A childhood that requires constant monitoring. 3

Sofia Zinchenko is a kind and cheerful 10-year-old girl. But for almost two years now, she has been living with an incurable disease – insulin-dependent type 1 diabetes.

During this time, her family has learned to live in new special conditions: daily insulin injections in the morning, evening and before each meal; accurate calculation of food through the scales, constant monitoring of blood sugar levels – all this is necessary to compensate for the disease in order to avoid serious complications. After all, diabetes is a very insidious disease; a person looks healthy on the outside, but in a matter of seconds can feel unwell and even lose consciousness due to sudden changes in glucose levels in the body. Sofiika does not always feel low sugar, and does not feel high sugar at all, so to ensure a healthy life without complications, she needs constant monitoring of her blood sugar.

Thanks to charitable assistance last fall, Sofia received sensors for round-the-clock sugar monitoring. It makes life so much easier! Thanks to the sensors, the child can lead a full life without fear of falling asleep and not waking up, or going to school and fainting, because her mother constantly sees the real picture of glucose levels and manages to react to changes in time to prevent hypoglycemia or hyperglycemia.

Sofiika studies with “excellent” grades, attends an art class, and takes an active part in school activities because she loves performing with her friends. She is a very active and sociable child who tries her best to live a full life. But there is no stability in diabetes – you never know how the child's body will behave today and how it will react to a usual meal, a walk or even a test at school. Without the sensor, we would have to do finger punctures almost every hour, and this is very difficult for the child morally and physically.

Currently, the girl feels well, does not differ much from her peers, has full compensation of her sugar level and has no complications. But this is possible only due to the considerable efforts of the parents and the child herself, daily strict control in counting food, adherence to the plan of regular injections, as well as constant monitoring of sugar levels and timely response to changes in glucose levels.

Currently, the family does not have enough money to provide the child with everything necessary to compensate for diabetes – to buy sensors, needles, lancets, and sometimes iPorts (to reduce the number of skin punctures during insulin injections). Sophia's mother is once again asking for help in purchasing sensors for daily blood sugar monitoring.