Armonk Girl Overcomes Challenges to Help Type 1 Diabetics
Sarah Ilany doesn’t let her Type 1 diabetes hold her back.
Now the 13-year-old Armonk girl has been honored for her efforts to raise awareness about the disease.
In February, Ilany, who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at 11 years old, created an Instagram account entitled Blood Sugar Cookies where she shares posts that describe the funny, awkward and challenging aspects of dealing with Type 1 diabetes.
“It’s almost like a support group,” Ilany said. “You can reach out (to) people who you probably don’t know and there’s international people, so you can ask people questions if you don’t know any diabetics in person, or just kind of relate about how everyday life is affected and also learn stuff.”
Ilany said many people don’t fully understand the amount of work involved managing Type 1 diabetes and often hold misconceptions because they are used to hearing about the more common Type 2 version of the disease.
Unlike Type 2 diabetes, which is usually caused by poor diet and often linked to obesity, Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease that causes the body to attack cells that produce insulin. Only about 5 percent of the population has Type 1 diabetes. There is currently no cure.
Tracy Joseph, outreach manager for the Westchester County chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, said efforts such as Ilany’s Instagram account go a long way in raising awareness.
“Sarah always kind of had the attitude of what am I going to do and what am I going to need to do this,” Joseph said. “She started her Blood Sugar Cookies, she started a walk team, she engaged all her friends and her entire school, her community, so it really became something of a mission.”
In addition to the social media efforts, Ilany has also been active in fundraising for Type 1 diabetes research. Her team raised $6,000 for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Fund walk last year while a bake sale that she and her friends held in downtown Armonk raised an additional $500.
For her efforts in fundraising and building an online community, Ilany was honored by the Westchester County Department of Health last Thursday in Greenburgh. The H.C. Crittenden Middle School seventh-grader received the J.R. Tesone Youth Public Health Service Award, an honor developed last year in memory of the late John Richard Tesone, an Armonk resident and former Breezemont Day Camp owner.
Ilany was nominated for the award by her guidance counselor, Sue Adams, who stated in a letter that “Sarah took her diagnosis in stride and she handled in the initial stages with grace and maturity.”
Ilany explained that she was inspired to create the Instagram account after browsing through other accounts dedicated to Type 1 diabetes, but was disappointed in the quality of the posts. After a few weeks of managing the account, she realized she was pretty good at creating posts that others could relate to and has seen the account grow to more than 2,000 followers.
She created the profile’s name after seeing a Before and After puzzle, where two words are tied together by a common word in the middle, on “Wheel of Fortune.” She liked the play on words with blood sugar and sugar cookies and went with the title of Blood Sugar Cookies after several previous title ideas were deemed inappropriate by her mother.
In managing her diabetes, Ilany has had to overcome a host of challenges, ranging from the humorous time she found a test strip stuck in her hair to dealing with strangers staring when she must give herself an insulin injection in public. Despite the day-to-day struggles, Ilany lives an active life. She is a certified scuba diver and plays modified field hockey and tennis.
“Sarah is certainly Westchester smart for what she is doing with Type 1 diabetes and the virtual community that she organized and leads,” County Executive Rob Astorino said during last week’s ceremony to recognize Ilany. “She has done a great job and it’s [with] that support network…that you can get through it and learn from it and live a healthy, normal life.”
Also honored at the event was the Westchester Library System for its health literacy initiatives for older adults. Since 2010, 10 Westchester libraries have offered space where seniors can speak to navigators about healthcare issues. The program has helped more than 440 people apply for healthcare since its inception, according to county Commissioner of Health Sherlita Amler.
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