Twitter Summary: @asbrown1 shares his top 10 tips for living w/ #T1D, straight from presentation to 100+ teens at #CWDFFL15
At the Children with Diabetes Friends For Life Conference this month, I had the incredible opportunity to speak to ~100 teenagers with diabetes. My talk, “10 Tips for Living Well with Type 1,” was a lot of fun to put together, and our team thought diaTribe readers might be interested in seeing it.
I agonized over how to present this so that it wouldn’t come across as a lecture – even my teenage self would not react well to some of the advice (“Sleep seven hours a night? Hah! I have sports plus exams plus the next level to beat in Halo 3!”). I concluded that the best thing I could do was make this session a conversation, but ground it in lessons I’ve learned over time. Thankfully, I also had the amazing FFL staff by my side to help guide the discussion.
The session reminded me of something that I intuitively know but often forget: each person’s diabetes is completely different, and what works for me won’t work for everyone. And equally important, what works for me may change over time – it certainly has since I was a teenager. I’m sharing the slides below in case they’re useful, but my biggest hope is that it gets you thinking about your own diabetes. What motivates you? What drags you down? What can you do better today? Who can you reach out to for support? Let us what you think by email or on Twitter.