Northerner
Admin (Retired)
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
Phil Southerland started cycling for one reason ? so he could eat a chocolate bar. "I started riding so I could eat," he says. "I was just a young boy, exploring the neighbourhood, taking up time so I could go eat another bar."
Junk food was banned in Phil's house: he's had type 1 diabetes since he was seven months old, so his body doesn't produce insulin ? the hormone responsible for enabling our cells to convert glucose into fuel. Organ failure and diabetic coma are the biggest short-term risks, while long-term complications include blindness, kidney failure, cardiovascular disease and nerve damage ? sometimes leading to amputation.
These can be avoided with early diagnosis and good control ? yet Phil's parents were told by doctors it was unlikely he'd live beyond 25. And by 12, lured by the school snack machine, he had developed a potentially dangerous taste for Snickers bars. But he soon realised that cycling seemed to make his insulin injections work better ? and what began as an innocent pedal around his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia, led to a passion. By 19 he was competing for his university ? and was in excellent health.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2013/jul/07/type-1-diabetes-cycling-team-novo-nordisk
Junk food was banned in Phil's house: he's had type 1 diabetes since he was seven months old, so his body doesn't produce insulin ? the hormone responsible for enabling our cells to convert glucose into fuel. Organ failure and diabetic coma are the biggest short-term risks, while long-term complications include blindness, kidney failure, cardiovascular disease and nerve damage ? sometimes leading to amputation.
These can be avoided with early diagnosis and good control ? yet Phil's parents were told by doctors it was unlikely he'd live beyond 25. And by 12, lured by the school snack machine, he had developed a potentially dangerous taste for Snickers bars. But he soon realised that cycling seemed to make his insulin injections work better ? and what began as an innocent pedal around his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia, led to a passion. By 19 he was competing for his university ? and was in excellent health.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2013/jul/07/type-1-diabetes-cycling-team-novo-nordisk