The first speaker of the day was Claire Lomas, who shared her incredible story of overcoming a serious spinal injury that happened whilst horse riding, and left her paralysed from the waist down. To become an inspiration to the nation, by dreaming beyond and completing incredible feats such as completing the London marathon in her walking suit, which she learned to use just a few weeks before the big event.
Claire was also a Paralympic Torch bearer for the London 2012 Olympic Games and has raised half a million pounds for spinal charities to date. We then got to have a go at being life coaches for an hour, before heading out on a photography walking tour of Amsterdam. This was a lovely way to get to know each other, as we got to know the city and learned more about taking photos from the professional photographer.
But it wasn't just us who were sharing experiences, our hosts Abbott kindly shared some of their research on how people use the Flash Glucose monitoring system from all around Europe. To summarise in my own words, the research has shown that the more engaged people are in their diabetes, with flash measuring their glucose levels, then the better their diabetes outcomes appear to be. From elements such as time spent experiencing a hypo being reduced, to time spent with hypoglycaemia decreasing too. There were many moments of joy and laughter throughout the day, but there were also times of shock and sadness, when stories were shared that highlighted just how different access to vital diabetes care is, even within around Europe. But that's why it's so important to be a vocal community, to raise awareness and support each other with the condition of diabetes which brings us all together.
0 comments:
Post a Comment