Pump Pocket rose from the ashes of a diagnosis
Once there was a little boy who was very much like other boys his age. He had a mom and dad and two sisters and a brother. He loved to play soccer, jump on the trampoline and build pump tracks for his bike in the backyard.
One day, he got very, very sick. Everyone thought he had the flu. But soon, his mom and dad realized that it was something more.
He remembers riding to the hospital in an ambulance at top speed. He remembers the doctors and nurses rushing to put an IV in his arm and he remembers one word the doctor said, DIABETES.
Diabetes? Oh no. Wasn’t that something that you got when you ate too much fast food? That is what his friends laughed about at school. Anything but that! Please, No!
Soon, he learned that Type 1 Diabetes (T1D for short) was NOT his fault. He learned that for some reason that no one knew, his body’s powerful army that usually fought off enemy viruses and bacteria, was fighting against him. They were fighting and killing special cells called beta cells that made insulin. Insulin was the key to open the door to his cells so that sugar could get in and feed them. If the sugar couldn’t get in, his cells would die.
The good news was that about 100 years ago a man named Sir Frederick Banting had discovered a way to get new insulin into the body, so that people with Type 1 Diabetes could live. Insulin could be injected with a little needle poke or through a new thing called an insulin pump.
The insulin pump was a great help to the boy. With it, he could eat what he liked, and when he liked as long as he calculated how much insulin he needed to cover the food. He was learning to do the work that his beta cells automatically did for him before.
While the pump was great in most ways, there was a big problem with it. What was he supposed to do with it when he played and ran with his friends at school? It rattled around in his pocket when he ran, and his light, sporty clothing didn’t always have pockets to carry it and he hated having it clipped on the side.
His mom didn’t know how to solve the problem for him. So, sitting on the front steps, together they prayed and asked God to help.
His mom remembered reading about a pro basketball player with T1D who said he was thankful for the new basketball tights he had that had pockets in them for phones. He used the pockets for his pump. No one made clothing like that for kids. Then, it happened. A light bulb went off in the mom’s brain.
She bought too-big underwear from the store. She took it home. She cut them up and re-sewed them together with a pocket on each side to hold her son’s pump!
When the boy got home from school he tried them on, and they fit! The next day he tried them at school, and they worked great! He loved them. When he played at recess, his tubes did not get caught on his friends clothes, nor did the pump fly out of his pocket.
After the first one, there were still a lot of changes that the boy suggested his mom make. After about 30 new pairs, they finally got a style that worked perfectly!
They wondered if other kids had the same dilemma. They wondered if they could share Pump Pocket with other kids. Soon, they were.
That is why they are happy to share a bit of their story with you and hope that they can help make your life journey with T1D a little bit easier!
The Rodgers Family
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