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Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends and welcome to episode 1202 of the Juicebox Podcast.

We're calling today's guest Stephanie she's 33 years old, she was diagnosed with type one diabetes when she was three. I'm not going to give the whole story away here. But Stephanie grew up in an abusive household, she's had a lot of trouble that led her to foster care where she met people who got into more trouble and eventually she ended up in prison. Nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan. When you place your first order for ag one with my link, you'll get five free travel packs and a free year supply of vitamin D. Drink ag one.com/juice box, my 40% off offer at cozy earth.com ends in June of 2024. So hurry up and get over there to save 40% off of your entire order use the offer code juice box at checkout. I'll get back to you and I know what the offer goes to after June and if you have type one diabetes, or are the caregiver of someone with type one and you're a US resident please go to T one D exchange.org/juicebox. and complete the survey. You will be helping with type one diabetes research when you complete the survey AT T one D exchange.org/juicebox. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by touched by type one touched by type one.org. And find them on Facebook and Instagram touched by type one is an organization dedicated to helping people living with type one diabetes. And they have so many different programs that are doing just that check them out at touched by type one.org. I forgot to tell you that their big event is coming up and I'm going to be speaking at it. The tickets are free. It happens in Orlando touch by type one.org. Go to the Programs tab and click on annual conference. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the Dexcom G seven made for all types of diabetes Dexcom G seven can be used to manage type one, type two, and gestational diabetes, you're going to see the speed, direction and number of your blood sugar right on your receiver or smartphone device. dexcom.com/juice Box. Today's episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, a company that's bringing people together to redefine what it means to live with diabetes. Later in this episode, I'll be speaking with Jalen, he was diagnosed with type one diabetes at 14. He's 29. Now he's going to tell you a little bit about his story. And then later at the end of this episode, you can hear my entire conversation with Jalen to hear more stories with Medtronic champions. Go to Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox or search the hashtag Medtronic champion on your favorite social media platform. Okay, so

Stephanie 3:05
my name is Stephanie.

Scott Benner 3:08
Stephanie has type one diabetes. Yes, I

Stephanie 3:10
do. For how long? I got diagnosed. I was three. So that was 1994 1994.

Scott Benner 3:17
Hold on 2004 1424 30 years ago. You're 33. Look at me. All right. Pretty proud of myself counting by 10s I could probably have done that all the way up to 100. Right. diabetes for a very long time. But you're on this show today for something pretty specific. I'm gonna ask you a couple of questions about your diabetes that we're gonna get to the specific topic. Okay, obviously, you're diagnosed with three probably don't remember much about it. No, no. Was your care. I mean, 33 years ago, were you like, regular and mph? Were you on a sliding scale? How did you manage in the beginning?

Stephanie 3:56
When I first started, I was on mph and AR and I did that until cumilla came out and that that kind of changed the game for me. Think I was 10 When I first started it, okay. My diet changed. I could eat different things. My mom was way less restrictive because of that. 30 minute active insulin.

Scott Benner 4:24
Yeah. So your first the first seven years, so you're about 10 years older. So you were just eating on a schedule like we launched at this time. Were you doing the exchange diet? Or how do they have it

Stephanie 4:33
work? Yeah, I did do the exchange diet. My mom would like count out my McDonald's fries. For me. It was pretty terrible. But I didn't know anything different until I change to human logs though. And

Scott Benner 4:47
then you could suddenly count carbs and just decide what to eat and covered is a big deal for yeah.

Stephanie 4:52
Oh yeah.

Scott Benner 4:53
How was your management returns How was your a one sees like your health.

Stephanie 4:58
It was really off and on puberty was trash. My agency, I think the worst I've ever got was 13. And like, my parents were fighting all the time. Like, they told me that I wasn't gonna live to be 25 if I kept doing what I was doing, so it was pretty rough until I got into my 20s Yes,

Scott Benner 5:22
definitely. That sucks. You at 13 years old, were living with parents who were telling you to your face, you're gonna die. You're not doing a good job taking care of yourself. Yes. How did that impact you?

