me to see what I was doing then she made notes on her clipboard about what I was doing. It was super quiet and I felt like a test subject. She made comments on how independent I was and I probably didn't even need a nurse but it was required for the school to have one for me. When I was done she told me to go have fun at lunch and I left. She seemed nice and I was happy to have gotten a good nurse. The nurse I had was important to me even more important than the teacher I got because I had more interaction with her, and I needed to be able to go to her for anything while at school. I was not like that with my teacher they were just there to teach me boring stuff that I thought I wouldn't need. Kateyln was really nice to me and let me do my own thing which I liked. After the two weeks, Katelyn told me I was one of the most responsible eight year olds she has ever worked with.
The next day I walked into the nurses office and Miss Susan was back and she told me she got good feedback from Miss Green about me. I wanted to jump up and tell her it was Katelyn but I know that would be a bad decision. Over time I learned to deal with Miss Susan and would just tune her out for the remaining of my third grade year.

I finally started to get back into gymnastics after a couple of weeks cause the doctor suggested that I should take a break for about a month. my first day of coming back to the gym everyone on my team had put together a card and signed it. My coach larry told me that I was to have to take it easy until I could feel more comfortable about starting again. He could tell I was nervous about coming back.
All through practice I just sat there watching all my teammates to scared to try anything because I was worried I would mess up and get embarrassed. So even though I was excited to be back, I needed some time to adjust. I went from training four days a week for four hours to just sitting there on the first day back in only a month. On the way home my mom had told me that it was going to take a while to be fully committed to gymnastics again and I shouldn't be upset about it. I thought I would be able to jump right back into it but something was holding me back and I couldn't believe I was afraid of something I loved so much and worked so hard to be good at.
I slowly started to get back into gymnastics and get used to the hard training I had always had to endure. And now I also had to stop to go test my blood sugar to make sure the number was right. If it was too low I had to eat something with carbs to bring it back up, and if it was to high I had to take insulin to bring it back down. Sometimes I would forget and my parents would get mad at me and tell my I needed to be more careful because ever since I got diagnosed with diabetes they have been a lot more protective of me which. I understood because I know it’s a big deal to parents when their baby is having to deal with such a big thing. I was such a young age and since I was the only baby of the family it was like a super sized happy meal of protection.
I was finally about to turn nine years old which was also around the time of the gymnastics competition season. That year I was going to compete in a different age group which was the nine to eleven age group. This meant I would be competing against bigger older and better girls so I was kinda nervous. I also was now in fourth grade which meant I was the highest grade at my elementary and to me that meant I was in the coolest grade. Fourth grade was my favorite year in elementary school so far I was at the top of the school. I got a new nurse and I had the best teacher of all time. Being at the top of your school was a really big thing for elementary, Middle, and high school especially. Because you felt like you have more power, you could boss people around, and you were smarter than them because you new more.
