As summer approaches, it's time to secure plans for vacations, part-time jobs, and ... camps! Most kids have gone to summer camp at one time or another. Day camps are great, but sleepaway camps are awesome! Some people I know who have diabetes have not been able to go away from home by themselves, though, because their parents worry about their diabetes management.
It is true that at summer camps geared toward teenagers, the counselors may not watch out for you as much or be able to help you manage your diabetes. On the other hand, at camps specifically for kids with diabetes, the counselors are diabetics too and they help campers count carbs, measure out food at meals, and carry around glucometers and glucose tabs. The staff at these camps basically make every normal camp activity diabetes-friendly.
I have been to sleepaway camps several times; for almost five years I went to diabetes camp, and then, in High school, I went to a running camp with my Cross Country and Track teammates. I had a great group of girls that would meet me at Glyndon every summer. The same counselors were there year after year, and year after year the girls and I would get put in the same cabin. Some of us wore pumps, some took injections (but eventually switched to pumps after the rest of us convinced them that insulin pumps rock!), and we all had slightly different ways of managing our diabetes.
Looking back, I wish I had kept going to the diabetes camp, Camp Glyndon. Nothing can compare with living in a cabin with a bunch of girls who have something so important in common with you.
