For example, when you're going out of town for an away football game, it's smart to let the bus driver or chaperon know you have diabetes. Or when you go to someone's house for dinner and hear the food will be late after you've taken your insulin, you might tell someone. People will usually be helpful if they know what your needs are.

If your HbA1C is running high, you may find that your periods aren't regular. On the other hand, you may find that your blood sugar level may be high around the time of your period. It can happen a week or so before the flow starts and is due to changes in female hormones. These hormones cause insulin to not work as well.

With your doctor's approval, you could take less short-acting insulin at dinner and cover the pizza later with the difference in the short-acting insulin. If you count carbohydrates, you can use your usual insulin-to-carbohydrate ratio to account for the pizza. Approximately one unit of Regular insulin can cover 10 to 15 grams of carbohydrate eaten.

Alcohol has no nutritional benefit. It's processed in the liver like a fat, so it's usually counted in the diet as a "fat exchange" if you're using an exchange diet. Alcohol can also make you forget to take your insulin, or help you forget how much you ate while you were drinking.

It doesn't so much matter what you eat as long as you adjust for carbohydrates. The other bonus is that you can have a snack along with everyone else, whenever you want, as long as you cover it. You can even play with the carbohydrate content of your meals from day to day as long as . . .

On more shots a day, a long-lasting insulin such as Ultralente gives you a steady amount of insulin between meals. Then you take a fast-acting insulin to cover meals and snacks. The idea here is to try to mimic what your body should be doing . . .

Your parents, doctors, educators, and others have expectations of you and how you should take care of yourself. You, on the other hand, find it hard to keep diabetes management a priority. It's pretty hard to keep everything straight – even if you want to . . .

Guilt is neither a pleasant nor helpful emotion. In fact, it only slows you down. While guilt is often laid at your feet by others, it doesn't mean you have to pick it up. It only becomes a problem for you if you accept it!

Your baby will have to have frequent injections, finger pricks, and blood work at doctors appointments. All of these will eventually become a way of life and are accepted to some degree by most children. However, it is not normal for a child to have to have these intrusive sticks done . . .

When siblings fight, they have angry thoughts toward each other. When the brother or sister develops diabetes, they commonly think that their angry thoughts caused the diabetes. Parents and other adults can help by talking about feelings and fears.

Testing for urine ketones is done by dipping a urine strip in urine, waiting a certain amount of time, and comparing the color to a chart on the bottle. When your child is in diapers, checking ketones can be challenging.