Sarah Howard
Sarah Howard has worked in the diabetes research field ever since she was diagnosed with T1D while in college in May 2013. Since then, she has worked for various diabetes organizations, focusing on research, advocacy, and community-building efforts for people with T1D and their loved ones. Sarah is currently the Senior Marketing Manager at T1D Exchange.
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In what year were you (or your loved one) diagnosed with T1D? Cancel reply
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It was 1982, I was 13 years old. I was in 7th grade and weighed 70 pounds.
My son was diagnosed Nov.2,2013. He was 18mos old.
❤️
in 2003 at age 43
I answered 2020 for my kid.
His grandparents are 1970 and 2000.
1977, age 23. What is it about the 1960’s and 1970’s that so many were diagnosed during that period?
I noticed the same thing! very curious now. They told my parents when I was diagnosed at age 8.. that it was a virus that stayed in my system and attacked my pancreas. A lot of people died before being diagnosed in the 60s and 70s because there just wasn’t as much information collection then. I wonder what the numbers would be in that time period if they counted deaths by type 1.. or maybe it was considered dehydration then?
This is a self-selected group — we don’t have statistics on the whole population.
On the other hand, it seems that many of us were diagnosed shortly after one of the “childhood” diseases, like mumps. Today, kids are vaccinated against those. Without the childhood diseases, perhaps the auto-immune problems don’t get activated until later in life. ?
The choices for answers are more like “what decade were you diagnosed?” For me, 1976 at age 18 while in college.
I agree decade would be more accurate.
1991 when I was 35
2003, was 17 years old
2004, I was 48
I was diagnosed in the spring of 1964, I was 8 years old back in the time you used large gauge needles and glass syringes, animal made insulin tested your b/s buy putting 5drops urine and 10 drops water in test tube and adding tablet and it boiled it and gave you results blue light blue and so on. Wow things have changed(for the better) yet sometime I would like to stop the world I want to get off.
1980, we did have plastic syringes but a big gauge, the rest is the same. I remember my parents asking me if I wanted to use pig or cow hormones. I was 8. I guess there is some humor in it, I chose pig.
10 drops of water
5 drops of pee
Put in the tablet
And what do you see?
4+, 3+, 2+, Trace or Negative
That was the little ditty I learned as a newly diagnosed 8 year old in 1962 to test my uirne with a Clinitest kit.
Idk about you, but my urine “sugar” was usually 4+ orange or 3+ murky olive green. Sometimes it would be 2+ (brown mustard yellow) and very rarely Trace (blue green), The only time my urine was Negative (blue) was when I paid my brother a nickel to pee in the cup for me and I would test his urine instead so my mother would lay off criticizing and telling me I was “a bad diabetic” and must be “cheating” all the time.
I did not cheat. I adapted and learned what I had to do take daily insulin shots and eat at meal times and snacks to prevent having “insulin reactions” or from getting a nauseous pukey feeling when sugar was too high.
Albert, I have all the same memories. I was dx’d in 1960 right before my 4th birthday.
1980 at age 32. I was told that it was very rare for someone my age to develop type 1. Since then, I have met tons of people in their 30s and older who were diagnosed as such. So much for being considered “rare”!
I was 27 when diagnosed. For 2 weeks preceding dx I had excessive thirst, frequent urination and lost 13 pounds (from 120 to 107). My Dad had been Dx’d 20 years earlier at age 63….but back then they didn’t differentiate among “types” of diabetes.
30 years old, 1982. “they” were still using the age criteria, so I was initially Dx’d with T2D. Didn’t have any of the risk factors – no family history of D (not any type) and had recently retired as a ballet dancer and my weight had gone form my working weight of 105-110 (I’m 5’6″) to 95 lbs. But still, I was an adult – so the Dx was “adult onset”.
