Doing it for Sam!

In 2015, aged just 16 months, my beautiful godson Sam became very poorly. After a very worrying few months he was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune condition, which means his immune system attacks healthy body tissue by mistake. In this case, it attacks the cells in his pancreas. Since his diagnosis, he has been such a brave little boy, learning how to live everyday with this life long condition and has done so with such a wonderful smile on his face. Everyday Sam and his family have to work hard to ensure they carefully control what he eats, how much he exercises and constantly monitor his insulin levels. For Sam this can be very distressing and something he has to lI ve with everyday. However Sam lives life to the full and his diabetes doesn’t, and won’t, stop him doing anything he puts his mind to. Sadly determined Sam isn’t the only young person living with this condition. One local organisation which has helped Sam and other Type 1 children is Investing in Children which runs a project called Type 1 Kidz. It supports many of the 1,000 children/young people & their families living with Type 1 diabetes in North East England; creating spaces to share their views on living with diabetes and supporting them to 'be in control of their diabetes and not let diabetes control them' learning together in partnership with local Paediatric Diabetes Teams. Sam has been lucky enough to enjoy trips out to places such as Lightwater Valley and learn that he is not alone. He and his family are able to seek support and shares worries and experiences with families going through the same as them. Thank you to everyone in advance for your very generous donations - this is going to be one of the hardest challenges I’ve ever done but BRING IT ON!