I had gotten a new nurse this year her name was Miss Cathy she was a middle aged lady who had short blonde hair and glasses she always wore a cashmere sweater and I swear she had a different colored one for every day of the week. I noticed on fridays she always wore her purple one. She paired her cashmere sweater with tan khakis and some sort of usually white earrings and bracelet. She always had dark circles under her hazel eyes and was very quiet she never talked much. I guess was a good thing since I always wanted to get in and out of the nurses office as fast as I could. My teacher Mr. Rubin was one of the best teachers I had ever had he was a average sized man with brown hair and green eyes and always smiled and when ever he talked the whole class listened. We did so many fun things in his class like going on tons of field trips, having outdoor lessons, and having a contest on who could build the best bridge out of popsicle sticks, me and my friend mia won that. We even building rockets and launched them at the park next to our school. My rocket was blue and yellow which was supposed to represent the sun and the ocean but everyone thought it was the San Diego Chargers colors. In the morning right before class Mr. Rubin would always ask me how my gymnastics was going and I could have sat there and talked to him about it for hours about it because he was such a good listener. But the bell always cut me off and he said I could tell him later. Then all the kids would rush into Mr.Rubens class which was filled with color and light and we would sit on the rug in the center of the room with colored squares on it. We were each assigned a color that was our color for two weeks and I always wanted to sit on the pink one because it was in the very front in the middle. Mr. Ruben told me we all would have to take turns on the pink square because everyone wanted to sit there. I mean it was the best square to have. So each time we got reassigned colors Mrs. Ruben would save the pink one for last to make us wait and get anxious because he thought it was funny how bad we wanted it. And the person that got it would having bragging rights for the whole two weeks. Another thing that was exciting about fourth grade was I was now all the way back into gymnastics and that was what made me most happy. I was also back with all my teammates which I missed so much for that month I was gone. Taking a month off was nice but coming back was the hard part. That was because once I was fully recovered and able to do all the things I was used to doing, my coach did not let me ease slowly back into workouts I had to do everything and for the next week I would walk out of the gym so sore I looked like a bow legged cowboy and the next day. It would hurt to sit, stand, walk, run, move, do anything, even write on a piece of paper I was so sore. But I finally got used to it and was happy to be back. The comp season for me was good I got some first place medals and some second to but I didn't qualify for nationals I felt as if I had not had a month off I would have. So I promised myself I would next year. At my fourth grade promotion we all waited to go up on stage to get our hat and certificate and when it was my turn all my friends and my mom and dad yelled my name and I was super embarrassed but it was ok because I was going to be in middle school next year which I was so excited for.
Middle school was kinda scary and fifth grade was a lot different than elementary school because this year all the kids that were in forth when I was in third were now in sixth. They had grown up a ton the kids were huge and some of them were at least 5’5 and all the girls wore makeup and tighter and shorter clothes and I still wore my favorite spongebob shirt with shorts and pigtails. I took school really seriously in fifth grade because I wanted to get all A’s, and because I was now ten which meant I had two numbers instead of just one. That is a big deal to any nine year old who is soon to be ten. So I had a huge birthday party. It was not the best birthday I had ever had because one girl at the party told us that we weren't including her. So she cried for like and hour and then my mom made me apologize for something that wasn't my fault. She could have played with us she but all she did was sit there. It was not like we didn't want her to play. We just never invited her to. But because I was only ten I got mad at her and told my mom she ruined my party by being a brat. My mom just sighed and told me she didn't care and to go play with my presents.

I knew that having Diabetes would lead to a lot of questions whenever I had to stab myself in public and yes it did get annoying but I got used to it. The most common question was “What is that?” or “what are you doing?”. But I just ignored it. Some people ,mostly boys, would say “thats so cool” and I would just sit in silence in my head laughing at the stupidity. I always felt like nobody knew what I was going through and how hard it was to remember things. I have to count carbs, stab myself several times a day, and how irritated I got when I thought “why me, what did I do to deserve this.” People murder people, don't you think they should be the ones being punished? My mom says we are never given things we can't handle, but I felt like this was too much for a little girl to have to go through. When ever my friends had food and offered me some I had to wait till I took insulin and I got irritated when I thought about it and I didn't feel like a normal kid.
I was now going to gymnastics five days a week for four hours now so it basically consumed most of my time. I wasn't able to hang out with my friends after school when they asked me to. And on fridays when there parents took a group to the movies I was never able to go cause I had gym. Don't get me wrong I love gymnastics but it consumed my whole life pretty much. I already didn't feel like a normal kid because of diabetes and now I especially felt sad about not getting to do all the stuff a normal fifth grader should be able to do. But I loved gymnastics and I could never quit. But it was hard on me and my body cause I was always so tired. I would sometimes sprain an ankle and be on crutches for a few days and it sucked not being able to walk. I was basically known as the cripple of the school because on average I was on crutches about five times my fifth grade year. I had really weak ankles and so whenever I even slightly landed wrong my ankle would roll and I would twist it or sprain it. One time I even fractured it just from landing a little funny on a mat. And having such weak ankles was not a good thing if you wanted to do gymnastics. So i basicly just crippled around the school as fast as i could to avoid being knocked over.
