I had grown up riding my bike. When I was in the second grade I even rode 50 miles on a banana seat bike in Texas over the Fourth of July weekend. Talk about HOT! Then in the fourth grade I moved to Colorado and continued to ride my bike even taking some mountain biking classes offered through my Girl Scout program. I was your typical kid riding my bike to school and using it for transportation to and from my friend’s houses.

My diabetes story begins in September of 1997. I was in the seventh grade and still an active kid. I played basketball & softball, did recreational gymnastics, and ran long distance track. I was strong and enjoyed a good athletic challenge. I remember the week of my diagnosis being in PE class and feeling so sick and so weak that I couldn’t even use the light archery bow; so I went to the nurse’s office and she sent me home from school. I then spent the next week in bed. I would get up to get a drink since I was SO thirsty, and to use the bathroom. After being in bed for a week my parents decided it was time to take me to the doctor. It just was not like me to be in bed for so long. At the doctor they performed a variety of tests and finally decided to check my glucose. It was outrageously high. The pediatrician said that I had diabetes and sent me to the Barbra Davis Center in Denver. I remember thinking “can I have something to drink if we have to go to Denver, I am SO thirsty.”

I don’t remember realizing that I was diabetic until I was admitted to Children’s Hospital. I then spent a few days in Children’s Hospital, and the next two weeks in and out of the Barbra Davis Center learning the “ins and outs” of diabetes. I thought I had a good understanding of the disease and how to care for myself. I remember wanting to cry as I told all my friends and my family about my new diagnosis and they were all very supportive. The first couple of years I had diabetes were fine. I would discuss my numbers and doses with my parents and it was part of our everyday life. As I started to mature and become more independent I would hide my diabetes as much as I could. When I didn’t people would look at me like I was crazy. At one point in time someone told me that it was rude of me to take my insulin in public. I was mortified. I became involved in different activities provided by the Barbara Davis Center including ski trips and holiday parties and even getting to meet Mrs. America who was diabetic at the time. I thought that this was so cool. I made several friends who also had diabetes enjoyed their companionship yet I still felt like no one understood what I was going through.

In October, 2007, I was twenty-eight weeks pregnant with my second child. My husband and I were healthy and active, ate a primarily vegetarian diet and worked out at the gym five or six times a week. An avid cyclist, I continued to ride my bike throughout my pregnancy. I was stunned, then, when my midwife called to let me know that I had failed a routine Glucose Tolerance Test to screen for pregnancy-induced Gestational Diabetes. She broke the news gently, letting me know that my results were "slightly elevated." I would later learn, however, that my blood sugar was dangerously high.

In those first moments, I was buried by the weight of the diagnosis. I feared for my precious child. I felt the burden of an enormous guilt, as if I had done something to create the illness within me. It seemed a personal failure, indicative of some bigger shortcoming. My focus, however, quickly shifted to the baby for whom I was responsible. I found a doctor who specialized in treating women with Gestational Diabetes, I ran out and bought arm fulls of Diabetic Cookbooks, and I poured over literature on the disease. In the process, I began down a path I never anticipated walking and found, to my surprise, that the diagnosis was not a condemnation but, rather, a gift.