SAN ANTONIO – There’s a lot of preparation for teachers who are about to welcome students into their classrooms, but planning school days isn’t just curriculum for one local high school teacher, and others like her.
“I was diagnosed March 23, 2007. So right before I turned seven years old,” said Health Careers High School math teacher Taylor Schofield.
For 17 years, Schofield has learned how to cope with her Type 1 diabetes.
It’s an autoimmune disease where the pancreas doesn’t make insulin, different from Type 2 diabetes. Type 1 is often diagnosed in children and it has no cure.
“I went to the bathroom a lot. I was constantly drinking water,” she said, describing two of the big red flag symptoms.
The main symptoms include:
- Extreme thirst
- Frequent urination
- Lethargic
- Excessively hungry yet losing weight
- Blurred vision
- Fruity taste in the mouth
Once diagnosed, most kids are immediately hospitalized, like Schofield was.
Treatment plans typically develop from there and now commonly involve a new technology pump, like a Dexcom.
“A Dexcom, I currently wear on the back of my arm and it tracks your blood sugar for you. Then my Omnipod I wear on my leg, and this is what lets me give myself insulin,” she said while showing her devices.
The devices are game changers? for people like Schofield who have demanding and active jobs.
She’s been a math teacher at Health Careers High School for three years.
“The Dexcom will sync up with an app on my phone. So right now I can see that my blood sugar is 136, which also syncs with my Apple Watch, which is really good when I’m teaching because I don’t have to have my phone on me,” Schofield said.
If her sugar is low or high, it lets her know.
“Then I can deal with my class and say, ‘Hey, do a problem. Hey, take a break, talk with each other. I’m going to go take care of myself,’ and then go right back into teaching,” she said.
Schofield is also amazed at the unexpected little community she’s found in her classes.
“My first year teaching, I had three diabetic students. In this past year, I started out with three. One had to move,” she said.
Schofield smiled as she talked about their connection.
“My students’ favorite thing was when there’d be multiple of us in a class. They hear a beep, they’re like, ‘Okay, who’s beeping? ‘Are you okay?’ or ‘Miss Schofield? Are you good?’ I was like, ‘Yes, I’m fine! Give me a minute,’ and I’ll go eat like my snack or something,’” she said.
Her colleagues are also aware so if she needs help, she’s got it.
It’s a reassuring thought so she can focus on what really matters: her students.
Schofield is also active in the organization Breakthrough T1D, formerly JDRF.
It’s an organization that supports the type 1 diabetes community and fundraises for groundbreaking research.
The community formed within the organization has led Schofield to patients of all ages, including a high school student with T1D who let KSAT tag along with her as she prepared for a new school year.
Watch that video below: