Latest / The Healthy Diabetic / #142: Defying Diabetic Odds: Leonardo Varroni

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#142: Defying Diabetic Odds: Leonardo Varroni · The Healthy Diabetic

0:19
Speaker 1: So I got a a flight for the thirteenth of August, but that was the only flight available and was the last seat on that flight.
0:28
Speaker 1: So I did a coffee test to get back home because I had to be tested.
0:31
Speaker 1: And meanwhile, my symptoms got worse and worse, cadache.
0:34
Speaker 1: This pressure was, you know, worsening, was losing keyless.
0:38
Speaker 1: I was, like, transforming the plus zombie, but I couldn't realize I couldn't even stand on my feet.
0:49
Speaker 1: I was so tired that I couldn't even get a fork and get some food.
0:54
Speaker 1: And on the eighteenth of August, I went to my doctor, so the local doctor And when he sold me, he was like, you're not good.
1:03
Speaker 1: You're completely sick.
1:04
Speaker 1: You gotta go to the hospital right now, so you wrote me a letter and went to the emergency room.
1:09
Speaker 1: And when I got into the hospital, I was tested positive with COVID and they told me I had diabetes.
1:23
Speaker 2: Welcome back.
1:24
Speaker 2: This is episode number one forty two of the healthy diabetic podcast.
1:28
Speaker 2: Before we get started, please remember that nothing that you hear on this podcast would be considered medical advice or otherwise.
1:35
Speaker 2: Please always consult your medical team before making any changes to your diabetes management.
1:41
Speaker 2: I'm your host, coach Kent Canice.
1:43
Speaker 2: Let's jump into today's episode.
1:46
Speaker 2: And actually, before we jump into today's guest, I wanna thank all of you for being here, for listening to this episode.
1:53
Speaker 2: Listening to the show.
1:54
Speaker 2: If you're brand new to the show, welcome.
1:57
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for joining me, and I really hope that you get some really good value out of the episode today.
2:03
Speaker 2: And if you do, I hope you take some time and listen to some previous episodes that might, you know, catch your eye.
2:09
Speaker 2: And if you do get some value out of this episode and maybe that you've already listened to.
2:15
Speaker 2: I really hope that you share the show with someone that is living with diabetes or maybe they're a caregiver of diabetes or someone living with diabetes.
2:23
Speaker 2: Please share the show with them because the more people that get to listen to the show, the more the show grows, and the more amazing individual I get to touch, which is why I'm doing this.
2:35
Speaker 2: Okay.
2:36
Speaker 2: So I wanna also leave you with two other things.
2:39
Speaker 2: And the first one is, as you are listening to this episode, go into the show notes and click on the link that says newsletter.
2:46
Speaker 2: And sign up for the newsletter.
2:48
Speaker 2: And the reason I want you to do this because this is another outlet that I'm putting out there is spending a lot of time on it of giving you guys information that's just stored up my brain about diabetes, my own personal experiences, different tips and tricks.
3:02
Speaker 2: That I have gone through myself and that I teach people about just that it's just gonna be a really cool thing every other week for me to be able to sit down and introduce some more information in written form.
3:17
Speaker 2: So I'm excited about that.
3:18
Speaker 2: The second thing is is there's another link called more than a one c.
3:23
Speaker 2: This is my ten week coaching program filled with just an ungodly amount of information.
3:29
Speaker 2: That is gonna be really beneficial for a lot of people.
3:34
Speaker 2: If you're not interested in coaching, awesome.
3:36
Speaker 2: Go in there anyway.
3:37
Speaker 2: Click on that link.
3:38
Speaker 2: Because it gives you some more insight onto different things that I'm talking about.
3:43
Speaker 2: And I would also love it if you shared that link with someone that you think you might be interested coaching.
3:48
Speaker 2: Alright.
3:49
Speaker 2: Let's transition to today's guest.
3:52
Speaker 2: I had the incredible pleasure of sitting down with Leonardo.
3:56
Speaker 2: I called him Leo basically through the whole entire conversation.
4:00
Speaker 2: But Leo's diagnosis story is probably the craziest.
4:06
Speaker 2: And if it's not the craziest, probably definitely one of the craziest diagnosis stories I've ever heard in my entire diabetes career.
4:16
Speaker 2: It was incredible what happened and what he had to go through.
4:21
Speaker 2: And I'm gonna I'm not gonna give you too much on that because I want you to hear it from his words.
4:27
Speaker 2: But we talked about his diagnosis story, and we also talked a lot about what's happening now, two years later, from his diagnosis of him getting ready to travel the world and how really important that is to himself and his values and what he wants to do in his life.
4:45
Speaker 2: So this is just another really good conversation and I really hope that you stay tuned throughout the whole conversation because there's there's a lot of really cool stuff to peel back from this conversation.
4:55
Speaker 2: So without further ado, let's get with the Bernardo.
5:00
Speaker 2: Alright.
5:09
Speaker 2: Leo, thank you so much for being here.
5:13
Speaker 2: This is gonna be This is gonna be awesome.
5:16
Speaker 2: The like you just mentioned before we actually press record that this is your first time like, talking about diabetes on a podcast and, like, I'm I'm honored to be able to give you this platform and and let you share your your story.
5:30
Speaker 2: So let's dive into that first.
5:33
Speaker 2: Tell me, like, what your diagnosis story is, how this, you know, how long you've been diagnosed where you are in the world.
5:40
Speaker 2: Let's let's give a a name and a face to all the listeners that are listening.
5:46
Speaker 1: Okay.
5:46
Speaker 1: Alright.
5:47
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for this introduction and for hosting me tonight.
5:50
Speaker 1: It's the first time that I talk about diabetes.
5:53
Speaker 1: It's right.
5:55
Speaker 1: And I've never talked about diabetes before on a public level.
5:59
Speaker 1: And so I'm I'm very thrilled and excited to be here and I'm honored to, you know, man.
6:04
Speaker 1: Like, it's it's amazing.
6:05
Speaker 1: So I was diagnosed less than two years ago when I was twenty I was twenty two at the time.
6:12
Speaker 1: I was diagnosed on eighteenth of August two thousand and twenty one.
6:16
Speaker 1: And I've been leaving with type one diabetes, you know, since that time.
6:21
Speaker 1: And when I was diagnosed, I didn't know anything about it.
6:25
Speaker 1: I mean, nothing because I was the first member of my family and I had no diabetes friends in my group friends, so no one and Aranomy had a relationship with diabetes.
6:37
Speaker 1: So some of them had, like, type two diabetes relationship, but you know, we were talking about some friends or friends and we we they were not the conversations that we usually had well ending out, you know.
6:50
Speaker 1: So I didn't know anything about it, and I was diagnosed completely out of the blue.
6:55
Speaker 1: I was the the story is crazy.
6:58
Speaker 1: And every time I think about it, I am, like, whoa.
7:01
Speaker 1: I I I still can't believe what happened.
7:03
Speaker 1: And I mean that in a positive way, because I was like, if all the thing happened I mean, I'll I'll I'll I'll I'll share this, like, in a second.
7:13
Speaker 1: But when I think about the story of my diagnosis, is he still crazy because I was in Greece in two thousand and twenty one.
7:21
Speaker 1: And during the summer, I was spending the summer there as as I was working as a social media manager for a hotel.
7:27
Speaker 1: On cross island.
7:28
Speaker 1: And so I left on June two thousand and twenty one to work there.
7:34
Speaker 1: And I was living a dream.
7:36
Speaker 1: I was having the best time of my life.
7:38
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I had spent almost a year a lockdown because into the COVID was tough.
7:45
Speaker 1: And so at the end of the year, I was traveling a lot before a COVID that was I was used to traveling around the world until copied for me was was a very tough period where I had to spend all that time at home was super stressful.
7:58
Speaker 1: And this probably one of the reasons why I was diagnosed But when COVID ended in so around May two thousand and twenty one, Italy, I was finally able to start my job as a social media manager that was like a sort of dream job for me because I had studied, like, multiple you know, years to get to that point where I could actually transform my passion into a job.
8:22
Speaker 1: And so it was the the first time that I was actually working as a social media manager.
8:26
Speaker 1: And I was working on a Paradigm islands for a Five Star Hotel and it felt like I was actually leaving the best life that I could live And I was twenty I was twenty two.
8:38
Speaker 1: I was leaving on a paradise island.
8:41
Speaker 1: I was, you know, just hanging around with a lot of cool people kite surfing and windsurfing all day.
8:47
Speaker 1: It was doing my dream job, taking shots with my drone, with my cameras.
8:52
Speaker 1: You know, it was it was beautiful.
8:54
Speaker 1: But I started feeling very sick at the end of July of the same year.
9:00
Speaker 1: I started feeling like these weird symptoms.
9:02
Speaker 1: And like this kind of strong pressure on my chest that I couldn't explain, that was probably the first symptoms that I associated with diabetes at the time I didn't know anything, of course.
9:13
Speaker 1: But I started feeling this very strong pressure on my chest.
9:17
Speaker 1: And I was thirsty.
9:18
Speaker 1: I was drinking so much water like it was not possible.
9:22
Speaker 1: But I thought it was very warm.
9:25
Speaker 1: I was spending my days on the beach or out outdoor, outside on the swing -- Yeah.
9:30
Speaker 1: -- at the hotel.
9:31
Speaker 1: So I thought it was probably connected with the amount of you know, hours that was spinning out the door.
9:37
Speaker 1: And but I'm talking about an insane amount of water, like, five or six liters of water.
9:44
Speaker 1: Like, five big bottles of water each day, and it was crazy.
9:49
Speaker 1: And I so the first two weeks so the first two weeks of of August when I was still in Greece.
9:57
Speaker 1: These symptoms got worse and worse.
9:59
Speaker 1: I started losing weight, a lot of weight, And but I --
10:04
Speaker 2: Mhmm.
10:04
Speaker 1: -- I didn't feel like there was something worse than a normal situation because I thought that everything was associated with the kind of lifestyle that I was doing on the island.
10:14
Speaker 1: I was very active.
10:15
Speaker 1: I was not even I was not eating many carbs.
10:19
Speaker 1: I was just having a lot of solids and the Greek lifestyle.
10:22
Speaker 1: The Mediterranean and Mediterranean kind of lifestyle is perfect.
10:26
Speaker 1: So I was I I thought that I was very healthy, but I was not at all.
10:31
Speaker 1: And at the, like, fourteenth of August, I had to come back home because my contract was over.
10:40
Speaker 1: But the thing is that I asked my boss to you know, to stay longer in Greece because I liked the I liked staying there.
10:49
Speaker 1: But he said that
10:51
Speaker 2: he
10:51
Speaker 1: couldn't pay for my insurance anymore, and I had to find a place where to stay.
10:55
Speaker 1: And since my because my accommodations was provided by my boss.
10:59
Speaker 1: But my once my contract was over, I could not stay there longer.
11:03
Speaker 1: So I had to find another accommodation, another place where to stay and spend a lot of money.
