Dani Mellon-

Learning Story
Intro
During the months
april through august
of 2020 I endured
one of the greatest
learning experiences
of my life.
Sickness
Up until the end of March I was completely fine
and the all of a sudden I got quite sick. I didn’t
think much of it at first because It felt like a
normal cold.
Finally in the last week of April I reached
the last straw. I lost around 30 pounds
in less than a week. This was when we
decided to phone my doctor.

Then as April came around it wasn’t going

away. I kept getting new symptoms and
nothing was consistent. I was getting
extremely tired and it became hard to walk
up my stairs in the morning.
Diagnosis
On May 1, I talked to my doctor and she
requested I came immediately to her office. My
blood sugar tested higher than her machine
could read and so she sent me to ER.
Once I arrived at the hospital I got some
further testing they diagnosed me with type 1
diabetes. This was very hard to hear at first
because I didn’t understand.
Fortunately I was checked into
pediatric care to be taught about
diabetes. They kept me in the
hospital for a week to learn
everything and become well
enough to return home. It was a
crazy week of my life even though
all I did was lie in bed.
Recovery
It wasn’t until they let me go home that I started
I was in the hospital for 6 days that consisted
seeing myself get back to normal. But I didn’t end
of many IV’s and tests and in my many other
up looking anywhere near the same as before. It has
hours of spare time all I could do was lay in
taken me so long to build back a similar figure and
bed.
level of athleticism as before.
If the sickness and weight loss hadn’t already
I have been training so hard to get
broken me down enough now I could add 6
back and I can say now that I have even
days of nothing. I had no muscle anymore and
exceeded my old level of fitness.
was very underweight. I didn’t look like
myself.
What I learned/How it changed me
This entire experience has taught me so much about myself. It’s taught me a lot
about what perseverance can do. Taught me to not compare myself with other
people, but at the same time not to make excuses for myself. I could use diabetes as
an excuse to be not as good, or as motivation to become the best. I want people to
say that I am so good and I have diabetes in addition to being the best. I have never
been as motivated to get better, this has truly changed me for life.