Actress Elizabeth Perkins Living With Type 1 Diabetes Since Age 44
Diabetes Forecast magazine's February 2008 issue features actress Elizabeth Perkins on the cover. Ms Perkins has starred on stage and film and can currently be seen in Showtime's hit series, Weeds. In 2005, Perkins was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at the age of 44.
People who become type 1 diabetics as adults frequently feel isolated and suffer emotions such as denial and depression as they try to cope with the disease. Type 1 diabetes is typically thought to strike children and teens. There are few resources available for adults who are diagnosed later in life.
According to the article, Perkins also underwent a period of denial, isolation and depression, keeping her condition a secret for while. She is quoted as saying, "I felt completely overwhelmed that first year on the show [Weeds] and I didn't tell anyone I had diabetes. All of a sudden I was in my trailer at work, testing my glucose and shooting myself up, and I was really scared and felt very alone and completely in over my head".
After coming to terms with the disease, she goes on to say, "I'm actually a happier person than I was before I was diagnosed. I have a much greater perspective on the world around me and what's important."
The Diabetes Forecast article was written by Carolyn Butler. Read it in it's entirety...
Read more stories of people diagnosed with type 1 diabetes as adults...
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Comments
I think all of us who have dealt with a diabetes diagnosis go through a period of mourning. We miss our healthy lives (or in my case, my son’s healthy life). What makes it so difficult is the unrelenting 24 hour a day, 7 days a week care of this disease.
I guess diabetes is a great equalizer, too. It doesn’t matter if you are a celebrity or a toddler — the management is the same and it it changes your life.
I have five children. Three wonderful healthy sons and two daughters. One was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 1996 and died in 1997. She was four years old. That was very hard. My younger daughter was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in 2004. That was very hard also. However it is a joy to live everyday with her. Sure we check blood sugar, deal with insulin doses, carb counting, some sleepless nights and we all work very, very hard to keep her healthy…but we have our daughter and she continues to thrive and survive long after the diagnosis. She also shows extraordinary maturity, compassion and strength as a result of her condition.
My daughter is Katie, too, and she has just been diagnosed, at age 9, with Type 1. I think, although I am exhausted right now adjusting and I freaked out for about half an hour, it helps that my mother died seven weeks ago. I say this only because I can’t tell you how happy I am to be able to take Katie home from the same hospital. I didn’t get that with my mom, and this means, no matter how much management or stress involved with her diabetes, I get to have her with us and still here, alive. I have high hopes for Katie, and believe she will only become a better person as a result of weathering yet another challenge. My cousin was diagnosed with Type 1 as an adult, and like Elizabeth Perkins, it’s really hard and isolating. IN some ways children are so much more flexible and able to handle this kind of news.