11:08
Speaker 1: And I was kinda like, it was enough.
11:09
Speaker 1: I was just getting to the point where I was working from free and I just wanted to go back home, recharge my batteries and change environment.
11:16
Speaker 1: But the thing is --
11:18
Speaker 2: Yeah.
11:18
Speaker 1: -- so I was actually I booked a flight.
11:21
Speaker 1: I had booked a flight to stay longer.
11:23
Speaker 1: I was I was supposed to say in Greece until, like, and the focus.
11:27
Speaker 1: But since he told me that I had to pay for all this stuff, I was like, you know, there's no sense that I get to this flight.
11:34
Speaker 1: I won't anticipate it.
11:35
Speaker 1: So I got a a flight for the thirteenth of August, but that was the only flight available and was the last seat on that flight.
11:44
Speaker 1: So there was last seat on the flight on the last flight available for that week.
11:49
Speaker 1: So I did a coffee test to get back home because I had to be test it.
11:53
Speaker 1: And meanwhile, my symptoms got worse and worse headache, this pressure was, you know, worsening, was losing kilos.
12:00
Speaker 1: I was, like, transforming it to a zombie, but I couldn't re realize this.
12:03
Speaker 1: And --
12:05
Speaker 2: Yeah.
12:05
Speaker 1: -- so I did the task before getting to this plane.
12:09
Speaker 1: And for covey and I was tested negative so I could go back home.
12:13
Speaker 1: But once I got back home and that's when things got worse and worse.
12:17
Speaker 1: I got back home, my family got me from the from the airport and my mom immediately realized there was something very bad going on with me and she was very worried And I was like, I don't know.
12:29
Speaker 1: I just feel weird.
12:30
Speaker 1: I just feel super exhausted and tired and all the symptoms got worse and it was drinking a lot and But then, I spent three days at home and I could even I couldn't even stand on my feet.
12:42
Speaker 1: I was so tired that I couldn't even get a fork and get some food.
12:46
Speaker 1: And on the eighteenth of August, I went to my doctor, so the local doctor, And when he saw me, he was like, you're not good.
12:56
Speaker 1: You're completely sick.
12:57
Speaker 1: You gotta go to the hospital right now.
12:59
Speaker 1: So you wrote me a letter and went to the emergency room.
13:01
Speaker 1: And when I got into the hospital, I was tested positive with COVID, and they told me I had diabetes.
13:09
Speaker 1: So the crazy part is that I was home in that moment.
13:12
Speaker 1: I was in that hospital, but it was a matter of luck to be there because Three days earlier, I had been tested, talked negative with COVID, and then I was tested positive when I was at the hospital.
13:26
Speaker 1: And also I was on a plane that I was not supposed to be on originally.
13:32
Speaker 1: So that was crazy.
13:34
Speaker 1: That I went to the hospital.
13:35
Speaker 1: And of course, the diagnosis was crazy.
13:38
Speaker 1: It was in a severe status of ketoacidosis.
13:41
Speaker 1: I guess that's that's the name in in English.
13:45
Speaker 1: And I was
13:47
Speaker 2: What is it?
13:48
Speaker 2: What is it in so Is your native tone of tone?
13:52
Speaker 2: Yeah.
13:53
Speaker 2: Yeah.
13:54
Speaker 2: So how do you say that in
13:56
Speaker 1: like anchi dozi.
13:59
Speaker 1: So it's kind of similar.
14:00
Speaker 1: It's not that hard.
14:02
Speaker 2: Yeah.
14:02
Speaker 1: It's it's on hard road in Italian.
14:04
Speaker 1: That, of course, I didn't know before being in that state.
14:07
Speaker 1: Yeah.
14:08
Speaker 1: It's a very I I mean, I was almost deaf.
14:10
Speaker 1: When I was when I woke up on the nineteenth of August, so I spent the night at the hospital.
14:16
Speaker 1: And when I woke up, doctors came to my room, and they were not the doctors, they were not endocrinologists.
14:21
Speaker 1: Because they were not allowed to get into the apartment of the hospital I was in because that was the COVID section.
14:28
Speaker 1: That was the COVID department.
14:29
Speaker 1: I was not hospitalized with, you know, other diabetes patients or in the area for those kind of illnesses and diseases.
14:39
Speaker 1: I was in the COVID department, so I was sharing my room with someone that was there because I had problems in raving and it was a very, like, advanced status of COVID.
14:50
Speaker 1: And I was there and I woke up on the nineteenth of August And I was like, yeah, I got diabetes.
14:56
Speaker 1: I don't know what the hell is that?
14:58
Speaker 1: But I was kind of I don't know I don't even know how to explain that feeling, but I was I was feeling very lucky to be there.
15:05
Speaker 1: I was feeling very lucky to be alive because I was get I I got to the point where it could be it could be everything.
15:13
Speaker 1: You know?
15:14
Speaker 1: Like, I was so sick.
15:16
Speaker 1: I was When you and you go to the local doctor, a new local doctor, looks at face and say, you're sick.
15:22
Speaker 1: You gotta go to the hospital.
15:23
Speaker 1: You're gonna run to the hospital.
15:25
Speaker 1: Then you start thinking about the worst case scenario.
15:28
Speaker 1: You start thinking about everything.
15:29
Speaker 1: Also because I came from a period where ambulances were everywhere, a COVID was death.
15:35
Speaker 1: There was like a lot of people talking about being sick and So your brain just immediately go to that point where you feel already that you're dying.
15:42
Speaker 1: Yeah.
15:42
Speaker 1: So when I woke up on the nineteenth of August, doctors came to me and they said, you were very lucky because we got you to the point.
15:50
Speaker 1: Like, we don't know how you get to that point where you were still on your feet and when you were not in a coma status.
15:55
Speaker 1: Because you could have entered a coma in a matter of hours.
15:58
Speaker 1: So I had already I I was already feeling lucky to be there in that moment.
16:02
Speaker 1: But after they told me that, I was like, what the hell happened?
16:05
Speaker 1: And an image and I was there, I couldn't see my parents, I couldn't see my friends, I couldn't see anyone who knew something about diabetes.
16:14
Speaker 1: And I was completely surrounded by people who had severe consequences of COVID.
16:21
Speaker 1: Some of them died.
16:22
Speaker 1: Some of that died in the corner of, you know, like, on the pathways of of the hospital.
16:28
Speaker 1: There were people screaming and asking for how old people praying, and I was there alone.
16:32
Speaker 1: And that was that was crazy.
16:36
Speaker 1: And I still have goosebumps.
16:38
Speaker 1: Like, it's the first time that I talk about this in this way.
16:41
Speaker 1: And right now, I have goosebumps if I think about all the story.
16:46
Speaker 2: Man, dude.
16:47
Speaker 2: I I'm always gonna say this.
16:50
Speaker 2: Like, when you started talking about your story and you first started, with, like, yeah, I have a crazy story.
16:56
Speaker 2: I'm like, I've heard in my head, I was thinking I've heard so many crazy stories of diagnosis of, like, just the craziest the craziest stuff.
17:05
Speaker 2: This guy this guy is not gonna have any craziest oh my gosh.
17:09
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh.
17:11
Speaker 2: Holy genius.
17:13
Speaker 2: Like, I I think about all the stories that I read and heard about during COVID during the heightened of COVID of people dying in the halls of the hospital, people being, like, in those wings and, like, the the craziest thing I think about one of the craziest things I think about in that story is that I get that get frustrated with even in the US with the medical field.
17:38
Speaker 2: And I know there wasn't Endo's present and stuff like that because they couldn't have access to you.
17:42
Speaker 2: But the fact that you're going through this whole traumatic process, but no one is explaining I don't know if any of these doctors are explaining anything to you about anything.
17:52
Speaker 2: Right?
17:52
Speaker 2: They're treating you in were because you were in a COVID wing, were they treating trying to treat you for COVID as well, or were they just treating you for Saturdays?
18:02
Speaker 1: That was probably the the hardest part of the situation because I was I was in a situations that doctors were doctor were coming into my room, so they were coming and they were visiting me, but they were listening to my breath, they were listening to my lungs, they were listening to like the COVID related symptoms and dangers.
18:23
Speaker 1: But I was just like, so yesterday, I was told that I was diagnosed with type one diabetes.
18:28
Speaker 1: Could someone please explain me what diabetes is?
18:31
Speaker 1: Because I don't know anything about it.
18:33
Speaker 1: I thought diabetes was --
18:35
Speaker 2: Yeah.
18:35
Speaker 1: -- okay.
18:35
Speaker 1: I was like, I woke up and I was like, okay, tomorrow, I stop eating candies if that's the problem.
18:40
Speaker 1: Of course, we all know that because this is not that.
18:43
Speaker 1: I I wish it was that.
18:44
Speaker 2: Yeah.
18:44
Speaker 2: I
18:45
Speaker 1: was I was just like in the situations where nurses were coming into my room and they were great, they were super they they knew the situation.
18:52
Speaker 1: I was the youngest, person because I was twenty two and I was surrounded by older guys.
18:57
Speaker 1: The average age, I think it was like around seventy five or eighties, you know, these are the people that had problems COVID.
19:03
Speaker 1: And so I was treated very well, but they came into my room.
19:08
Speaker 1: They used to come into my room and getting shot of insulin.
19:10
Speaker 1: So they come with these shots, but I didn't know what these injections were about.
19:15
Speaker 1: I didn't know what they were doing to my body.
19:18
Speaker 1: And you know, you're super overwhelmed by the environment itself.
19:21
Speaker 1: You have all these, you know, tubes and things on your body that you are you don't understand what's going on.
19:28
Speaker 1: And no one explained me what diabetes was, and neither I had the chance to talk to an endocrinologist.
19:33
Speaker 1: I couldn't even, like, phone them.
19:35
Speaker 1: And I was trying to ask them, please, like, try to get, like, some kind of situations where I could speak to someone.
19:47
Speaker 1: They they only told me that my pancreas was good even if I was found in a very advanced situations and dangerous situations that I unfortunately, like, luckily, I've I've ordered all the bad consequences on my pancreas, but no one explained me what diabetes was.
20:04
Speaker 1: I had to do all my the job by myself.
20:06
Speaker 1: And that was that was stuff.
20:10
Speaker 1: That was very hard.
20:12
Speaker 2: Yeah.
20:12
Speaker 2: And
20:15
Speaker 1: you know, there was a situation in your life when you're like, I don't know what's going on.
20:20
Speaker 1: And the hardest part of everything for me was not a set in the fact that I was sick.
20:25
Speaker 1: It was not accepting the fact that I was in the hospital.
20:27
Speaker 1: It was not accepting the fact that I had diabetes because I was likely to be there at that point.
20:32
Speaker 1: Like, I was already in a mindset when I entered the hospital.
20:35
Speaker 1: I was already in a mindset.
20:36
Speaker 1: I don't know if tomorrow wake up.
20:38
Speaker 1: I already prepare my my, you know, whatever I was prepared for whatever was about to happen.