Stephanie 5:34
Well, I thought I was gonna die before I was 25. So then when I turned 25, I was kind of like, well, what do I do now? Surprised

Scott Benner 5:43
to be alive? Yeah, yeah. Were your parents helping you with your management? And you weren't listening? Or were they just like, how come? You can't figure this out?

Stephanie 5:52
It was more of how come you can't figure this out? All right,

Scott Benner 5:57
so definitely, I'm gonna ask you a difficult question. Okay. Do your parents still alive? If they're dead? It'd be easier for God.

Stephanie 6:05
Yes, they're still alive. They're

Scott Benner 6:06
still alive. Are they quality people?

Stephanie 6:09
They have gotten better. As time has gone on. I think the older you get, the more calm you get. Okay.

Scott Benner 6:18
How old were they when they were younger?

Stephanie 6:20
I would not have picked them. That's

Scott Benner 6:23
fair. Given a choice, these were not your choice. Yes. Okay. So are we talking about verbal abuse? Are we talking about lack of intelligence? Are we talking about drinking drugs? What are we what are we

Stephanie 6:37
feeling there was a lot of verbal aggression. Kind of towards the end, there was some pretty significant physical abuse. So when I hit puberty, my hormones, my diabetes, everything just kind of went off the rail. Right. So they didn't know how to handle it. They just thought I was like a teenager. It got pretty bad. And actually, the state got involved and I ended up in foster care. Somebody

Scott Benner 7:03
was hitting you at home. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry. Like, for reasons like did you know it was coming with it like varied and just variable or was it like if you did something said something, that's how you were punished. Mostly

Stephanie 7:17
it was if I did something said something, but like, it kind of got out of hand. Like they got to a point where like, I was scared to leave my room because I didn't know what was waiting, you know,

Scott Benner 7:30
so somebody might just for no reason at all. strike you. Yeah. Can I ask you? Are we talking about like a backhand or a full on assault didn't last long. My

Stephanie 7:42
dad never punched me he never like balled up his fist and like punched me. But there was definitely slapping hitting thrown down the stairs one time.

Scott Benner 7:52
Well, you're 33 Now do you have kids?

Stephanie 7:55
I do have kids. Okay.

Scott Benner 7:57
Is there anything that you remember from your childhood? That rose to the level of being hit like that? No, no, like you didn't come back in the house with a shotgun and heroin and he smacked you or something like that. That's what I was saying. No, no, this is just general everyday stuff. Was your mom is bad, or was it mostly him. Dexcom g7 offers an easier way to manage diabetes without finger sticks. It is a simple CGM system that delivers real time glucose numbers to your smartphone, your smartwatch. And it effortlessly allows you to see your glucose levels and where they're headed. My daughter is wearing a Dexcom g7 Right now, and I can't recommend it enough. Whether you have commercial insurance, Medicare coverage, or no CGM coverage at all Dexcom can help you go to my link dexcom.com/juicebox and look for that button that says Get a free benefits check. That'll get you going with Dexcom. When you're there, check out the Dexcom clarity app where the follow Did you know that people can follow your Dexcom up to 10 people can follow you. Right now I'm following my daughter but my wife is also following her. Her roommates at school are following her. So I guess Arden is being followed right now by five people who are concerned for her health and welfare. And you can do the same thing. School Nurses, your neighbor, people in your family. Everyone can have access to that information if you want them to have it. Or if you're an adult, and you don't want anyone to know, you don't have to share with anybody. It's completely up to you. dexcom.com slashed use Box links in the show notes links at juicebox podcast.com. And when you use my link to learn about Dexcom you're supporting the podcast.

Stephanie 9:46
My mom was more complicit and she didn't like stand up for me. So that's like,

Scott Benner 9:52
I gotcha. She didn't hate you, but she didn't step in either. Right? Do you think he ever hit her

Stephanie 9:58
because they're still alive. I'm not going to answer that. Okay. Yeah,

Scott Benner 10:03
we'll just we'll assume your mom didn't think it was safe for her to step in. Probably yeah. Okay. Well, so they told you, you were gonna die. If you didn't figure it out. They didn't help you figure it out. And then if anything happened, or even maybe nothing happened, you were under assault. And you got out there pretty quickly.