Finally! it was my sixth grade year I was eleven years old now and I was at the top of the school again. I loved being on top of the school. You just felt like you had more power even though you didn't. You could walk down the halls and feel like you were higher than everybody else. This probably makes no sense to you, but at that age it made perfect sense. I loved all my teachers this year except for one my math and social studies teacher. Her name was Mrs. Hause and she hated me for no reason. But her partner Mrs.Rossie, my english teacher, loved me. Mrs. Hause was short and a little chubby and had frizzy dirty blond hair which was about shoulder length. In that class she would always try to get me in trouble because there were other kids that talked. If she had to choose who to punish for talking it, was always me. And with Mr. Rossi whenever I talked in his class he would just look over at me with his white beard and bald head and say “Paris” in a long billowing tone. Than everybody would laugh and we would go back to what we were working on. I never understood why Mrs. Hause hated me. The sixth graders last year told me it was because every year she would pick someone out of her class the opposite gender of the year before that she hated. And since the year before she hated on this one boy named Kayden Berks ,this year she had to pick a girl .Out of all the girls in my class, of course it had to be me as the one she picked on. And so thats why I figured she hated me because I was the first girl she saw as a target for a crumby first and second period. Mrs. Hause was the total opposite of Mrs.Rossie she was mean made us do tons of work and never congratulated us for any thing we accomplished. Mr. Rossi was nice he always gave us candy for doing good and didn't overwhelm us with too much work. He was overall a way better teacher than boring stuck up mean Mrs. Hause. As you are reading this you probably think I am either the worst student ever or I get a lot of bad teachers. Just so you know, it’s a little bit of both.
In gymnastics I have had problems with my ankles wrist and back. But now I was having problems with my elbow and it wasn't getting better like all the other times. I was starting to have so much trouble with it I couldn't straighten my arm all the way. I put it off like I do with most of my injuries and tried to just push through the pain at practices.I told my mom and showed her that my elbow couldn't straighten all the way and she said that I have to go to the doctor. She made an appointment to see the doctor next week and told my coach I was going to not come to practice until we knew what exactly was going on with my elbow.


The day of the doctors appointment I was terrified because I thought I would have to quit gymnastics. I was seeing a new doctor that day. My usually doctor’s name was doctor Wallace he was middle aged and he had a white goatee and mustache. He specialized in bones and joints and sport related injuries. He moved my elbow in different ways and then asked me to straighten it all the way I told him I couldn't he gave me a funny look and asked why. I shrugged and told him I didn’t know and then I showed him. He told us it could be somthing to do with the cartilage and I would need to get an X ray. We went straight from the small white room right to the X ray room and I layed down and the nurse placed heavy mat type things over my forearm and shoulder. My mom and dad stepped behind a closed off area and the machine started to make take the X rays. It was fairly short and we were sent home and told the X ray would come in about a week.
My mom got a call and was told the xRays are in and I would need to make another doctor appointment. Our second doctor appointment was to so that we could see the results of the x Ray. But we also got some other news. Doctor Wallace told me my mom and dad that I had cartilage in my elbow that needed to be taken out and I would have to have surgery. I didn't think much of it until the day of the surgery. I was fine for the four hours of waiting, but when they called me to come back, I immediately burst into tears. I lied down on the table still sobbing the anesthesiologist gave me a shot and told me to count backwards from one hundred and by ninety seven I was out. I woke up three hours later and felt horrible I had a cast and I could barely stay awake. I went to go see my parents who told me everything went well. We then went to go talk to doctor Wallace he didn't have good news. He told me it was going to be about a month recovery and he recommends I don't do gymnastics anymore. I was crying and in my head telling myself the doctor isn't always right and he could just be trying to be safe like most doctors.
One month later after crying everyday, Thinking about it, and healing. I had to say goodbye to my team after telling them I had to quit. I eventually learned everything happens for a reason. It was time for me to move on It was time to start something new in my life. I told all my team mates I would come and visit and that I would miss all of them. But I would miss my coach most of all and I thanked him for giving me one of the best experiences ever and I would never forget him. I eventually learned to move on but I will always have this to remember for ever.