20:44
Speaker 1: So it was not the fact I was sick.
20:47
Speaker 1: It was that my life completely changed because I was leaving I was leaving a dream.
20:52
Speaker 1: And in a matter of like two or three weeks, I found myself with something that I didn't know anything about.
21:00
Speaker 1: And that was the hardest part.
21:03
Speaker 1: And I was like, okay.
21:05
Speaker 1: So what am I supposed to do right now?
21:07
Speaker 1: And so I had to do everything by myself.
21:10
Speaker 1: I used all these energy, all these feelings, all these angers as a fuel.
21:16
Speaker 1: To get on the Internet to open up YouTube and communities online to find what diabetes was.
21:24
Speaker 1: I did everything by myself.
21:26
Speaker 1: So I had to stay at least one week.
21:29
Speaker 1: That's what they told me when I entered the hospital.
21:31
Speaker 1: They said, you're gonna stay here for a week, at least a week.
21:35
Speaker 1: And so I knew
21:37
Speaker 2: Was that because of
21:38
Speaker 1: COVID?
21:38
Speaker 1: COVID.
21:38
Speaker 1: Yeah.
21:38
Speaker 2: Was that because of COVID?
21:39
Speaker 1: But also because it was very, very like, I was completely dehydrated, and I had no, like, strength in so that they had to reingrade all this substances they're wearing my blood.
21:51
Speaker 1: And so I had I was in a very bad situation and they wanted to control that everything was alright.
21:57
Speaker 1: So I had to spend at least seven days there.
22:01
Speaker 1: And I, you know, the first day, I remember that I tried and I screamed and I school, my dad, and my family, my mom, my brother.
22:09
Speaker 1: But then I used all this energy to get as much information as I could about diabetes.
22:16
Speaker 1: And I did everything by myself.
22:18
Speaker 1: And I was like, you know, when you are studying math, I was not I I've never been good at math.
22:24
Speaker 1: But now, you know, I deal with numbers every day.
22:27
Speaker 1: That that sounds like a joke.
22:28
Speaker 1: But and and you're, like, watching tutorials on YouTube, and watching everything, like reading all the papers that you can find online, I was doing that all that because I wanted to study what I had.
22:41
Speaker 1: So I could get to the point where I was scared because I didn't know what I had.
22:46
Speaker 1: And I was sure that if I had studied more, if I had some researches, I could control it or at least I could have a sense of control over my life and put the brakes all together again.
22:59
Speaker 2: Yeah.
22:59
Speaker 2: Yeah.
23:00
Speaker 2: I just yeah.
23:01
Speaker 2: Dude, this is this is this is incredible.
23:03
Speaker 2: And and I I wanna applaud you and give you grace for, one, everything you had to go through on both fronts.
23:13
Speaker 2: Being sick and being in the hospital.
23:16
Speaker 2: In a COVID wing, which you could have got even sicker, being in the COVID wing, And then on top of that, having to deal with it all on your own.
23:26
Speaker 2: I can hundred percent relate to having to deal with that whole process of being diagnosed in your own because that's what I went through.
23:34
Speaker 2: Not because of, you know, not because of, you know, mal practice, but because my family practitioner, which is who I went to first, didn't know anything really about the disease.
23:49
Speaker 2: Like, they just did they just know the basics.
23:51
Speaker 2: And this is one of my biggest pet peeves with, you know, the medical fields, with doctors, is, like, we have to be more educated and comment all of us with compassion and empathy.
24:03
Speaker 2: Like, even even if those doctors would have came at you and said, hey, we just don't know we're we're regular regular doctors that deal with when we're dealing with this COVID stuff.
24:15
Speaker 2: We don't know a lot about diabetes, but we're gonna try to find someone or we're gonna try to help you get some information.
24:21
Speaker 2: Here's some pamphlets.
24:22
Speaker 2: You can check out this website whatever it does.
24:25
Speaker 1: You know, just the FaceTime to someone.
24:27
Speaker 1: You know?
24:28
Speaker 1: Something like that.
24:28
Speaker 2: Yeah.
24:29
Speaker 2: Yeah.
24:29
Speaker 2: For sure.
24:30
Speaker 2: And and it's It's it's amazing.
24:34
Speaker 2: One, you being the age that you are being in a digital world and understanding when that digital world is and how to find things on in a digital world compared to someone that's fifty.
24:45
Speaker 2: Have any go through that?
24:46
Speaker 2: Because I've talked to many adults that are fifty, sixty years old, that have to go through that same process and don't know how to use the digital digital world.
24:55
Speaker 2: So it's it it is a It is a amazing thing that you came out of that situation.
25:04
Speaker 2: That's amazing.
25:05
Speaker 1: Right.
25:06
Speaker 1: Thank you.
25:06
Speaker 1: Yeah.
25:07
Speaker 1: Sometimes when I think about it, I don't know where all that strengths came from.
25:14
Speaker 1: If I think about what I was before and what I was going through right now, look at look at that with the rational perspective overview about all that situation.
25:26
Speaker 1: I was like, where the hell was he able to find all that energy, all that power to get, you know, to get to get through that.
25:37
Speaker 1: Mentally, mentally stable because that was the real challenge of everything.
25:42
Speaker 1: My mission was to get because you said the truth, like, I I could have get sicker in a COVID area of of the hospital.
25:51
Speaker 1: But I also was a it was a mental brain.
25:54
Speaker 1: It was a it was the father was surrounded by a lot of people that were dying.
25:59
Speaker 1: And I could have lost my mind there.
26:01
Speaker 1: I could have thought about --
26:03
Speaker 2: Mhmm.
26:03
Speaker 1: -- I was actually living my best life.
26:06
Speaker 1: I was I've always been super healthy.
26:09
Speaker 1: I mean, not super bad.
26:10
Speaker 1: I've never eaten junk food.
26:12
Speaker 1: I don't go to McDonald's.
26:13
Speaker 1: I don't smoke.
26:14
Speaker 1: I drink.
26:15
Speaker 1: You know, some beers, some some drinks sometimes.
26:18
Speaker 1: But getting out of there, mentally stable was the real challenge.
26:24
Speaker 1: And I don't know where I found that strength.
26:28
Speaker 1: I think it's like a survival instinct type of stuff, and they don't like community helping a lot.
26:33
Speaker 1: So
26:35
Speaker 2: That's not I
26:36
Speaker 1: mean, like, that's the reason why I'm here right now.
26:38
Speaker 1: Like, that's the reason why I started talking about diabetes because I wanna I wanna share all I have because someone might be in the position I was some years ago.
26:48
Speaker 1: Like, what if someone found my account and I'm just you know, making some funny videos about diabetes or some educational content about diabetes.
26:56
Speaker 1: That's exactly the the type of stuff that I wanted to have when I was almost dead on a hospital bed.
27:02
Speaker 1: That's the reason why I'm doing everything.
27:04
Speaker 1: I'm doing it right now at the moment.
27:05
Speaker 1: That's the reason why I'm very happy to be here also sharing my story because that's come that that comes from my heart.
27:12
Speaker 1: Like, without the support of your line community, I was not even looking on Instagram.
27:19
Speaker 1: Right now, if I felt like I didn't know your podcast, I didn't know many other podcasts, many other people talking about diabetes and sharing inspiring stories.
27:28
Speaker 1: I was on YouTube, watching educational stuff, watching vlogs, watching the NBC and Diabetes UK talking about everything.
27:37
Speaker 1: I was reading Italian researches Unfortunately, Italians are not that developed in a sense of online community, but we are working on that.
27:48
Speaker 1: But I I couldn't have survived.
27:50
Speaker 1: At least I couldn't have survived, you know, mentally, without the support of these people.
27:55
Speaker 1: And that I'm very hap like, I'm very lucky to be a digital native, you know, that I I was born with technology.
28:05
Speaker 1: So I know how and also work with technology.
28:07
Speaker 1: So I know how much technology can positively impact the world of and people's lives in general.
28:16
Speaker 2: Yeah.
28:16
Speaker 2: I just yeah.
28:17
Speaker 2: I think that's beautiful because it it it really is, like, I talk a lot about this concept of figuring out what works for you.
28:25
Speaker 2: And and then I I have five pillars basically that that I really focus on teaching about and talking about.
28:33
Speaker 2: And one of those five pillars is is your support system.
28:36
Speaker 2: And the people that have your back not just emotionally, but physically.
28:41
Speaker 2: And this diabetes community It's very sad, but it's growing exponentially for from people being and communicating being online, communicating with each other, telling each other stories.
28:57
Speaker 2: It's very sad to me that it's it's dramatically increasing, especially after COVID.
29:03
Speaker 2: But it it is so powerful and and I love the fact that you were able to get on to that community and get answers and and and get support.
29:15
Speaker 1: Absolutely.
29:16
Speaker 1: That that that that's true.
29:19
Speaker 1: Like, I also compare so right now, I'm you know, I'm I'm spending more time on Instagram with educational contents because even if it's been almost two years, since my since I was diagnosed with type one diabetes, there's still a lot that I can learn from myself and from other people.
29:37
Speaker 1: So, and compare to the time that I was diagnosed, so we're talking about, you know, two years ago, the amount of people that's that's right now talking about diabetes increased exponentially on TikTok, on Instagram, on these are the main channels because a lot of people on LinkedIn, I've seen like a lot of doctors and and that's very sad.
30:00
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I think that's the kind of support that young people or not just young people like everyone needs in their diabetic lives because that stuff, especially in the beginning, but it also might be in the phase of burnout.
30:15
Speaker 1: It might be in a phase where you're emotionally unstable or you're facing problem free diabetes and there's someone that's showing you how to get over it or I like you running and I see some guys who are We've run marathon.
30:31
Speaker 1: I remember this guy on I don't know his name, but I watched this TEDx talk when I was in the hospital.
30:38
Speaker 1: And there was this guy sharing wholly's life and all he has done with type one diabetes.
30:43
Speaker 1: And I was like, these men went to mount Everest.
30:46
Speaker 1: Like, he he did some so many amazing stuff, and that's where I found the strength.
30:52
Speaker 1: That was, like, if he did it, like, if all these people are surviving, And I'm just taking here an example, but just surviving, you know, just leaving the best lives that we can.
31:02
Speaker 1: That's the greatest achievement that we can have as a type one diabetes because our lives are our heart.
31:08
Speaker 1: And that's beautiful.
31:10
Speaker 1: Being able to see all of this happening and it it it truly is amazing.
31:19
Speaker 2: Yeah.
31:19
Speaker 2: I love that.
31:20
Speaker 2: So you you're in there for seven days.
31:24
Speaker 2: Were you able to connect with your family?
31:27
Speaker 2: Was your family able to come see you?
31:29
Speaker 2: Or did you not have interaction with anybody till after you guys.
31:33
Speaker 1: So at the end, I stayed ten days.
31:37
Speaker 1: So I was to I was supposed to stay seven, but I stayed longer.