Stephanie 10:23
It took me actually two years of contacting CPS DCFS to like, actually get out of there.

Scott Benner 10:34
How old were you when you had to contact the state and say you need to get me out of my house.

Stephanie 10:40
I started when I was 14. And I didn't actually get out until I was 16.

Scott Benner 10:46
I'm sorry. Okay. Oh, hell, all right. Can I ask a difficult question is your dad's intelligence in question here, his mental stability?

Stephanie 10:59
My dad is he's like a, one of the most extreme extreme, like Gen X, if you like, put all the Gen X's in a pool, and you're like, Oh, this is what a Gen X is. That's him. He had a rough childhood and not to excuse his behavior, but he never learned how to deal with his anger. And then I was just like, an obstacle that wouldn't immediately comply with what he said. So he, his response to that was violence.

Scott Benner 11:31
So you either just being a kid, or your diabetes wasn't going the right way. Any of these things could make him frustrated or angry. And that that was the response I got. Yep. Okay. So when you get out at 16, you get into foster care.

Stephanie 11:46
Yep. I was in like four different foster homes in the first six months. And then, like, no one really wanted to keep me because no one understood the diabetes. Like it scared them. Yeah. And then I was in group homes, and it was kind of the same thing. Like they had nurses on staff. But this is, let's see, 2006 2007. And no one knew what the heck I was talking about.

Scott Benner 12:16
Okay, so they didn't understand diabetes, you probably even weren't the best person to, like, you could have explained to him how to keep you alive. But you probably couldn't even explain like good care, right?

Stephanie 12:26
I mean, I knew carb counting, it was just that, like, no one trusted me like, I was in this place. So I must be a bad kid. You know,

Scott Benner 12:35
I see. And up until then you hadn't done anything questionable? Like legally. No, no. Were you drinking? Smoke? Cigarettes, smoke weed, anything like that?

Stephanie 12:51
Nothing. start smoking cigarettes until I was actually 18. And I didn't start drinking until I was like, 22.

Scott Benner 13:00
Interesting. Do you see your parents now?

Stephanie 13:03
Yeah, I see them kind of often. Now. Like, like I said, with their age, they've gotten more tolerable.

Scott Benner 13:14
The way anybody wants to be described. You're tolerable now. Okay, wow. Foster Care. You bounced around?

Stephanie 13:23
Yeah, I ended up in a residential treatment center. And it's so in the state I was in, they have like a tier system. So Tier one is like regular foster care. Tier Two is like group homes and stuff. So tier three was like the highest care, supervision, whatever. And I ended up in the tier three because of the diabetes mostly. And then. Also, at that point, I had developed behavioral issues. Yeah,

Scott Benner 13:56
I mean, I'm waiting for that to happen. Like you're, it's got to happen, right? So behavioral issues, like,

Stephanie 14:02
I was running away, like I would, I didn't have access to my insulin while I was in state care. So I would just run away without my insulin and get really sick. And so it was looked at as like a self harming suicidal thing. And then eventually, I did develop self harming and suicidal behaviors. Yeah.

Scott Benner 14:23
Your parents were not alcoholics or drug

Stephanie 14:25
addicts. As far as I know. No. Okay.

Scott Benner 14:29
What kind of financial situation were they in? Would you call yourself middle class, upper class lower, like, where did you fall?

Stephanie 14:36
I would say middle class, like when I was much younger, we would have been lower class. But as I got older, we kind of like, made more money and

Scott Benner 14:47
stuff. If you live in a home that they owned. Did you rent? Yeah, yeah, they owned a home on its own property. Yep. Yeah. drove a car that was newer. Had a job, that kind of stuff. Okay. With a perfect nationals or blue collar doesn't matter. I'm just asking questions.

Stephanie 15:03
My dad was blue collar. He's been a truck driver for like 3040 years at this point. Okay?

Scott Benner 15:10
Was he even there every day? For quite a while he

Stephanie 15:14
was only home on weekends. And then as I got older, he took different like truck driving jobs, so he was home more often.

