15/11/2023
Lil Tony’s story
In the summer of 2014 Tony started to sleep a lot more than usual, he was bruising more than his typical boy bruises, and he was always out of breath. He was experiencing the same symptoms of Leukemia. He was extremely thirsty and constantly needing to go to the
bathroom. We took him to the hospital, scared out of our minds that they were going to tell us our son had leukemia, but shortly after arriving at the ER they did a finger poke to check his blood sugar level and it was over 700, and in DKA. At the time I was relieved that it was diabetes and not diagnosed with cancer. But I quickly realized how serious diabetes is, we spent a couple days in the ICU and then on the regular floor until the nurses thought we were ready to go home and manage it for ourselves. I think I was more scared to take him home then, then when Igave birth to him. That summer changed his life, all our lives, everything changed. Grocery shopping, vacations, staying the nights with his friends or family, even just normal running errands. He had some good day’s about staying on top of it and there was some bad day’s to. But we did the best we could in our capabilities. Tony lived with his diabetes for 4 year’s before he passed away August 28th, 2018. There needs to be more awareness about juvenile type 1 diabetes and by sharing his story I hope it helps family know that they aren’t alone
