Jacques is a member of the Young Leadership Committee (YLC) and an ambassador to the 2019 Golf Classic. His transition from student life to a young professional greatly impacted the way he manages his type 1 diabetes (T1D), but having peers in the YLC who were able to offer advice helped him make the transition smoothly. This year, as a proud ambassador to the golf program, he hopes to connect and share his story with other young professionals living with T1D. 

What is your T1D story?

I was diagnosed in June 2010, when I was just finishing 8th grade.  I played in a lacrosse tournament the weekend before and felt dehydrated, had very low energy, and noticed that drinking gatorade made me feel worse not better.  A few days later, I went to my annual pediatrician appointment and luckily, they detected the diabetes before I had any serious complications or needed to be rushed to the ER.  My parents took me to the hospital a few hours later and I was stabilized relatively quickly when compared to other diagnosis stories I’ve heard.

 

How did you take on your new diagnosis?

When I was first diagnosed it was a lot to process, but I had just started summer vacation and so I was able to devote a good portion of my day towards figuring everything out and making sure I was following all of the instructions my endocrinologist gave me.   About a month after my diagnosis I began training for the United States Lifesaving Association Junior National Championships.  They were being held in Cape May, only a few hours away. I competed and qualified for the prone paddle boarding and beach run events.  The training consisted of workouts, swimming, and surfing and I would find myself training up to 5 or 6 hours a day.  Still in the honeymoon phase of my diagnosis, my metabolism was running so high that I ended up completely off insulin for a 3-4 week span leading up to the tournament.  My doctors were concerned that I was pretending I didn’t have diabetes and that it was a sign of poor management, but at the time I knew I would need insulin when my training ended.  The fact of the matter was, if I took insulin for anything under a 60 carb meal, I would drop low, even if it was only one unit.

That fall, I started my freshman year at a private high school, and found that I was able to frame my T1D management habits as just one more step in my new routine.  Having a fresh start on everything that year made my T1D feel less daunting and more normal. My mom was extremely helpful and hands on with helping me recalculate insulin ratios and practicing good habits.  The school nurse and my teachers were also extremely accommodating. I found that the feeling that I could easily make the right choices to take care of my health was a huge driver for my transition into life with diabetes.

 

You lead a very active lifestyle – tell us how diabetes played a role in that.

My active lifestyle provided a baseline to keep my blood sugar stable, stay in good physical shape, and even drove me to prefer a healthy diet because I wanted to feel like I was performing to the best of my ability on the ice, field, or in the water.  Hockey felt like the easiest sport to play while managing my diabetes.  In games, you roll 3 lines and your shifts are about a minute long, so for every minute of intense exercise you have two minutes on the bench to process how you feel and whether you might be dropping low.  You also go to the locker room between periods while they cut the ice, which gives you plenty of time to check your blood sugar, eat a snack, or do anything else to keep things running smoothly.  I played hockey for Seton Hall Prep and thoroughly enjoyed it, and went on to play two years on the club team at Lehigh University.  I can’t remember ever having a major issue with my diabetes while playing.  In high school, my linemate for two years also had T1D, which was a unique experience, and his dad was one of the coaches on our team.  The two of us would keep each other in check, and almost treat it like a competition; who could manage it better.  Having multiple people affected by T1D in the locker room changed the conversation from uncharted waters to a familiar, and even casual, topic.  We never felt uncomfortable getting off the ice at practice to check our blood sugar if we weren’t feeling right, and it was commonplace for me to host a team vote on whether I should drink the juice box with big bird or elmo on it to treat my low.

The more difficult activity for diabetes management was my 5 years as an Ocean Lifeguard.  Unlike the certainty of an hour and a half hockey game, a day on the job could include multiple workouts, multiple rescues, and lots of urgency, or you could spend the majority of the day sedentary, “riding the pine” up on the lifeguard stand.  I found I had to switch to a pump in the summers, so I could unplug and turn my basal off, on days with big waves and rough surf, and use full basal and different ratios on slower days.

 

How did you get connected to JDRF?

When I was in high school and college, my family and I toured a few research facilities and met with scientists working on specific research projects for a cure.  On the advocacy and management side, I always had other friends that were diabetic who I could talk to for advice, so I was slow to reach out to a more national support system like JDRF.   That changed when my grandfather took me to a JDRF golf outing last June, and Sam DiGaetano, a JDRF ambassador my age, was in my foursome.  We hit it off and became friends at that golf outing. He invited me to several Young Leadership Committee (YLC) events where I met other peers living with or caring for someone with T1D.  I am excited to get involved with stuff ranging from a spin class to a Jets game, but between professional exams and starting a new job, I’m focusing on working with Sam to organize the golf outing in June that we enjoyed so much last year.

 

How has JDRF impacted your life?

I got involved with JDRF because when I graduated college and moved to a desk job, the change in activity level and lifestyle was accompanied with the need to make changes to my diabetes routine.  With so much on my plate, the YLC group helped provide a valuable source of advice for me. My peers shared what devices worked best for them, I better understood how to change my insulin ratios and eating habits, and they even gave me general life advice.  Currently, I’m helping to organize the JDRF Golf Classic at Fiddler’s Elbow in June. Working this event is my way of expressing thanks for finding this network of support.

 

What about JDRF excites you the most?

Something that has really impressed and excited me about JDRF is the scope of the organization’s work, which can be broadly categorized into advocacy, maintenance/management, and the cure.  My previous exposure to T1D research and advocacy had been fairly singular, learning about one research project or talking with a couple of other people my age also living with T1D.  In learning more about JDRF, the best way I can describe their approach is they bet on every horse in the race, so it’s inconsequential which horse wins, as long as the race ends as fast as possible.

 

What advice would you give to someone just newly diagnosed?

Diabetes isn’t about swinging for the fences, just make contact and keep your eye on the ball.  Building strong daily habits and paying attention to detail is a recipe for success and much less stressful than trying to achieve perfection. So, stick with a basic framework, be prepared to make a few mistakes early on, and don’t take shortcuts, even if they seem harmless at the time.

 

What does a cure mean to you?

I’m not sure what I’ll do on my first true vacation day, but I’m excited about the possibility.