31:41
Speaker 1: And that was also tough, you know, knowing that I wasn't a hospital, but I never I wasn't I'd never been able to see my family or my friends when I was at the hospital.
31:52
Speaker 1: And when I was drove back to my place, in my hometown, I couldn't stay at home because I was still positive.
32:03
Speaker 1: So before leaving the hospital, I was tested, and I was still positive.
32:07
Speaker 1: Of course, I was leaving with COVID patients everywhere, so that was kinda
32:13
Speaker 2: Well, also, but still, if you're still getting all of your levels, you know, for diabetes, your blood sugar levels, like in check.
32:20
Speaker 1: Well, that was crazy.
32:22
Speaker 2: And they're still fluctuating.
32:23
Speaker 1: They're still
32:24
Speaker 2: fluctuating a little bit.
32:25
Speaker 2: You're yeah.
32:25
Speaker 2: Your protein levels are gonna be up.
32:27
Speaker 2: So, of course, you're gonna be you're gonna
32:28
Speaker 1: And also, So I had to go back home, but I couldn't stay in the place where I'm staying right now.
32:32
Speaker 1: So I was staying in another place.
32:34
Speaker 1: I had a room for myself, but I couldn't see my parents, I couldn't see my family.
32:37
Speaker 1: And and the worst part is I will send home by the doctors.
32:43
Speaker 1: But without any kind of information, about how to deal with the highball.
32:49
Speaker 2: Yeah.
32:49
Speaker 1: So imagine, you you you are diagnosed with type with type one diabetes and you don't know anything about insulin and they say, you're eating, you know, your levels.
32:58
Speaker 1: Check your levels.
32:59
Speaker 1: They're you know, if they are above two hundred, just get just get you know, ten units of insulin without even considering carb counting and carb to insulin ratios, insulin sensitivity, none of that stuff is considered.
33:13
Speaker 1: They just say, get your huge amount of insulin, it's gonna be fine.
33:18
Speaker 1: So I follow this paper even here at the time I already studied all the card counting things and it was kind of weird.
33:25
Speaker 1: I came back home and I remember the first time I was home, I was not assisted by anyone.
33:30
Speaker 1: I gave a massive shot of insulin.
33:32
Speaker 1: I gave, like, thirteen or fourteen units of insulin.
33:35
Speaker 1: And my body, like, I started feeling super sick and super weird on I didn't know what the symptoms of a low, severe, lows weird.
33:44
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness.
33:45
Speaker 1: Like, what the hell is going?
33:46
Speaker 1: What what the hell is happening to me on my hands where like this?
33:49
Speaker 1: So imagine I was stuck at home and no one was helping me.
33:53
Speaker 1: No one was there to assist me.
33:55
Speaker 1: No one And I could have actually, you know, paid the consequences of severe lows there.
34:03
Speaker 1: That was the probably the most dangerous part because when I was in a hospital, I was in a bad place, but it was a comfortable place.
34:10
Speaker 1: At least I fell kind of Yeah.
34:12
Speaker 2: They were monitoring you.
34:13
Speaker 2: They were keeping you alive.
34:14
Speaker 2: Yeah.
34:14
Speaker 2: They were monitoring your blood sugar and doing everything for
34:17
Speaker 1: But at home, I didn't know anything about it.
34:20
Speaker 1: And no one
34:22
Speaker 2: What'd you have to what'd you do?
34:23
Speaker 2: What'd you do?
34:24
Speaker 2: What'd you the like, what did you treat with?
34:25
Speaker 2: Did you
34:26
Speaker 1: treat it?
34:26
Speaker 1: I had I had a lot of shooters.
34:27
Speaker 1: Because, meanwhile, I knew the basic stuff.
34:30
Speaker 1: So I know I knew the, you know, the logic, the simple insulin, you know, you go to highg, got insulin, you got too low, you got sugar.
34:37
Speaker 1: So I kinda knew that.
34:38
Speaker 1: But the only thing that I that I did was giving me a book with the very basic instructions.
34:44
Speaker 1: They were probably from the nineties.
34:46
Speaker 1: You know, they have the same graphic design from the old nineties type of stuff.
34:51
Speaker 1: And I was like, this is terrible.
34:54
Speaker 1: And I I was I survived So but I had no kind of assistance.
35:02
Speaker 1: And the first site was diagnosed on the eighteenth of August two thousand and twenty one.
35:07
Speaker 1: The first time I saw my endocrinologist was around the twenties of September.
35:13
Speaker 1: And that was when I got to the endocrinologist that I love, I feel very, like, personally connected to hair and she She's been super helpful and she's very you know, she she's on online.
35:28
Speaker 1: She's on WhatsApp.
35:28
Speaker 1: If I have some problems, I can connect to her whenever I can.
35:32
Speaker 1: And she's she really helps me a lot.
35:34
Speaker 1: But when she sold me for the first time, she was like, you already know a lot about diabetes.
35:40
Speaker 1: Like, she was expecting a guy that had an anti connection with diabetes and didn't know about it.
35:47
Speaker 1: When I got there, I studied so many papers, so many banks.
35:51
Speaker 1: I had already, like, counting my carbs.
35:53
Speaker 1: And I was doing something that at the hospital.
35:55
Speaker 1: Like, I I was carb counting even if I even even I was never instructed by anyone to do that.
36:02
Speaker 1: And
36:03
Speaker 2: You just learned it on your own.
36:04
Speaker 1: So when she saw me, she was like, okay.
36:06
Speaker 1: I she was like, your story's crazy.
36:09
Speaker 1: And and I was like, I think it is.
36:12
Speaker 1: And And then I just learned a lot about it.
36:18
Speaker 1: But I was doing I it felt super safe to be back home with my family and and see my friends again, that was that was beautiful.
36:29
Speaker 2: Yeah.
36:30
Speaker 2: God, dude.
36:31
Speaker 2: Like and and and I wanna add too because I I'm I'm sure you don't know.
36:35
Speaker 2: It's really awesome.
36:37
Speaker 2: That you got to see an endocrinologist within, that's what, thirty, maybe forty five days of being diagnosed in America.
36:45
Speaker 2: Sometimes you have to wait six months to a year.
36:50
Speaker 1: Really?
36:51
Speaker 2: Yeah.
36:51
Speaker 2: Because because there's not a lot of endocrinologists with that specialty, and everyone's all booked all backed up.
36:59
Speaker 2: Like, I just I went from I was at my insurance and my endocrinologist was through Ohio State University, and so a big time state university.
37:09
Speaker 2: And my insurance changed, so I couldn't use that endocrinologist anymore.
37:14
Speaker 2: I had to change the technologists.
37:15
Speaker 2: It would have if I'd had it known somebody that knew this dock that I wanted to go see, it would have taken me six months to get in to see him.
37:25
Speaker 1: That's crazy.
37:26
Speaker 2: And granted, like, I I figured out what what works for me.
37:30
Speaker 2: Like, I know it works me now.
37:31
Speaker 2: So it would have been totally fine, not seeing an endocrinologist right away, or getting a new one.
37:36
Speaker 2: But but, yeah, that that that's a real thing.
37:39
Speaker 2: Like, over here, like, it is hard sometimes to get into an endo.
37:42
Speaker 2: And on top of that, I don't know if this endo that you're seeing now is in your hometown or close to you sometimes people that are trying to see an endo, their the nearest endo might be states away.
37:54
Speaker 1: Really?
37:54
Speaker 1: So you gotta fly
37:55
Speaker 2: hundreds of miles away.
37:57
Speaker 2: Sometimes you have to fly to go see someone.
38:00
Speaker 2: Sometimes you just have to go to to drive hundreds of miles to go see one.
38:04
Speaker 2: Like, there's there's those cases too.
38:07
Speaker 2: So it's like it's
38:08
Speaker 1: -- That's great.
38:09
Speaker 1: --
38:09
Speaker 2: all the shit that you went through at diagnosis, you got blessed to be able to get in and see someone, like, super fast.
38:16
Speaker 2: It's awesome.
38:17
Speaker 1: I I didn't know it.
38:18
Speaker 1: Damn.
38:19
Speaker 1: Like -- Yeah.
38:20
Speaker 1: -- that's crazy.
38:21
Speaker 1: I thought it was a long time for me, you know.
38:23
Speaker 1: I thought I was, like, I was almost complaining that sounds like nava sounds kinda like I should, you know, be super you know, grateful for that.
38:32
Speaker 1: I I didn't know about it.
38:33
Speaker 2: Yeah.
38:34
Speaker 2: And I I yeah.
38:35
Speaker 2: I will say that, like, over here too, it's we're getting better I'm going to say that.
38:40
Speaker 2: We're getting better at trying to educate people or get education when you go to the hospital for the first time.
38:47
Speaker 2: But that that sometimes that education is met with, like, fear.
38:52
Speaker 2: And that's one thing I can't stand.
38:54
Speaker 2: Like, that it's, like, you're you're dealing with this big diagnosis or this major life change.
39:01
Speaker 2: You have no idea what's going on.
39:03
Speaker 2: No one's explaining to you what's going on similar to what you went through, but then you finally get in front of someone that's talking about it and they they come at you with fear.
39:12
Speaker 2: Like, if you don't do this, you could die.
39:14
Speaker 2: If you don't do this, you're gonna lose your eyes.
39:16
Speaker 2: You you know, your eyes are gonna go bad.
39:18
Speaker 2: If you don't do this, then you're gonna lose a leg and you're gonna lose, like, all, you know, limbs and, like, you you're gonna die young and you're not gonna die.
39:25
Speaker 2: Like, it's that that's not what we need in that moment.
39:29
Speaker 2: We need, like, everything's gonna be okay and we're gonna help you.
39:32
Speaker 2: We're gonna get you to the to an endocrinologist.
39:33
Speaker 2: We're gonna get you the information that you need.
39:36
Speaker 2: Like, here's some podcasts are really good.
39:38
Speaker 2: Here's some really good information.
39:40
Speaker 2: Here's some really good you know, that that's the type of stuff that we need, especially for people in your type of situation.
39:47
Speaker 2: Who are in this unreal situation.
39:50
Speaker 2: These doctors are like, we don't have time to deal with you right now.
39:53
Speaker 2: We're gonna keep you alive.
39:55
Speaker 2: And we're gonna get your blood sugar down, but we don't have time for that right now.
39:58
Speaker 2: Like, it it's understandable.
40:00
Speaker 2: It still shouldn't happen, but it's understandable.
40:03
Speaker 1: That yeah.
40:03
Speaker 1: Exactly.
40:04
Speaker 1: Like, I I I completely agree with you.
40:06
Speaker 1: I feel like, well, when I go to the endocrinologist, there are some nurses around to, you know, So and I go to a pretty close in the chronologist.
40:15
Speaker 1: I have to drive, like, ten minutes.
40:16
Speaker 1: You know, it's completely different at this point.
40:20
Speaker 1: I don't know how it it's in the US.
40:22
Speaker 1: But does this kind of fear thing?
