The year of 2013

So its nearly the end of the year so I thought I would write a post about how much my life has changed and how much I have achieved in this year. You might sometimes feel like you aren't moving forwards with you diabetes and that it is stopping you from doing things, I feel like that quiet a lot of the time. However if I think back to at the beginning of this year I have achieved so much and I am sure you have too.

At the beginning of this year I was ill and unwell because I hadn't been looking after my diabetes how I should have been. I went through a stage where I didn't want to be diabetic, I wanted to be like all of my friends at school. I wished I wasn't diabetic. I ending up in hospital because my levels were so high.I totally regret doing what I did. I made it stand out more that I was diabetic and different to everyone else at my school because I had to have time of because of how ill I felt and I had to go into hospital. 

After when I was out of hospital I realised that if I looked after myself I would feel a lot better and my diabetes wouldn't affect me as much when I was older. So I started doing what I was meant to do. My levels were so much better which meant my hba1c was so much lower, its the lowest I have got it in a long time (:

While I was in hospital I got told about some Facebook group that were for Teenagers with type one diabetes. So when I got home I joined some of them and they made me feel so much better because it made me realise that there are loads of other people going through exactly what I was going through. The groups have helped me so much because you can ask questions on there and then people will answer your questions. The people on the groups are so lovely and are always happy to help you. I have made some great, amazing friends on there who live in places like England, New Zealand, America, Canada and some other places.

Also this year I have learnt to change my line on my own, I know it probably sounds stupid that I was 14 years old and I had never been able to change my line by myself. The reason why I had never changed it before was because I have a really bad phobia of needles and my mum had always been there to change it for me. The hospital told me that I need to learn to change it myself because I was getting to old for my mum to keep changing it and my mum isn't always going to be there to change my line, for example she wasn't going to come round my house when I had my own house just to come and change my line, haha. It came to the point were I really wanted to do the Duke of Edinburgh Bronze award which is an award which is given for completing a programme of activities that can be under taken by anyone aged 14 to 24. We got told you picked a skill, physical and volunteering activity and we would do an expedition which meant sleeping in the middle of nowhere in a tent for a night and walking 14miles over 2days. This meant I had to learn to change my line myself or I wasn't aloud to go. I really wanted to go and I didn't want to let my friends down so for the first time I changed my lie by myself, I was so happy when I did it. Now I change my line myself every 3 days (:

Since being able to change my line myself, being able to control my levels better and being able to carb count, I have been able to go to so many more things without my mum. I have been able to do the Duke of Edinburgh, go to the O2, go to Cambridge and go round friends houses for sleepovers more because my mum feels a lot happier and doesn't worry about me as much. Also I have been able to get a paper round that I do Monday to Saturday every week. I have to get up at 6am everyday to be able to do my paper round which I wouldn't have been able to if my levels were high because I wouldn't have felt well enough. I wouldn't have even thought about doing some of this stuff this time last year.

This year I have also made this blog, I cant believe how many people read my blog. I just wanted to have somewhere where I could write stuff that was on my mind and things that were bothering me but at the same time be able to help other people with diabetes and show them that they are not alone. Always remember you are a lot stronger then you think! If you ever need someone to just talk to or need any help I am always more then happy for people to send me a message or comment below and I will chat to you (:

 I have realised that I have achieved so much this year. I am more independent, happy and more well then I was last year. Even though I have had some times when I feel so fed up of my diabetes and just feel like giving up, when I look back I am so glad I never gave up and I kept going on because I wouldn't be where I am today if I had given up. Remember you are stronger then you think

The Duke of Edinburgh

A couple of months ago at school we had a assembly about The Duke of Edinburgh bronze award. The Duke of Edinburgh bronze award is an award which is given for completing a programme of activities that can be under taken by anyone aged 14 to 24. We got told you picked a skill, physical and volunteering activity that you would have to do for 3 months or 6 months. We also got told that we would have to do a expedition where we would have to plan a walk from the bus to the campsite and then we would camp for one night and then we would have to plan a walk back to the bus, each walk hade to be 7-10 miles long. We also got told we would have basic training on how to cook on a trangia, first aid and how to set up a tent. I really wanted to do it!

While I was sitting in the assembly I was thinking how fun it would be if I was able to go, I would have so much fun with my friends. However I didn't think I was going to be able to go because of my diabetes. At the end of the assembly I picked up a letter about it to give to my mum. I hoped she would let me do the Duke of Edinburgh bronze award. When I got home I should my mum the letter and told her how much I want to do it. She told me it was going to be a lot of work, I told her that I didn't care it was going to be loads of fun. So my mum filled out the form and said I was allowed to do it.

The next step was to choose what skill, physical and volunteering activity I wanted to do. For my skill activity I choose to make a patchwork blanket for 3 months, for my physical activity I choose to do Pilates for 3 months and for my volunteering activity I choose to help out at football training for 6 months. Next in my group we had to plan a practise expedition so that we could learn  all the skills and work out what we would need to take on the real expedition. It was all going really well and my diabetes hadn't stopped me from doing anything everyone else was doing.

However when it came to the real expedition there was a problem. I couldn't change my line to my pump myself, so the hospital wouldn't let me go. If you read my post called Changing my line, you will find out how I changed my line myself for the first time, so the hospital let me go on the expedition at Grafham water.

The expedition at Grafham water was so funny, I had so much fun with all of my friends. On the first day we were meant to walk 8 miles but we got really lost and ended up having to ring one of the teachers and they tried to find us. The teacher asked us what was around us, the funny thing was all that we could see around us was trees and fields so the teachers had no idea where we were. Luckily the teachers found us and then we carried on walking to the camp. When we eventually got to the camp we worked out that it had taken us over 9 hours to walk 8 miles. It took us so long because we had got lost so many times. All the other groups had cooked dinner, put their tents up and had a shower by the time we got to the camp. One the second day we walked 7 miles and we didn't get lost once. We had a much better days walk on the second day, this was because everyone was looking at a map and we had better maps then on the first day.  It took us about 4 hours to walk 7 miles on the second day. Overall we had a really fun time and I will never forget it. The best thing about the whole expedition was my levels didn't go low once while we were there, even with all of the walking. I didn't go low because I checked my levels every hour and I put a temp basal on my pump of 70% the whole expedition. My diabetes didn't stop me from doing the expedition and I would recommend people to do it because I felt so proud after I had completed the expedition and it was loads of fun!

Just because you are diabetic doesn't mean you can't go on trips like the Duke of Edinburgh expedition. You can do everything other people can do.