Family learns how to deal with diabetes

Editor's note: People tend to be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes after ages 35 and 40. This has been corrected below.

The distress a Jackson family felt when their 7-year-old daughter was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes two years ago has gradually evolved into confidence.

Mike and Leslie Buck had expected a routine visit to the doctor when their daughter, Alexa, felt badly. But when her blood glucose tested 900, well over the normal of 70 to 100, they found themselves undergoing a three-day orientation at St. Louis Children's Hospital.

"It was petrifying, definitely life-altering," Leslie Buck said. "We had to pass a difficult four- or five-page test before they felt confident enough to let us leave."

"We went from zero knowledge to having a firm grasp of how to care for Alexa," Mike Buck said. "We carry on because she deserves the same kind of life as any other child. We just deal with it."

Alexa Buck, 8, holds the syringe she uses to inject insulin April 9 in the living room of her family’s home. Alexa has Type 1 diabetes.ADAM VOGLERavogler @semissourian.com

Alexa's 11-year-old brother, Austin, stayed with relatives while the rest of the family was away, but he has since become part of the effort to keep her healthy.

"It isn't much of a difference," Austin said. "I worry sometimes that she might pass out if [her blood sugar] goes too low."

Alexa remembers that time as "scary," but says that with the help of South Elementary School nurses Tosha Borgfield and Katrina Waters, she and her family are managing the situation well.

"It did make a difference, but we're coming along, getting better at it and learning as we go," the third-grader said.

Asked how she knows when to go to the nurses' office, Alexa said, "I don't feel right.

"Sometimes I start to shake or feel dizzy, and I know the sugar is low and I need a shot."

Rotating among her arms to her belly and legs and sometimes injecting herself, Alexa needs four shots of insulin a day, ranging from two to 13 units before breakfast, lunch, dinner and bedtime.

Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation spokeswoman Laura Roeder of St. Louis said Type 1 diabetes occurs when the pancreas stops making insulin to remove excess glucose from the blood, whereas Type 2 is a result of the body's becoming insulin-resistant.

"In Type 1 diabetes, the body attacks itself," Roeder said, adding that Type 2 may often be treated with exercise and dietary changes.

Type 1 is most often diagnosed in younger people, from children to young adults, said Rosie Danker, a certified diabetes educator at Saint Francis Medical Center. Type 2 tends to be diagnosed more in adults after ages 35 and 40.

She also said more cases of Type 2 are diagnosed today because of the obesity problem in America.

Roeder said nearly 392,000 people in Missouri, or 8 percent of the state's population, are affected by both types.

Janet Stewart, a diabetes educator at the Southeast Diabetes Center, reported that Cape Girardeau County has 7,500 adult diabetics, 600 who have Type 1, and 900 child diabetics younger than 17, 750 with the more severe form.

"There may be another 3,000 people who are undiagnosed," she said.

"Thirty-percent of the kids with Type 1 have a relative who has it, and 85 of 100 people with Type 2 have weight problems."

Until around the early 1990s, Stewart said, the life expectancy of a child with Type 1 diabetes was 10 years less than that of an average child, but scientific advances have ensured diabetic children a normal life expectancy.

She said stress or illness can cause fluctuations in blood sugar, and the danger zone is usually when the diabetic is asleep.

The Bucks said Alexa probably will progress to an insulin pump. They said she is doing well, recently joining a softball league and continuing her fourth year of tap, jazz and ballet lessons at the Academy of Dance Arts in Cape Girardeau. Her favorite subject is mathematics.

Mike Buck, director of recreation services at Southeast Missouri State University, said that for many people, it might be better to get Type 1 as a child. "We've had employees at the recreation center diagnosed, and it was extremely difficult for them to change their lifestyle at that stage," he said.

Leslie Buck, a self-employed speech language pathologist, said her children have helped a lot. Holding their lively Shih Tzu, Holly, she said, "As a lady said when we were leaving Children's Hospital, life with diabetes is like life with a stick shift.

"Alexa is a very responsible, mature, wise and strong girl. She has had to grow up quickly. If this happened to other children, I don't know how they would do. She has been a real trooper.

"We're proud of her brother, too. I have heard him say, 'You can eat this.' They are really good kids. I think life is as wonderful as it can be."

She said Robin Masters and Kathy Childers, the parents of Type 1 children at West Lane Elementary, have been a good resource.

The Bucks raised $800 with a March Madness basketball fundraiser for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and will participate Saturday in its "Walk to Cure Diabetes" at Farmington, Mo., 70 miles northwest of Cape Girardeau.