Transcript – Andy Meade
Andy:
My name is Andy Meade and I joined Team Type 1 about a year and a half ago and raced in the Race across America and we won, beat the record by twenty minutes and I have type one diabetes.
I can imagine people watching us race across the country and think, "Boy, oh those are athletes, that's a completely different story. I'm a normal person." And it's exactly how I felt when I first heard about Team Type 1 and I was an amateur racer and had been handling my own athletic life with diabetes all by myself without any help from the outside. But becoming involved with Team Type 1 I've realized that we're all, we're all normal people, we're all normal people with diabetes. We as a team go through all the whole spectrum of ups and downs that people with type one diabetes go through.
Everything I do to help my diabetes, with the team, with exercise, it's no different than anyone with type one diabetes would benefit from. But becoming involved with the team has shown me just what a relief it can be to have people around who have to deal with the same problems everyday. And it's like we're all helping control each other's diabetes and blood sugars too.
I was diagnosed when I was sixteen, so a little bit later than most. I was in control of my own diabetes from the start. My brother, my half-brother, is also type one diabetic, and he's fourteen years old now and has had it for five years and he's having a rougher time. I know that he, he's had some higher A1C's and it's very common at that age and I know he's frustrated with it. I know he does not like testing his blood sugars, especially when his mom tells him to.
I think about that when I'm not at my best with my blood sugar control. I'm not just doing this to keep myself going, I want to be in good control as an example to him as well.
I'm currently a PhD student at the University of Pennsylvania and I work in a lab. I really have to fit my eating and my diabetes around the rest of the things I do in a day. I can take Apidra within fifteen minutes before or within 20 minutes after starting to eat. It may not seem like a big deal to many people hearing that but that flexibility enables me to keep my blood sugars under control.