Scott Benner 15:22
Okay, are you okay? I'll be home more often. No, no, no, no, don't do it. Geez. Alright, so now you are actually self harming. Cutting. What are you doing?

Stephanie 15:37
Yeah. Cutting, abusing my insulin. Pretty much every time I tried to kill myself, I would just overdose on my insulin. Okay, that was like my thing. I would just in my head, I would just fall asleep and never wake up, you know?

Scott Benner 15:51
Yeah. And how many times do you think you tried that? Four or five? What are you trying to escape at that point?

Stephanie 15:59
At that point, it was more just the idea that I didn't belong anywhere. No one loved me. I was like, bad. I was just a bad person.

Scott Benner 16:09
Gotcha. They offered you therapy and group home but did help.

Stephanie 16:13
No, because no one really was like me. No one had literally a terminal illness that they were fighting every day against, like, how could they understand? You know? Yeah, I see. Well,

Scott Benner 16:27
you ever abused the insulin in the other way? Did you ever just not used it at all? Or did you always go with a shot it?

Stephanie 16:34
I never thought of that. Like, I never even thought of that as a possibility. Like, it just never occurred to me because like being high was so awful. Like, why would I pick that?

Scott Benner 16:46
Either I'm gonna be comfortable or, or I'm getting out of this one or the other? Yeah. Do you think you really wanted to die?

Stephanie 16:55
No, I didn't like looking back. If you'd asked me at that moment. I absolutely did. But looking back, no, I just wanted someone to care about me. Yeah. Okay.

Scott Benner 17:09
How long are you in that home for?

Stephanie 17:12
I was in the residential? Until 2009. How old were you? Oh, about three years. I was 18 or 19. When I left.

Scott Benner 17:24
They they basically street you they tell you gotta go.

Stephanie 17:29
They put me in a different facility. They're called Transitional Living placements. So kind of like a halfway house. But for foster kids, right. So everyone there was between 17 and 21.

Scott Benner 17:44
Were you being educated while you were there?

Stephanie 17:48
You mean like school? Yeah. If you could call it that. Yeah. Is

Scott Benner 17:53
it more like summer school for kids? Who could NAD like they just made you do something? Yeah. Right.

Stephanie 17:58
Yeah. Kind of. I was always like, really? Ridiculously smart. So for me, like going to those schools was just kind of getting babysat. Yeah.

Scott Benner 18:08
And you could just figure your way through it. But you weren't really building skills or learning? No, no, weren't you weren't moving towards like, you could go to college if you'd like. Nobody was talking like that to you, right? No, no. What was your expectation in those three years? Like, what did you think your life was going to be when you became an adult?

Stephanie 18:28
I honestly did not think about it.

Scott Benner 18:31
Okay. So more day to day survival. Yep. Okay. Was that needed? Were the other kids. A cause for your, like, concern about your safety? Oh, yeah,

Stephanie 18:42
definitely. Definitely. And they were all like not to everyone there had mental health issues. Like everyone there had been through some p&l.

Scott Benner 18:55
Have you ever kept in touch with any of them? Actually, yeah. Do they? Quite a bit of them? Do they make it out? No, none

Stephanie 19:02
of us made it out. So. So what I mean by that is, every single person that I grew up with has either died or gone to prison. No exceptions. Every single one of us no exceptions. And I thought I was the exception until like two years ago.

Scott Benner 19:19
So two years ago. How old are your children?

Stephanie 19:22
My children are 11 Six. And now one. I've had a child since I got out of prison. Okay.

Scott Benner 19:31
11 Six. Now, one, not the same fathers or Yes, the same fathers.

Stephanie 19:37
My two older ones have the same father. The younger one does not.

Scott Benner 19:41
How old were you when you had your first? I was 21 I believe. Okay. All right. So you get out you get put into the halfway house for adults. And now it's get a job time or latch on to a guy time. This episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, Medtronic diabetes.com/juice box. And now we're going to hear from Medtronic champion Jalen.