40:26
Speaker 1: And I think it's not the way that that would never be the way to, you know, support someone who has that point of liberty.
40:33
Speaker 1: What we need is empathy.
40:35
Speaker 1: What we need is assertive communication.
40:36
Speaker 1: That that's, you know, that's what we need.
40:40
Speaker 1: And I think we are making good steps and at least where I go.
40:45
Speaker 1: But, you know, I just don't know then or situations.
40:48
Speaker 1: But I I I completely agree with you about that, you know.
40:52
Speaker 1: Strategy of fear.
40:54
Speaker 1: So I remember once I went to the this doctor for my eye exam and She was like, oh, because you young people, you drink too much.
41:04
Speaker 1: You always worry, you don't you don't take care of your diabetes.
41:08
Speaker 1: And was like, what the hell you know about my diabetes?
41:10
Speaker 1: You don't know anything about it.
41:12
Speaker 2: You don't have any number.
41:13
Speaker 2: You don't know what my a one sees.
41:15
Speaker 1: And she was like, you're gonna lose your you're gonna lose your eye and it was like, okay, I'm close to it, but wafer.
41:21
Speaker 1: You know, I'm already kind of blind.
41:24
Speaker 1: I use a lot of I can't see very well.
41:26
Speaker 2: Well, man's wearing glasses right now.
41:28
Speaker 2: He thinks it's blind.
41:30
Speaker 2: But oh, god.
41:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, man.
41:33
Speaker 2: Like, it's it's crazy.
41:34
Speaker 2: And and and the great thing about it though is, like, when you find that when you find that endo, when you find that, you know, eye doc when you find those people that are going to be part of your medical team.
41:45
Speaker 2: And they everything just works really well.
41:48
Speaker 2: Everything's everyone's compassion.
41:49
Speaker 2: Everyone's you know, empathetic.
41:51
Speaker 2: Everyone's coming at you with kindness.
41:53
Speaker 2: When you find that, it is it it's such a great feeling.
41:57
Speaker 2: It's such a great feeling.
41:58
Speaker 2: And, you know, I hope and I'm I hope that you have found that if you have, like, I'm I'm glad because a lot of people haven't.
42:05
Speaker 2: I've talked to people on this even on this show before, that have been through two or three endocrinologists because if they just didn't jive well or they came at this person with fear or they you know, it just it just they weren't coming at com with compassion and and helping them in the way they needed help.
42:21
Speaker 2: And it's just it's it's really sad that we're in that place because it's it it really is a very lonely and scary condition that we're living with.
42:34
Speaker 2: And and being able to be in a place where you can ask for help from your medical team and from the community is is how we're gonna thrive.
42:44
Speaker 2: It just is.
42:45
Speaker 1: Yeah.
42:46
Speaker 1: I think in general, like the human part of type one diabetes, you know, it's not just about numbers or graphs or care accounting there's a very important human and, you know, human side of all this.
43:02
Speaker 1: Like, I What I love about my endocrinology, she treats me as a person, as a friend, not as someone who's sleeping with a condition that is there because he's sick.
43:12
Speaker 1: She helps me.
43:13
Speaker 1: She gives me advices.
43:14
Speaker 1: She gave me she gave me her number and when I wanna whenever I wanna call her and she's available.
43:21
Speaker 1: I was living in the states and I couldn't visit I couldn't be in Italy for my exams.
43:26
Speaker 1: And she was don't worry.
43:28
Speaker 1: Let's do it online.
43:29
Speaker 1: So we FaceTime and we share our numbers because now everything is digital.
43:34
Speaker 1: So I'm also very lucky because she knows the importance of technology.
43:37
Speaker 1: She invited me to, you know, talk about the technology and how it helps other people, like, devices such as like the free style or that's what I use, you know.
43:50
Speaker 1: And she's great.
43:52
Speaker 1: She's she recommended me some users on Instagram, some accounts, some communities, and that's what we need.
43:59
Speaker 1: We need more people like like here.
44:02
Speaker 1: We need more of this relationship because I think that alone by my by myself, I would never have, like, gone through all of this.
44:12
Speaker 1: And like I did, and like I'm still doing every day.
44:18
Speaker 2: Yeah.
44:18
Speaker 2: That's awesome, man.
44:19
Speaker 2: I'm yeah.
44:20
Speaker 2: I'm I'm so happy that you have found that.
44:22
Speaker 2: In in her.
44:23
Speaker 2: And and I I applaud her for being able to be in that position for you.
44:30
Speaker 2: Because it not all of us have that.
44:32
Speaker 2: So that's awesome.
44:34
Speaker 2: So let's let's switch gears here.
44:37
Speaker 2: Right?
44:38
Speaker 2: Because this is I I love the story, but I wanna switch gears and you've mentioned their freestyle Libre, are you in on any other technology in an insulin pump?
44:47
Speaker 2: Are you doing the CGM with MDI?
44:50
Speaker 2: What what's your kind of your management style?
44:53
Speaker 1: So I'm I actually, yeah, I'm using FreeStyle, and I use my foam to check my blood sugars.
45:00
Speaker 1: And I'm on pump yeah.
45:02
Speaker 1: Sorry, I'm on pens.
45:03
Speaker 1: So I use pants, I injects myself.
45:05
Speaker 1: Because that's how I started and that's how I feel comfortable with.
45:10
Speaker 1: I have never tried a pump.
45:12
Speaker 2: Nice.
45:12
Speaker 1: And I know there are a lot of devices right now that are, like, popping up on the web.
45:18
Speaker 1: I can see a lot of people that I follow on Instagram, they have they look like, you know, super tag.
45:25
Speaker 1: And I'm just using pants still doing the whole school.
45:28
Speaker 1: Navel stuff, but I I feel comfortable with that.
45:33
Speaker 1: And I also did a period without the CGM, you know, the and -- Mhmm.
45:39
Speaker 1: -- when I when I started using it, that changed my life.
45:43
Speaker 1: I was like, couldn't I couldn't live without it right now.
45:47
Speaker 1: That makes everything so much easier than than it is without that.
45:52
Speaker 1: You know, just doing everything manually.
45:54
Speaker 1: And especially because I live a very active lifestyle.
45:58
Speaker 1: I have, like, this dynamic life I travel.
46:03
Speaker 1: I do a lot of activities.
46:05
Speaker 1: I spend a lot of those time outdoors.
46:07
Speaker 1: I do so many different things.
46:10
Speaker 1: And knowing that I can have access, you know, real time to my blood sugars, you know, that makes me feel much safer.
46:18
Speaker 1: And and trust in the technology.
46:21
Speaker 1: Like, I'm I'm very lucky that I was diagnosed in a period where these kind of devices already existed because some friends of mine were diagnosed before and that was introduced in two thousand seventeen in Italy, like the CGM, the Freestyle, was introduced, and we were talking about six years ago.
46:40
Speaker 1: So it's crazy.
46:42
Speaker 1: If I think about them and I think about me, I'm like, I have this massive advantage in managing my diabetes and just living my life with less stress than they used to do.
46:54
Speaker 1: So I'm very yeah.
46:56
Speaker 1: I consider myself very lucky to be surrounded by all this kind of devices and to have the support to all these technology and to live in a state, in a country, sorry, easily, where I don't have to subscribe for an expensive insurance plan to get what I have.
47:14
Speaker 1: So today, I went to the hospital, to get all the, you know, supplies that my diabetes stuff.
47:23
Speaker 1: And I don't have to pay anything when I go there.
47:25
Speaker 1: I just show them the paper and because, of course, we pay with taxes.
47:30
Speaker 1: But taxes are reasonably you know, compared to the kind of service that you get.
47:36
Speaker 1: And I live in a very, like, one of the most economical developed region of Italy and our, like, our infrastructures and, you know, we're I'm very lucky to put you in a place like that where I'm, like, you know, I'm going for a trip.
47:53
Speaker 1: I'm going to the US.
47:54
Speaker 1: I'm going to the states.
47:55
Speaker 1: I'm staying there three months.
47:57
Speaker 1: Could you please give me because normally, I'm giving things for I'm giving things for two months, but I was staying for for longer.
48:04
Speaker 1: And I was like, could you please give me more?
48:06
Speaker 1: And they're like, of course, we give you four fourth because you never know what can happen when traveling.
48:10
Speaker 1: And that that's because I know the US are kinda different.
48:15
Speaker 1: Right?
48:15
Speaker 1: Like, I've never met any diabetic from the US.
48:18
Speaker 1: But I I I spent four months in the US.
48:21
Speaker 1: And so I know that things are kind of different there.
48:26
Speaker 2: Where do you want me to try?
48:28
Speaker 1: That's a big that's a big theme.
48:29
Speaker 1: Right?
48:30
Speaker 1: So the big topic.
48:31
Speaker 2: So the fact that the fact almost every other major country in the world has free healthcare drives me crazy.
48:38
Speaker 2: K?
48:39
Speaker 2: That's the first thing.
48:40
Speaker 2: Because I pay a lot of money for okay coverage in healthcare.
48:47
Speaker 2: And on top of that, because I'm a diabetic, I have to pay more than someone that drinks and smokes.
48:53
Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
48:54
Speaker 2: So the that that's that's the thing that really irritates me.
48:58
Speaker 2: Or someone that drinks and smokes and eats like crap, goes to McDonald's, like, whatever it is, and it does not take care of themselves in the way that they probably should, doesn't exercise or whatever.
49:08
Speaker 2: I my rates are higher than that person for the for the most part.
49:14
Speaker 2: That's that's the first thing.
49:16
Speaker 2: The second thing the second thing is our insurance coverage over here for something like diabetes isn't isn't terrible.
49:25
Speaker 2: If you have good coverage, I have like I said, I have an I'll have it okay coverage.
49:30
Speaker 2: Now that the US is passing some laws that, you know, insulin can't be, like, super, super high.
49:37
Speaker 2: That that really helps as well on us.
49:41
Speaker 2: The crazy thing is is before we started passing some laws that, you know, these insulin companies can't jack the rates up.
49:52
Speaker 2: If you didn't have insurance, this was even well, even talk two years ago, if you didn't have insurance where I live in Columbus, Ohio, just one vial of insulin cost almost four hundred dollars just for one vial of ensam.
50:11
Speaker 2: And you could only get because most of most insurance companies will only cover you for ninety days.
50:18
Speaker 2: That's like the standard over here in the states.
50:20
Speaker 2: The doctors give you a script for ninety days, and you can refill it.
50:24
Speaker 2: No big deal.
50:25
Speaker 2: So that that's another thing.
50:29
Speaker 2: So let's say I need something for even just say I'm gonna get something for a month, and a lot of people, they take way more insulin than I do.
50:38
Speaker 2: I take about forty units of insulin a day.
50:41
Speaker 2: And a lot of people take twice that, triple that.
50:46
Speaker 2: Think about how much that's gonna cost if they don't have insurance.
50:49
Speaker 2: Or if they don't have very good insurance, bad.
