Be a Life-Long Learner!
My 3 (and a half) favorite places to get diabetes information
Want to know a secret?
We’re still learning a lot about how to optimize diabetes management.
Okay, so maybe that’s not much of a secret! Back in my 20s, I assumed that how I was managing diabetes - count the carbs and take the insulin (except for exercise where you eat the carbs and skip the insulin) - was the pinnacle of diabetes management success. And honestly, it wasn’t that great.
Can you believe there was a time when we didn’t think protein, fat and fiber could influence blood sugar? Shocking, I know.
Luckily, as I spent more time working as a freelancer for various publications, I realized just how limited in scope my knowledge was. In fact, a lot of my work as a writer influenced my desire to become a diabetes educator.
Anyway, if you’re like me and you love learning and you feel like maybe there are aspects of diabetes management that you haven’t quite figured out, I want to share a few of my favorite places where I go to get educated about diabetes research and management strategies.
diaTribe- With the tagline “making sense of diabetes,” this online publication from the folks at the diaTribe Foundation is hands-down my favorite place to go for current news and insights about diabetes. The folks who write for this publication are writers which means the information is provided clearly, concisely and comprehensively. Their staff regularly attends all the major diabetes conferences, and they dig into relevant issues for all people with diabetes. They have a free newsletter so you never miss a headline and I always open their emails.
Think Like a Pancreas + the Integrated Diabetes Services Blog- I could have made this two separate items, but I decided to combine the work of Gary Scheiner into one super item. So, full disclosure, Gary - a CDCES who has T1D - used to be my diabetes educator (now I work with Jenny Smith, as needed) so I might be a bit biased but I think the 4.5 stars out of 637 Amazon reviews backs me up on this. Think Like a Pancreas is my go-to Fundamentals of Diabetes resource. It’s on its third edition, and I own all 3, and it thoroughly describes and explains all the different elements of diabetes, including physiology, medications, devices, exercise, and more. Gary’s online publication, the IDS Blog, is great because he and his staff regularly write updates about news and technology reviews, such as the latest Omnipod 5. It’s not updated super often, but it always has helpful insights when it is.
Sugar Surfing- I was introduced to Steve Ponder’s almost philosophical take on diabetes management several years ago, and it has greatly influenced my perspective and mindset in managing my own diabetes. Sugar Surfing is a methodology that encompasses several different diabetes tactics that Dr. Ponder (who has had T1D for 50+ years) outlines in his book. But my favorite aspect of Sugar Surfing the removal of the static, formulaic approach (where carbs + insulin ratio = control) and instead focuses on a dynamic approach where we are more in the drivers seat of moment-to-moment decisions (here’s a post to illustrate this). Yes, it can feel a bit overwhelming and daunting at the outset, but with practice, it feels more true to the nature of the disease and thereby more effective.
Honorary Mentions:
Why no podcasts? TBH, I don’t really listen to podcasts! So those aren’t on the list. But since my CDE Jenny Smith is a frequent guest on the Juicebox Podcast, I can recommend that, and I have also known Stacy Simms of Diabetes Connections for years and appreciate her professional journalist take on the issues (I’ve also been a guest on this podcast twice and really enjoyed both experiences!).
What’s your favorite diabetes information resource? Leave a comment to share!
Great post! I love ‘Think Like A Pancreas’ too - it’s a great resource! I used to hang out on diabetes.co.uk/forums a great deal, and there I learned a tonne of information when I first started pumping and then switched to low carb. There’s nothing like fellow T1Ds to bounce ideas off!