Speaker 1 20:09
I was going straight into high school. So it was a summer heading into high school was that particularly difficult, unimaginable, you know, I missed my entire summer. So I went, I was going to a brand new school, I was around a bunch of new people that I had not been going to school with. So it was hard trying to balance that while also explaining to people what type one diabetes was, my hometown did not have an endocrinologist. So I was traveling over an hour to the nearest endocrinologist for children. So you know, I outside of that I didn't have any type of support in my hometown. Did

Scott Benner 20:43
you try to explain to people or did you find it easier just to stay private?

Speaker 1 20:48
I honestly I just held back I didn't really like talking about it. It was just it felt like it was just an repeating record where I was saying things and people weren't understanding it. And I also was still in the process of learning it. So I just kept it to myself didn't really talk about it.

Scott Benner 21:02
Did you eventually find people in real life that you could confide in, I

Speaker 1 21:07
never really got the experience until after getting to college. And then once I graduated college, it's all I see, you know, you can easily search Medtronic champions, you see people that pop up, and you're like, wow, look at all this content. And I think that's something that motivates me started embracing more. You know, how I live with type one diabetes, to hear

Scott Benner 21:28
Jay Lin's entire conversation stay till the very end, Medtronic diabetes.com/juice box to hear more stories from the Medtronic champion community. Both.

Stephanie 21:41
So I actually only stayed at that placement for like six weeks, and then I ran away. So they allowed you to have a job there. So I worked a job and I thought it was great. And then I got fired. And I don't know why still, but then I ended up with my first paycheck. And I'd never in my life gotten a paycheck before but I got like, $600 and I was like, oh, sweet, I can be free. Now I can run away and buy a house and whatever. Like I just didn't know, you know,

Scott Benner 22:09
600 and, you know, invest half of it for the future and buy a house with the other half. Right?

Stephanie 22:15
It was everything to me, you know? Yeah. So I went and I bought a phone and then I like called a friend that I knew from my residential placement, and they came and picked me up in the town I was in and I was gone.

Scott Benner 22:33
Do you start doing drugs? Or you just start what do you do?

Stephanie 22:36
No drugs. I just kind of was a bomb. Like I just kind of like I slept till noon, and I wandered around town walking around with my friends. Like, I just didn't really have a direction at

Scott Benner 22:52
all. Who finances that? Because you're somewhere you're, you're indoors somewhere. Right? And you're eating right? How does that all get financed?

Stephanie 22:59
So one of the friends that I had from the residential, she had a boyfriend, grown man, older person that she should never have been with. That was really just paying for her and whoever she brought to the house.

Scott Benner 23:16
Are we calling this a sugar daddy? Yeah, yeah. Was he trading sex for money with her basically?

Stephanie 23:23
With her? Yeah. And I'm sure that spread to other girls. But I was gone before that ever happened to me.

Scott Benner 23:29
Okay. Could it have happened to you if you stayed? Definitely, yeah. Okay. So you meet a guy. And yep. And you're, I mean, you had two kids with them. And they're spread out a little bit. So you move in you're, you're making a life.

Stephanie 23:43
I actually I ended up going to college after I left that girl and her man. And I got so I got a Pell Grant, right, because I was in foster care. So I was like, automatically qualified. And then they paid my tuition. And I ended up with like, $3,000 that I got to just keep, right. And I was so excited. And I ended up renting an apartment. When I ended up meeting my kids, Dad, I had already been with someone and we were living together and I had gotten pregnant with him. That did not work out. So then when we separated. I met my kids dad, my older kids, dad.

Scott Benner 24:30
So wait, you said it didn't work. Did you have a failed pregnancy?

Stephanie 24:34
No, I actually what happened was when I gave birth to my oldest child, because I was in foster care, in the state that I gave birth and CPS DCFS came and took my first child and basically they said like, because I didn't have parents I would know how to be a good parent and and they had the right basically to come and take my baby. How old were you then?

Scott Benner 25:05
I was 1919. And did you have to sign anything when they did that?

Stephanie 25:11
No, we I actually went to court to fight them about it for 22 months.

Scott Benner 25:18
Have you seen the babies since then? No, no. To just given up for adoption.