50:53
Speaker 2: So this new law that we just passed, it really helps diabetic.
50:57
Speaker 2: I'm not a hundred percent sure yet how that law is gonna affect our taxes because everything that they pass affects your taxes.
51:04
Speaker 2: But we'll we'll have to deal with that bridge when when we come to it.
51:08
Speaker 2: In terms of, like, pump supplies and CGM supplies, those are also super super expensive.
51:14
Speaker 2: We have to pay for that.
51:15
Speaker 2: A lot of our a lot of our pump supplies come from a third party company.
51:20
Speaker 2: So the pump supplier or the pump the company that makes the pump supplies will basically partner with some of these other companies, and these other companies will basically, like, work with your insurance company to send you the products that you need.
51:33
Speaker 2: So it's not like what you're doing, where you're walking up into the hospital, and in a piece of paper, I'm a diabetic.
51:38
Speaker 2: I need thirty days of script for insulin, pens, fast acting, short acting, my Libre.
51:45
Speaker 2: I I need all that stuff for the next thirty days, and I just give you boxes of it.
51:50
Speaker 2: It's not like that year.
51:51
Speaker 2: Like, if you don't hit if you're not hitting your deductible, so at the beginning of the year, it sucks because you haven't hit any specific deductible, like as an example, my deductible is two thousand five hundred.
52:02
Speaker 2: Dollars So for pump supplies, for CGM supplies, I have to pay my my insurance doesn't pay anything until I hit twenty five hundred dollars, and then they only pay eighty eighty percent.
52:12
Speaker 2: So I'm still responsible for twenty percent until I hit to hit a maximum, which I think my maximum is like fifty five hundred dollars.
52:20
Speaker 2: So I have to pay an extra twenty some two hundred you know, two thousand dollars after I have a deductible just to pay for the shit that's making me alive.
52:30
Speaker 2: So it becomes a big it's a big problem over here, a huge problem.
52:34
Speaker 2: And we're we're making strides.
52:36
Speaker 2: I can see it that we're making strides to try to fix this type of stuff, but It's it's insane.
52:42
Speaker 2: And I I get so frustrated with the states, with this this country that I love so much.
52:48
Speaker 2: When I talk to amazing individuals like you that are that are across the pond, and you can just walk up into a hospital and get whatever you want for free.
52:56
Speaker 2: Like, that's just that's crazy.
52:58
Speaker 1: That is crazy.
52:59
Speaker 1: It's it's crazy that you gotta pay for something that you didn't have to choose.
53:03
Speaker 1: You know, like, you didn't choose to have diabetes.
53:05
Speaker 1: And you're actually, you know, alive because you have the, you know, chance to get insulin.
53:13
Speaker 1: But pain for that is, like, I knew some part of the story because I read a lot of things online.
53:20
Speaker 1: And that's why I feel so lucky to to live in a you know, we always talk about Italy.
53:27
Speaker 1: Like a lot of people here in my country, there's like this trend to to talk bad about it because there's a there are reasons why you should talk bad about Italy, but there are reasons why you should talk bad about other countries as well.
53:39
Speaker 1: But being diabetic and having such a street relationship with our public healthcare system.
53:46
Speaker 1: Reminds me of how lucky I am to live where I live.
53:52
Speaker 1: And and I'm very grateful because you cannot choose this.
53:56
Speaker 1: Like, it it's this is not something that you can.
53:59
Speaker 1: You know, I wanna bore there.
54:01
Speaker 1: That that's not what it is.
54:03
Speaker 1: So -- Yeah.
54:05
Speaker 1: -- that that's that's crazy.
54:09
Speaker 2: Yeah.
54:09
Speaker 2: Yeah.
54:10
Speaker 2: It's it's it's it sucks because it's it becomes part of your living expenses.
54:15
Speaker 2: It becomes part of, like, I have two little kids and a wife and a house.
54:20
Speaker 2: Right?
54:20
Speaker 2: So it becomes part of those expenses.
54:22
Speaker 2: It costs to come out of my living expenses.
54:25
Speaker 2: It has to come out of my expenses for that I have for my business.
54:29
Speaker 2: It has to come out.
54:30
Speaker 2: I mean, all of this stuff.
54:32
Speaker 2: It's like I have to I have to understand how much is gonna be every single month because it's part of my daily expense, part of my monthly expenses.
54:39
Speaker 2: So it it it's hard.
54:42
Speaker 2: It is it's a hundred percent.
54:44
Speaker 2: Absolutely, it's hard.
54:45
Speaker 2: But we make it work.
54:46
Speaker 2: And whatever way way we can and I feel I feel personally lucky because I have decent health insurance.
54:53
Speaker 2: It's not cheap, but I have decent health insurance.
54:55
Speaker 2: There's other people that don't have any health insurance.
54:58
Speaker 2: And it's just it's crazy.
55:00
Speaker 2: It's crazy.
55:01
Speaker 1: Yeah.
55:02
Speaker 1: That's stuff.
55:02
Speaker 1: Damn.
55:04
Speaker 2: Yeah.
55:04
Speaker 2: And it's it's, like, technically, I think, quote me on this.
55:08
Speaker 2: So if anybody's listening to this, don't quote me on this.
55:11
Speaker 2: But I think it's like kind of even illegal for if I have a friend that needs insulin for me to even give them insulin because it's I'm giving them a drug.
55:20
Speaker 2: And but or at least maybe it's frowned upon.
55:24
Speaker 2: I don't know.
55:25
Speaker 2: But it's like one of those things that, like, I've given I've given people in the community CGM supplies because they ran out of CGM supplies and they can't get more supplies for another week or so because their insurance doesn't roll over yet.
55:38
Speaker 2: I've given people insulin before because they ran out of insulin and their insurance doesn't allow them to get anymore for another week or whatever it is.
55:47
Speaker 2: It's it's like, that's why the community is so important in communicating and talking to people and, like, It's just it's so crazy to me that it might take my endo, which I love, forty eight hours or seventy two hours to get back to a question I have.
56:03
Speaker 2: But I can text someone in a Facebook group.
56:06
Speaker 2: I can text someone on I can make a post or a story on Instagram or TikTok and get an answer in ten seconds.
56:13
Speaker 2: It's it's unbelievable that that the reach of that technology, and it's for me, it's helped me in so many ways and and just like it's it's helped you in so many ways.
56:25
Speaker 1: Yeah.
56:25
Speaker 1: That that's amazing.
56:27
Speaker 1: Like, that that's amazing what you've done, you know, like giving, you know, being helpful for other people.
56:33
Speaker 1: And, I mean, there's a lot of ways to do it and I mean, here in where I live, we don't do it, like, economically, but we do it, like, on life sec psychological level.
56:46
Speaker 1: You know, like, we have other people.
56:48
Speaker 1: But when you even have a place like yours, doing what you're doing, I think it's it's beautiful because you're like giving all you can to help other people and you're making someone life better or just easier, sometimes less stressful.
57:05
Speaker 1: And that's beautiful.
57:06
Speaker 1: Like the impact that you can have on others, you you you really never know how much you're changing someone's life.
57:13
Speaker 1: And and that that's a beautiful message.
57:16
Speaker 1: No.
57:16
Speaker 1: That's a beautiful thing you're doing.
57:18
Speaker 1: And that that that that's just beautiful.
57:22
Speaker 1: I wish, like, more people could do this.
57:26
Speaker 1: Like, I encourage people to talk about diabetes and to share their stories for this reason to because the more we do it -- Yeah.
57:35
Speaker 1: -- the the bigger we become and the faster we grow, I guess.
57:40
Speaker 2: Yeah.
57:41
Speaker 2: And and and I will and I'll say this to you, Leo, is and this is one of the things that I was really drawn to you about about you is the fact that you're doing that too.
57:52
Speaker 2: You're having an impact on people's lives because you're sharing your story when you had a very painful story.
57:58
Speaker 2: You have a very painful story.
58:00
Speaker 2: And and I would encourage you to continue share that message because I guarantee there's someone else that went through something very similar.
58:08
Speaker 2: Maybe not exactly similar.
58:10
Speaker 2: But fair something very similar.
58:13
Speaker 2: And you having you know, you got two thousand followers almost on Instagram.
58:18
Speaker 2: Like, that that's a big that's a big reach of people, whether they're type one or type or whether they're type one or not, whether they're diabetic or not, like because I guarantee every single one of those two thousand people might know somebody that's diabetic.
58:32
Speaker 1: Exactly.
58:33
Speaker 2: You know, that can share your message with them.
58:35
Speaker 2: And that's That's that's amazing.
58:38
Speaker 2: And that's what that's what I want for this podcast.
58:41
Speaker 2: That's what I want for all my coaching.
58:42
Speaker 2: That's what I want.
58:43
Speaker 2: That that's why I was put on this on planet Earth is to help individuals find information and be educated about this disease.
58:50
Speaker 2: Because I did not have that when I was diagnosed.
58:53
Speaker 2: And if I did, my life would be different.
58:57
Speaker 1: That's beautiful.
58:58
Speaker 1: I feel like, well, thank you so much for, you know, your words, like, starting talking about diabetes is, It's been hard for me because, you know, I've always used my account as a personal account.
59:12
Speaker 1: You know, I was sharing my you know, my trip, my personal life.
59:17
Speaker 1: But diabetes was --
59:19
Speaker 2: Yeah.
59:19
Speaker 1: -- was more like, you know, I I talk sometimes about it, but I was not making contents about it, like, not as I'm doing right now.
59:28
Speaker 1: And it was hard because when you change your topic completely when you change what you're doing so much, when you go so much on talking about diabetes.
59:39
Speaker 1: A lot of people are like, they might be kind of confused at first.
59:43
Speaker 1: But, you know, like, I have some friends of mine that have been following me for because they're friends on Instagram and they're like, I love what you're doing.
59:51
Speaker 1: Like, keep doing what you're doing.
59:52
Speaker 1: And I was like, in a moment where
59:53
Speaker 2: if
59:54
Speaker 1: you don't know whether you're doing this, because starting something is always hard.
59:57
Speaker 1: Like, starting something is getting out of, you know, your comfort zone, getting out of exposing your same yourself on a camera doing this podcast in English, while I've never done this before, all of these things are hard.
1:00:11
Speaker 1: And I kinda feel uncomfortable that's weird.
1:00:14
Speaker 1: So I don't know whether I'm doing the you know, I'm doing this right.
1:00:17
Speaker 1: I'm doing this wrong.
1:00:18
Speaker 1: I don't I don't really care about it.
1:00:20
Speaker 1: I know that I'm doing something that is right for myself because I know that.
1:00:23
Speaker 1: Somehow I'm helping someone that's all that matters.
1:00:26
Speaker 1: And I I actually since I started this and I feel much better, you know.
1:00:34
Speaker 1: I feel that I am giving a power of myself and I'm I'm just being gay as I've always been, kind of funny and goofy sometimes, but I'm using all myself and my creative weapons and tools to share something that changed my life so much.