Took being found in a DKA coma by a neighbor to get the correct Dx. Actually, while I am grateful she found me, she wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. Like many in the performing arts, I had a day job so she called my work to say I wouldn’t be coming in. She mentioned she could notrouse me. Lucky for me I worked for a large city fire-rescue dept with EMS. They sussed the situation and dispatched from HQ. Saved my life having that day job.
1955 at age 9
1964, I was 15 but I failed to answer for my Father who was 30 in 1940, yeah one of the first LADAs of the Modern Age. He lived until 1988 and was 78, seems I will “outlive” him
I didn’t have my glasses on. I think I put 1980-1989. I was diagnosed in the 1990-1999 decacade. Sorry about that. I just had cataract surgery 😎
1951 at age 6
1951. Age 4. (^o o^)
Dx’d in 2013, at age 55. That year Thanksgiving and Hanukkah were back to back, so family was coming to celebrate. I refused hospitalization, I wasn’t in DKA anyway. Seven hours in the ER with the hospitalist trying to figure it out…type one or two? I am so thankful for today’s technology and my heart goes out to you folks that had to pee on a stick, etc. And, especially for the kiddos with T1D. ❤️
Are Arabs, Jews, Palestinians more susceptible to diabetes? Why?
1978, I was 13, beginning of the teens. I was little guy, pure bones
Started showing the classic symptoms (polydipsia, polyuria, polyphagia) in late November 1962 at age 8, a few months after having the mumps. My brother and paternal cousins (we were all born in the 1950s) had the same mumps virus but I was the only one who developed T1D. When I went to sleep away camp in North Central Ohio for kids with diabetes there were about 20 of us aged 8 to 12 who were also newly diagnosed after having the mumps the previous fall and winter.
Watching tv with my siblings my sister turned to me and said” that’s what you have”
Next day refusing to go to school , I was at the dr by 9:00 AM by 10:00 AM I was in the hospital with T1D this was December 1962
My tenth birthday
Talk about the gift that keeps on giving.. easy to remember my anniversary though.
2021, age 26. Zero family history, but looking back I think I was probably pre-diabetic for a fairly long time, such as having trouble with hypoglycemia at soccer camp when i was a teenager.
In 1995 at age 18
It was 1954, after a summer of riding my bike 7 miles to teach tennis to kids at a day camp. Do not know how I got through that, but in September, I got to go to Joslin to learn how to stab oranges. I feel very lucky, though, to have gotten some of my “training” from the doctor who started the clinic!
Can’t really remember what it was like before all that happened. Must have been pretty carefree, but the following 70 years haven’t been all that bad. In fact, my three kids and becoming a certified Braillist remind me that it’s really a matter of choosing what’s important. And noticing all the beautiful things along the way! I love being here!
June of 1970
1990
October 1980, at the age of 22.
1990 a couple months after my 26th birthday
#BeWell
1964!
58 Years ago in November, 1965
12/28/1966
I was dx in April, 1955 , age 8, after measles, chickenpox and rubella, all within three months. A history of autoimmune disease on both sides of my family. My maternal grandfather dx with diabetes in his 30’s and very fortunate to have early insulin available.
I was 9 in 1966, and had mumps right after I was discharged from the hospital.
1990
In the dark ages – before 1970 – zero technology. My mom is always happy as she learns about every new tech for T1D, because we navigated the unknown together and survived!
1953 at age 4
About 1952, about age 20..
Nov 1971
I was diagnosed in February 1998 and six months later my sister was diagnosed with breast cancer. After she had gone through surgery and reconstructive surgery and then chemo she said to me that she felt bad that her cancer journey was over and I had to deal with Diabetes the rest of my life. But little did we know that 16 years later her breast cancer would come back and she would have to fight it again for four long years before it would take her life while I just celebrated my 25th year of living with Diabetes.
April 1987 at age 19. I had not been sick prior to my diagnosis which seemed to confuse the endo in the hospital.
1966 – a year or so after having double-sided mumps and German measles