My Boys

For the week, I was responsible for a group of 12 13-14 yr old boys. I shared responsibility of the campers with Jairo and James along with Fernando, a local boy with diabetes too. Honestly, much of camp is a blur. Every day we had sports, arts, education and night activities to keep the kids busy. Our day started at 7am and ended sometimes well past 3am when we performed night checks.

My boys as I called them referred to me as doctora chan from Grey's Anatomy instead of juguete the name I had given myself. I thought it was funny and later they just shortened it to doctora. I fell in love with these kids especially Kevin who was just as camera happy as me.
At times I did want to scream. Gustavo in particular drove me crazy because he refused to wait for the other campers, for lunch, for really anything. And then there was Fernando who was suppose to be a monitor, but acted like a camper and so we had to demote him since he became a distraction. The rest of group did just fine and really bonded together.

They learned a great deal in their week, better techniques for injecting insulin, how to count carbs, understanding the pyscho social aspect of having diabetes and just learning that they are not alone and that diabetes is just a lifestyle and not a disease for them.

More than anything, they learned from each other. I could tell them what to do, but I don't lend a lot of credibility with not having diabetes myself. However, by watching the other kids, their fears of injecting in certain places lessened. In fact, Carlos Andres injected himself in his arm for the very first time on the last day of camp. And Juan Carlos who never used rapid insulin learned a great deal from his peers too.

Our living situation consisted of dorm beds in cabins. The boys separate from the girls and so I stayed with the 12-14 yr old girls next door to the boy's cabin. Most nights I had to separate the girls from the boys and send them to bed to which the boys always used my full name doctora chan and whined about it. I served as bad cop while Jairo was good cop.