Brian Angelo

"I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples."
— Mother Teresa

At the age of 23 I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. Unfortunately, I lived with this disease for almost a full year before it was diagnosed. I knew something was wrong from the start. I was constantly thirsty and could not stop urinating. My job performance was decreasing very fast and before long I barely had the energy to get out of bed in the morning.  At a very rapid pace things got bad, I literally lost 40 pounds in 3 days. I am generally a very athletic guy and love spending my free - time in a gym. My mom luckily located a doctor that would listen to my complaints. He diagnosed me before any tests had been run. After running the proper tests he came to us and said, “Just as I thought you have diabetes”. He told my mom I have no - idea how your son is still alive, let alone standing. I was rushed to the emergency room and before I knew it the doctors informed, my family I was having a heart attack. I spent the next 4 days in the ICU.  Laying there I had no idea what was going on and I didn’t even begin to understand. Doctor after doctor, but they all sounded the same. Spanish I suppose, but foreign for sure. Scared doesn’t begin to describe some of the emotions I was feeling. At the age of twenty-three, I was forced to learn life all over again.  Here I am 23 going through the worst break up of my entire life with my first and now you mean to tell me I basically have to learn life all over again.

Once I was finally released from the local hospital things got progressively worse. I guess we shall call it a pre-arranged marriage. Type 1 Diabetes was now my wife and I knew nothing about her. My honeymoon period lasted a little over a year. Let me be the first to say pretty would be a horrible classification. The embarrassment I felt and sense of confusion was completely over whelming.

Eventually I turned to drugs.  At this point my life had/was spiraling completely out of control. I never took the time realize what I was doing and the ways in which it was affecting my life. Constantly making one mistake after the next and disappointing myself and the ones who love me. Before long I moved from my parent’s home into a house with a few buddies. Worst mistake I’ve ever made, this house very quickly became known as the “Trap House”. Loud music every night, wild parties, gang members, drugs everything you could think of, it was there.

There was a period of time I was literally living from my vehicle. With no one else to blame, but myself I started realizing how bad things were. My life was literally falling apart and to top it all off, my dad suffered a heart attack right about this same time. He literally stopped breathing for three minutes. His near death experience affected me in more ways than one. To block out the hurt I convinced myself drugs were the only way and before long I was living in the trap house again. This time around though I was scared, everything was a hundred times worse than when I left. The house now had every drug known to man.  More gang members and guns than I could count.

I will never forget the sense of hurt I felt when I should of been home to watch the Super Bowl with my dad. Tradition every year for as far back as I, can remember. My mom called over and over leaving messages telling me how upset my dad was. I choose drugs that night instead of being there with my dad. Although I don’t think I’ve ever forgiven myself, I am thankful. In my opinion that night and the way I felt is what inspired me to walk away from everything cold turkey. (I’ve never looked back)!!

It was a fresh start, I eventually reunited with my first love and my diabetes was finally under control to an extent. I was willing to learn and that’s what mattered to me.  She had no clue though she wasn’t there when I was diagnosed. I now had to explain Type 1 Diabetes to her and that I would have to use insulin injections and continuously check my sugar. I thought she would leave me. Luckily she didn’t and together things got better. So much so that I took the time to learn everything I could. I did research for hours and hours. At the same time though, I was trying to determine what I was going to do with the rest of my life. When I was diagnosed with Type 1, I was laid off from a very good retail job. My career was in place. I made good money and could provide for our future. The cited performance reasons for letting me go, but I know better. My dedication and passion for Type 1 Diabetes was crazy at this point in time. I wanted to know everything and I was determined to make a difference. I decided that was my career plan, I was going to help every single person with Type 1 that I could. I knew what I wanted to do and where I wanted my life to go, but I knew it was going to take time and that just was not fair to another person.

For the next year, I locked myself in my bedroom. I refer to this point in my life as the dark days. During this time period my grandmother passed. I can very clearly see that she is my guardian angel. Since her passing everything in my life has started to come together and I am so grateful. She’s watching over me, she never stopped believing in me!

I’m asking for people to stand behind me and support me in this very personal battle with Type 1 Diabetes. As you can see it’s affected my life completely from top to bottom. If it’s done this to me, what about the small kids who don’t understand? What happens if they turn to drugs just as I did? What happens if they can’t find their way?

I am not a selfish person all I want to do is help and give back, I have to make a difference. I will not stop until I matter because someone must speak up! When I have kids of my own the chance is there that one or all could acquire this and it would because of me. Type 1 diabetes cuts lives short, if I am going to lose time with my family there is no way in hell I am going down without a fight.