1:00:56
Speaker 1: And I wanna do this to help other people.
1:00:58
Speaker 1: And that's beautiful what you're doing.
1:01:00
Speaker 1: Like, I've been filming your show, I've been filming you on Instagram.
1:01:03
Speaker 1: And I watch other people's episode and all of us have something that we can learn from.
1:01:08
Speaker 1: And and that's the most important part of being a community and being here, I guess.
1:01:13
Speaker 1: Because, you know, like, these words, if I had listened or I had seen your podcast when I was at the hospital, your podcast or other people's accounts and hundreds of other people that I follow on Instagram or TikTok or whatever.
1:01:29
Speaker 1: They somehow changed my life in a way that I'm grateful for what they gave me.
1:01:35
Speaker 1: And so that's why it's so beautiful and I feel I have Guzman right now because, like, again, it's it's amazing.
1:01:43
Speaker 1: Yeah.
1:01:43
Speaker 1: And and right now, I'm discovering I'm just testing what I can do, and I just wanna find a way to serve the community as best as I can.
1:01:55
Speaker 1: And I gotta do a spoiler here.
1:01:57
Speaker 1: I'll be
1:02:00
Speaker 2: oh, yes.
1:02:00
Speaker 1: I'll be starting traveling as I used to do before diabetes, so backpacking the world.
1:02:07
Speaker 1: And my account will be probably based on how to travel and how to get everywhere you wanna go.
1:02:16
Speaker 1: We type one diabetes.
1:02:17
Speaker 1: And be a backpacker.
1:02:19
Speaker 2: A lot of them.
1:02:20
Speaker 1: And do this kind of lifestyle because that was the greatest fear that they had before know, when I was diagnosed, I was like, I would never be able to do that again.
1:02:28
Speaker 1: I would never be able to do what I wanted to do before diabetes.
1:02:31
Speaker 1: My dream has always been traveling the world.
1:02:33
Speaker 1: And I was scared that a business could ruin this, could, you know, just impact that affect my life in a way that I had to avoid reaching that.
1:02:43
Speaker 1: I'm not just leaving the dream.
1:02:45
Speaker 1: And I took some time to understand what diabetes is.
1:02:50
Speaker 1: And I can't wait to be back on the road and doing some crazy adventures, probably South America, and just share all I can to inspire others or whatever they wanna do in life.
1:03:05
Speaker 1: But just knowing that you can always overcome your fears, your limits.
1:03:10
Speaker 1: And there's always a better version of yourself that is yet to be discovered.
1:03:15
Speaker 1: And that's the reason why, like, I love all traveling and that's why I think it's you know, the kind of best way to self discovery.
1:03:26
Speaker 1: And doing that with a chronic disease like diabetes, I think It will take a lot of challenges.
1:03:33
Speaker 1: And, you know, I just wanna share all of this.
1:03:38
Speaker 1: To get like because that's what I am, you know, that's what I've always been and and getting out and just sharing my life that That's what I wanna do.
1:03:49
Speaker 1: Okay.
1:03:53
Speaker 2: So you you talked earlier about I just wanted to share this with you talked earlier about following some people that were, like, climbers and doing a bunch of things with diabetes and you talk about this guy from Ted to Ted talk.
1:04:11
Speaker 2: And now you're gonna and now you're gonna join that community of, like, just traveling and live with diabetes.
1:04:17
Speaker 2: If you haven't listened to it yet, episode, I think it's seventy.
1:04:23
Speaker 2: And four and forty one.
1:04:26
Speaker 2: It is with the this incredible gentlemen who's a professional mount climber living with diabetes.
1:04:35
Speaker 1: I said
1:04:36
Speaker 2: they may type one.
1:04:37
Speaker 2: He climbed Mount Everest.
1:04:40
Speaker 2: He climbed he climbed k two.
1:04:42
Speaker 2: He washed his best friend die falling off of the mountain.
1:04:46
Speaker 2: It it's he's got an incredible store.
1:04:51
Speaker 2: He's been electrocuted on top of the mountain, trying to deal and and dealing with his diabetes on top of the mountain.
1:04:56
Speaker 2: How he's dealt with it.
1:04:59
Speaker 2: Like, it's an incredible two part series.
1:05:01
Speaker 2: This episode forty one and seventy, I just looked it up.
1:05:04
Speaker 2: And I think you'll get a lot of really cool stuff out of those two episodes.
1:05:10
Speaker 1: Thanks, man.
1:05:10
Speaker 1: Yeah.
1:05:11
Speaker 1: We have this before, Nick.
1:05:12
Speaker 1: I think once we
1:05:14
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:05:14
Speaker 1: That's gonna be the first thing I watch, actually.
1:05:16
Speaker 1: After hearing those.
1:05:21
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:05:21
Speaker 2: He's I mean, he's just an incredible individual.
1:05:24
Speaker 2: He's got he's got a nonprofit organization.
1:05:27
Speaker 2: And It's just it's it's incredible.
1:05:32
Speaker 2: Everything he's doing over in that in that area, with with diabetes.
1:05:39
Speaker 2: Just trying to be abigot abigot abigot at the same time trying to live his his life day.
1:05:44
Speaker 2: He's always wanted to live.
1:05:45
Speaker 2: So incredible individual.
1:05:48
Speaker 1: That's great.
1:05:49
Speaker 1: Well, thank you.
1:05:51
Speaker 1: I'll just -- Sure.
1:05:53
Speaker 1: -- written it down.
1:05:54
Speaker 1: Sorry.
1:05:55
Speaker 1: I got it here.
1:05:56
Speaker 1: That's good.
1:05:58
Speaker 2: Cool, man.
1:05:59
Speaker 2: So you're coming over the states soon.
1:06:01
Speaker 2: What's the after you're done with the states?
1:06:04
Speaker 2: What's the next trip?
1:06:06
Speaker 2: Do you know yet?
1:06:08
Speaker 1: I'm planning something.
1:06:09
Speaker 1: So actually, I'm still kinda planning like, I'm just I don't really have a plan right now because I there's a little slow.
1:06:20
Speaker 1: Mhmm.
1:06:21
Speaker 1: I'm running a lot right now.
1:06:22
Speaker 1: So there is, like, I'm trying to train for a marathon, which is something that I've always wanted to do.
1:06:30
Speaker 1: And there's one on November that is really connected with my story because it's innate and and increase is the place where --
1:06:39
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.
1:06:39
Speaker 1: -- you know why everything started.
1:06:41
Speaker 1: So my new life started because I guess I had two lives.
1:06:45
Speaker 1: This is the second one after diabetes.
1:06:48
Speaker 1: And it's like in the middle November, as it's around the thirteenth of November.
1:06:54
Speaker 1: So I'd like to complete that and probably coming back home in in October.
1:07:02
Speaker 1: I'm staying three weeks in the States and coming back home If I have the chance, if I feel if I feel that, I can train for that.
1:07:09
Speaker 1: If I feel like, I can I can complete it?
1:07:11
Speaker 1: I'll try that one, and then probably going to Colombia.
1:07:15
Speaker 1: That's the the place where I'd like to
1:07:18
Speaker 2: go.
1:07:18
Speaker 2: Okay.
1:07:19
Speaker 1: So I've already been to Chile.
1:07:21
Speaker 1: Part of Argentina, Bolivia and Peru.
1:07:24
Speaker 1: And I'd like to go back to Colombia because I I have a special connection with that place.
1:07:29
Speaker 1: It's been on the top of my bucket list.
1:07:31
Speaker 1: I actually had a plane ticket.
1:07:33
Speaker 1: So when I was diagnosed with diabetes, I had a plane ticket for to Colombia.
1:07:38
Speaker 1: Stone.
1:07:39
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:07:39
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:07:40
Speaker 1: So that was kinda
1:07:41
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:07:42
Speaker 1: That was that was that made everything harder, you know.
1:07:45
Speaker 1: So I got something.
1:07:46
Speaker 1: Like, I I gotta go there somehow.
1:07:49
Speaker 1: Like, there's still this kind of thing in my brain that it's like you gotta go there.
1:07:54
Speaker 1: You gotta go there.
1:07:54
Speaker 1: You gotta go there.
1:07:55
Speaker 1: No matter what I do, no matter what I wanna go, no matter where I am, but there's always this kind of voice in my brain that's like reminding me to visit that place.
1:08:04
Speaker 1: So I'd like to go to South America and then I have a lot of friends that I'd like to visit.
1:08:09
Speaker 1: I've actually quit my job I was working as a such a media manager and I quit my job, I save some money, and not working at home.
1:08:18
Speaker 1: It's like I'm working from home and I'm working at that coffee place.
1:08:21
Speaker 1: So I'm doing different jobs, making content for some people.
1:08:25
Speaker 1: And after this, I just wanna go and you know, enjoy this as much as I can.
1:08:31
Speaker 1: It was very hard quitting my job with stuff because I lost my job and I lost all the opportunities that it offered me.
1:08:40
Speaker 1: But I felt inside of me that it was time to do something And, you know, when you feel that inside of you, you just have to go and see how how it goes and then go meet the floor or whatever.
1:08:56
Speaker 1: But, I mean, I'm I'm very thrilled about what what's about you know, what's happening in my life and the future.
1:09:03
Speaker 1: Even if I don't know anything about that, I know that I feel inside and you know, I just started making things about diabetes and this makes me feel very good.
1:09:15
Speaker 1: This makes me feel as I haven't felt for a while.
1:09:18
Speaker 1: And I wanna keep doing this.
1:09:21
Speaker 1: And if I can do this while traveling, if I can do this while, you know, training or whatever I'm happy.
1:09:30
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter what where I am.
1:09:32
Speaker 1: Doesn't matter what I do, but for now it's giving me a lot of joy and and I like this.
1:09:38
Speaker 1: So I'm I'm not too focused on the future even if I know that I will be traveling.
1:09:43
Speaker 1: And I'm kinda more like I'm not I'm very Sometimes I'm very like, I would like to make plants, but also on the same side when I had all the plants that I figured it out before having diabetes and that was diagnosed.
1:09:56
Speaker 1: That changed the way I think about the future.
1:09:58
Speaker 1: I like -- Yeah.
1:10:00
Speaker 1: -- you know, I'll be traveling, but I like not to say that too loud.
1:10:05
Speaker 1: Because you never know what can happen in life.
1:10:06
Speaker 1: So I'm just trying to get as much as I can from the present, leaving the moment, leaving the space that I have here at home with my family.
1:10:14
Speaker 1: And I I'll I'll I'll for sure be on the road soon South America, Columbia probably because that's that's where I where I will I've always wanted to go and just for coffee that's like a dream destination.
1:10:29
Speaker 1: And
1:10:31
Speaker 2: That's awesome, man.
1:10:32
Speaker 2: It's good.
1:10:33
Speaker 2: It's great to have it's great to have your dream and be able to go after it because a lot of people can't say that.
