I am a certified personal trainer and nutritionist, author and speaker. None of these things would have ever been possible without type 1 diabetes, which has allowed me to see the silver lining in some of life’s most difficult times and remain grateful.
plant based
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I’m Mexican, first generation American and type one diabetic for 19 years. I love the outdoors and working out. My best friends is my Diabetic Alert Dog, Lady Bear 🙂 I got diagnosed at the age of 12! I didn’t mangage it at all. I kept living my life as if I didn’t have it diabetes. I was ashamed of it. I didn’t want to be different as I already was different as a Mexican. Cultural assimilation was the name of the game and I planned to play it. Emotionally and financially was hard. We didn’t know what diabetes was when I got diagnosed. My dad was a school janitor (he did have his BA degree but from Mexico) and my mom just had her General Educational Diploma (GED) working a minimum wage job at a company that refused to pay her more.
This is my tenth year of diabetes but for many of those, I was in complete denial about my diagnosis. No one in my family has diabetes and nor did my friends at the time, which left me feeling quite alone and like I didn’t have anyone who understood what I was going through. After much self discovery, trial and error with different diets and daily life practices, I made the decision to shift to a mostly plant based and whole foods diet.