Do It Yourself (DIY) has gained a certain notoriety in the Type 1 Diabetes community in recent years. If you have heard of the DIY movement you probably associate it with the technology advances made in the last decade by #WeAreNotWaiting. Creating the ability to share blood glucose values and trends along with analytical tools through Nightscout. Shortly after hacking insulin pumps to control them. Then built an algorithm to control insulin dosing called OpenAPS. Insulin pump and CGM manufacturers are still trying to catch up to the open-source Automated Insulin Delivery (AID) systems: OpenAPS, AAPS, iAPS, and Loop.
I have not really found this surprising. Type 1 Diabetes has always been DIY. When I was diagnosed on Christmas Day 1973 I began my T1d journey with almost no tools except the little dietary education I received in the hospital during my diagnosis stay. It was a rocky start. Telling a 12yo boy he would never eat candy, cake, cookies, cereal, syrup, honey or desert of almost any kind (except 1 slice of Angel Food cake) probably doesn’t usually go well. And it didn’t for me. Heading into the next major holiday, Easter, I was again in the hospital. Released on Maundy Thursday and back to hospital Easter Monday. I learned through fire and have not been admitted to a hospital for Diabetes in the last 49 years.
As I settled into the routines required for this journey my specialist doctor, after a year, said to me: “You are doing very well. You have learned to listen to your body and do what it needs you to do. From this day forward you are your own doctor. I cannot be there for you all the time. You parents can’t be with you all the time. You have to make the decisions. You are your own doctor.” In other words: Do It Yourself!
So if the the thought of doing it yourself has kept you from exploring Loop or other DIY systems because you are not a DIYer think again. You probably have been DIY managing your Type 1 Diabetes for quite a while.
Here's to all the people with Type 1 diabetes who do things their own ways.
Mike
Just Another T1d
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