1:10:44
Speaker 2: People have a dream and they either don't know how to get to that dream and make that dream a reality or they sit on their heels because of fear or, you know, this self prophecy if I can't do it or whatever it is.
1:10:57
Speaker 2: So that that's great that you're gonna put yourself in that situation and be able to to do that.
1:11:01
Speaker 1: Thank you.
1:11:02
Speaker 2: Awesome, man.
1:11:02
Speaker 1: Well, if if I can add something, I feel like you know, diabetes help me.
1:11:08
Speaker 1: I've always lived my life in a way that I knew that I have limited time available.
1:11:13
Speaker 1: You know, so I've always felt like when I was eighteen, I went alone to Patagonia to south in Argentina in Chile.
1:11:20
Speaker 1: So I've always done all these crazy stuff because I knew that my time on this earth was kinda it's like limited, you know, was counted.
1:11:28
Speaker 1: I I was not.
1:11:29
Speaker 1: So I was always I've always lived life in a way that I wanted to push through my goals and I wanted to, you know, do whatever I felt inside was right for me.
1:11:39
Speaker 1: But after diabetes, you know, I really I realized that and actually never know what happens in your life.
1:11:45
Speaker 1: And so it gave me, like, it it pushes me to get into this version of myself even more than I've always done.
1:11:54
Speaker 1: You know?
1:11:54
Speaker 1: And when I started feeling that, I was not a hundred percent satisfied at my job.
1:11:59
Speaker 1: And if and I liked it, even if I know that greeting was hard, even if I know that there were a lot of things involved in that situation.
1:12:05
Speaker 1: I just listen to myself, and that's why diabetes, you know, whenever I I I'm in struggle.
1:12:12
Speaker 1: I'm struggling with the present.
1:12:13
Speaker 1: Whenever I feel down or whenever I feel depressed or whenever I have bad days, I think about the moment when I was in the hospital room, when I wasn't that hospital bad, I look at the picture that I took.
1:12:24
Speaker 1: That's the picture that I sent to my family that I posted on Instagram that's been in my account.
1:12:28
Speaker 1: And I'm like, remember, this situation.
1:12:31
Speaker 1: Remember what you felt?
1:12:33
Speaker 1: Remember that you got all the tools and the weapons available to get for these situations.
1:12:37
Speaker 1: Because you've been there before.
1:12:39
Speaker 1: You have been to that situations where you didn't know anything about the life and look at the place where you're right now.
1:12:45
Speaker 1: And if I think about that layout, you know, eighteenth of August, nineteenth of August two thousand and twenty one in the hospital room thinking about how I have been through this and the process and the journey that let me hear.
1:13:00
Speaker 1: I'm extremely grateful.
1:13:02
Speaker 1: I'm extremely happy.
1:13:03
Speaker 1: About everything.
1:13:05
Speaker 1: The good things, the bad things had a lot of emotionally tough days and I had a lot of roller coasters, but you realize that life is a roller coaster.
1:13:18
Speaker 1: And when you're twenty four, when you're in your twenties, everyone is asking you like, oh, why don't you, like, stabilize yourself?
1:13:27
Speaker 1: Why don't you stop doing what you're doing?
1:13:29
Speaker 1: Why don't you get some, you know, some comfort in being doing something that everyone does.
1:13:36
Speaker 1: And I'm like, because I wanna be myself, you know, and The reason why I wanna be myself is because when I was in the hospital room, I knew that I was satisfied with all I have achieved in my life.
1:13:46
Speaker 1: So whenever You never know what happens in life, but if I had to be back in the situations where you're stuck in a hospital bed with something, I know I have to be sure that I don't always what I wanted to do for myself and what I thought I was right.
1:14:00
Speaker 1: And this being this mean this mean this doesn't mean being selfish, you know, but be respectful with people doing the things that are right for myself and just following my dreams no matter what.
1:14:12
Speaker 1: I had, you know, I had a job, I could work from anywhere, I could work from a beach in Bali.
1:14:19
Speaker 1: I could work from California.
1:14:20
Speaker 1: I could work from Norway.
1:14:21
Speaker 1: I could leave wherever it wanted.
1:14:23
Speaker 1: And I was getting like a good salary.
1:14:26
Speaker 1: But I was not in the situation where I was like, okay, it's time for me to do something different.
1:14:31
Speaker 1: I was doing contents, making contents for something that I was not Believing so much anymore.
1:14:37
Speaker 1: And I started listening to myself.
1:14:40
Speaker 1: And when you are like, when you have diabetes, I feel like these connections with yourself of much deeper.
1:14:45
Speaker 1: Because you're used to listen to your body.
1:14:47
Speaker 1: You're used to listen to your feelings.
1:14:49
Speaker 1: You have to control or somehow understand your emotions.
1:14:53
Speaker 1: And I feel like the psychological aspect of diabetes and the emotional side of it made made me, like, made me stronger.
1:15:03
Speaker 1: And now I know that I have to go, you know, and follow the directions that I think is right for myself.
1:15:10
Speaker 1: Because prioritizing myself and my well-being and my mental health and my dreams and my goals.
1:15:17
Speaker 1: Are the things that I'm just I'm leaving my life as it was an extra, you know.
1:15:23
Speaker 1: As I said, like, it was about to die.
1:15:25
Speaker 1: Yeah.
1:15:26
Speaker 1: There.
1:15:26
Speaker 1: That's what I said.
1:15:27
Speaker 1: They said you were lucky to be alive.
1:15:29
Speaker 1: So right now I'm leaving and trying to be you know, to to get better every day and everything I do.
1:15:37
Speaker 1: And is there something that I don't feel like it's mine anymore or it doesn't represent you know, what Leo is.
1:15:44
Speaker 1: And I think about what I've been through, and I found this strengthening the courage to go and seek for something different.
1:15:55
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:15:56
Speaker 2: I love that, man.
1:15:57
Speaker 2: That's beautiful.
1:15:57
Speaker 2: That's it that's it is a perfect place to end.
1:16:00
Speaker 2: This conversation and and I just it's just I I just have loved this conversation so much.
1:16:08
Speaker 2: It's been amazing to connect with you to, you know, listen to your story and I just I wish you all the best.
1:16:17
Speaker 2: In the travels.
1:16:18
Speaker 2: I can't wait to continue to watch you on social media and everything you're posting and and your story.
1:16:24
Speaker 2: How I can't is just I can't wait to continue to watch your story unfold.
1:16:29
Speaker 2: So, you know, mad props to you for dealing with everything that you dealt with two years ago.
1:16:35
Speaker 2: Having to go through that.
1:16:36
Speaker 2: That is definitely one on top of one of the the craziest stories I've heard so far.
1:16:41
Speaker 2: So Congrats to you for that for being on top of my I've heard a lot of crazy stories.
1:16:48
Speaker 2: So, yeah, thank you so much for doing this, Leo.
1:16:51
Speaker 2: For all the listeners, where can they follow you?
1:16:54
Speaker 2: Where they can where can they connect with you?
1:16:57
Speaker 2: If there's someone that has a question or wants to reach out to you, you know, maybe with the same type of story, where can I
1:17:05
Speaker 1: do that?
1:17:06
Speaker 1: So thank you so much.
1:17:07
Speaker 1: Well, it's been It's been amazing.
1:17:11
Speaker 1: And again, like, it I feel like I had a lot of things to say.
1:17:15
Speaker 1: I'm sorry if I've been, like, a tornado of
1:17:18
Speaker 2: No.
1:17:18
Speaker 2: I love it.
1:17:19
Speaker 2: Things.
1:17:19
Speaker 1: And I guess
1:17:19
Speaker 2: that this is so this platform's four, brother.
1:17:22
Speaker 1: Yeah.
1:17:22
Speaker 1: I got a very philosophical at the end, but Well, they can they can find me on Instagram, you know, leo, l e o, and, you know, underscore v a, double r, o n I.
1:17:35
Speaker 1: Hey.
1:17:36
Speaker 1: Damn.
1:17:37
Speaker 1: I don't remember the letters in.
1:17:38
Speaker 1: But it's like Veroni, so it it sounds like you you can see it there.
1:17:42
Speaker 1: And you can also follow me on on LinkedIn.
1:17:45
Speaker 1: I share pretty much the same things.
1:17:47
Speaker 1: I do want an Instagram with a different angle.
1:17:50
Speaker 1: And I also have one on TikTok account.
1:17:53
Speaker 1: It's type one layout or Italy.
1:17:57
Speaker 1: If you wanna visit Italy or whatever you wanna ask me about Italy is beautiful and it's perfect for diabetes, even if we eat a lot of pasta and pizza, but that's another detail.
1:18:08
Speaker 1: But I'll be very, like, you know, easy and ready to, you know, listen to all of your questions and answer them.
1:18:19
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for listening.
1:18:22
Speaker 2: Awesome, man.
1:18:23
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:18:23
Speaker 2: Thank you, man.
1:18:24
Speaker 2: And and your accent's beautiful.
1:18:27
Speaker 2: I mean, you you you almost talk perfect English.
1:18:30
Speaker 2: So that's great, man.
1:18:32
Speaker 2: That's great.
1:18:32
Speaker 2: When you first told me that before we started recording, I'm like, wait, what?
1:18:36
Speaker 1: Well, thank you so much.
1:18:38
Speaker 1: I had an American girlfriend, and he used to speak English, miss Ruth.
1:18:43
Speaker 2: Oh, okay.
1:18:43
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:18:44
Speaker 2: Well, there you go.
1:18:44
Speaker 2: That that makes a lot of sense.
1:18:46
Speaker 2: That makes a lot of sense.
1:18:48
Speaker 2: That makes a lot of sense.
1:18:49
Speaker 1: Thank you so much.
1:18:51
Speaker 2: I'll make sure all of your handles and information is in the show notes.
1:18:55
Speaker 2: And then, you know, people make sure If you're listening to this right now, if you've made it through this hour in, you know, ten, fifteen minutes of this conversation and you're still listening.
1:19:05
Speaker 2: Thank you, by the way, But reach out to Leo because he's got a he's just got a and he's such an incredible story and just connect with him, talk to him, give him your words of encouragement, asking questions.
1:19:17
Speaker 2: And he just I can't wait to continue to watch his journey unfold, so it's gonna be amazing.
1:19:24
Speaker 2: So Leo, thank you so much for coming on and talking and speaking to the diabetes community, and we wish you the best.
1:19:32
Speaker 2: And everything over the next year, two years, your rest of
1:19:36
Speaker 1: your life.
1:19:37
Speaker 1: I see that team in Talligan.
1:19:40
Speaker 2: It's not even worth it.
1:19:40
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:19:41
Speaker 2: Good
1:19:41
Speaker 1: luck to everyone listening.
1:19:43
Speaker 1: To you.
1:19:44
Speaker 2: Well, thank you everyone for listening.
1:19:45
Speaker 2: Again, reach out to Leo.
1:19:47
Speaker 2: And we'll see everybody next time.
1:19:51
Speaker 1: That's it.