My sister

I have blogged about my sister in the past but I don't think I ever really detailed how she got to where she is right now.

Her diabetes wasn't typical. What most people don't know is that the juvenile diabetes gene is triggered by a viral infection such as the chicken pox. Most children are not born being diabetic. Well as kids all three of us were fortunate enough not to get childhood diseases. But I don't know if it was really fortunate now that I look back on it.

My sister was seventeen when she got the chicken pox from her friend's son. Two years later she developed Type I diabetes. At first she was in denial. She would not check her blood sugar and she was hiding canybars under her bed. This continued until she wound up in the hospital with her first uncontrollable vomiting episode. They did not diagnose it at this point but she was in the hospital for 2 months. She wouldn't eat and when she did it was thrown up later. Once she was finally out they put her in an eating disorder clinic, not because she had a disorder but because she needed to learn how to eat all over again.

Fast forward 10 years, she is 30 and seems to be doing much better. Then the vomiting started again. We were all shocked since it had not happened in such a long time. I did some research on the web and came up with a possible diagnosis. A condition that is sometimes associated with diabetes is what is known as "gastroparesis". With this condition the nerves in the stomach stop working and food will just curdle in the stomach. Ultimately it will cause uncontrollable vomiting which results in elevated blood sugar and blood pressure. The only way to get the body back under control is going into the hospital. They agreed that this was in fact the condition that she had (it's a shame it took a non-medical professional to bring it to their attention). They put her on a ton of meds to control the "episodes".

The meds never seemed to work. Over the last 4 years she has been in and out of the hospital. As of the result of the eleveted blood sugar she has lost sight in one eye, use of her kidneys, and had her gall bladder removed.

Last year she was diagnosed with complete kidney failure and started the process to get put on the donor list for a kidney and a pancreas. In the last two years she has been in the hospital every 2-3 weeks with mainly the gastroparesis issues. A few times she also was in there for insulin shock (blood sugar getting too low).

Two months ago she was taken to the cleveland clinic and they wanted to put a pacemaker in her stomach which is supposed to help the nerves in the stomach regulate but the insurance wouldn't approve the procedure calling it "investigative". The gastro doc has been fighting and handling the appeal himself . Well last week she wound up back in the hospital again, along with my mom who isn't handling the stress all too well.

This morning we got the word that they approved the pacemaker and we are waiting to see when they are going to perform the procedure! I guess seeing how much she is in the hospital made them push it through.

So that is her story in a nutshell. I am sure I left some things out, but it's been such a long road its hard to remember everything.