Stephanie 25:24
Yeah, they ended up letting the foster parent that was taking care of him adopt him.

Scott Benner 25:32
Okay, well, listen, this is gonna keep being terrible, right? We need to tell people Yeah, okay. Yes. Yes, it is. Let's do a little bit of this for people so they can make it through you. Okay, now? I am okay. Now. Okay. Keep that in mind while she's telling the story so that the pit of your stomach doesn't just like burn through like hot lava, because that's what's happening to me while I'm talking here. Yeah, yeah, no, so Okay. Oh, geez. Alright, so you're out. You got this three grand that you've gotten an apartment with the three grand you probably thought like this will last me 10 years. And oh, yeah,

Stephanie 26:03
absolutely. I was so excited. I was a little more like world savvy at this point. Okay, but I know not a lot. I knew it would like last me forever. But I knew I couldn't buy a house with it.

Scott Benner 26:17
Yeah. So when you look back at yourself, do you just see a person who wasn't ever just shown what life was? Yeah,

Stephanie 26:24
yeah. And it's funny, because I thought I was so special. I thought like, well, I know how to vacuum and I know how to clean dishes. And a lot of girls there just didn't, you know, so I thought I like was gonna be fine. You know, it's interesting,

Scott Benner 26:39
isn't it? Like we can, we can always find somebody doing a little worse than us and then go, I'm great. And we never think Yeah, who knows more than we do? Like, probably right? I can vacuum and, yeah, so Okay, so you're in your apartment, you meet and you meet a guy. And you guys have a kid pretty quickly, right? Because you're like, 21, when you have the next one?

Stephanie 27:00
Yes. So I was actually still in court fighting for my first child when I got pregnant with my second child. And basically, what it came down to was, I was let's see, six months pregnant, and the state that they filed for a termination of my parental rights. And my caseworker took me into a little room. And she said, basically, if I sign this termination paper and let my first child go, they won't come after my second child. But if I don't, then they'll be at the hospital waiting for me.

Scott Benner 27:39
Even though you were with somebody and you had a home. Yep. Yep. You know, what the basis was for that? Were they just trying to strong arm you into doing the first thing and stopping they were

Stephanie 27:50
and they used a this? I can't remember what it's called. But it was basically, potential for neglect was like a charge that they brought against me. Sounds like the state. Nothing had happened yet. But there was a potential that my child would be neglected, because of my history. Right?

Scott Benner 28:15
Do you feel like they strong armed you to get you out of the cold case? Yeah, absolutely. So you did that begrudgingly. And how devastating was that? By the way? I

Stephanie 28:27
don't think I showered for like three weeks. I don't think I got up off my couch for like two weeks.

Scott Benner 28:33
So in that moment, like signing that paper made it feel like something like you were in the mall and somebody just snatched your baby and left with it. Yes,

Stephanie 28:40
yeah, very much. So the the Wild Thing is, I was pregnant with my second child. Actually, my mom went to court with me when it was time to sign the papers. And she was very supportive. And I love her for going with me. But she helped me pack up my house. And I put everything I could fit into my little Nissan Altima. And I drove from the state I was in to the state I'm in now, which was about 10 hours at the time. And I have never been back ever. It's crazy. Because after my child was born, my older child that I have now, about six months later, so I had forwarded all my mail to a friend I had in Chicago so that like the state couldn't track me or whatever, right? So he was opening all my mail to make sure like, I got everything I needed to get. Yeah. So he called me one day and he's like, Hey, you got a letter from DCFS. And I was like, what do they want? Right? So he opened it and it was a letter saying that it was basically an apology letter. So there was a lady who went to court against that, like charge that potential for neglect or potential for harm, or whatever it was. And she won in this state Supreme Court. And so they had to vacate all the charges for that specific potential for harm. Yeah. So my thing was vacated. And it was basically like, Oh, hey, sorry, we should have never done this. Yeah,

Scott Benner 30:27
we apologize for snatching your baby from you. Yeah.

Stephanie 30:30
Go yourself. Yeah. Basically,

Scott Benner 30:33
how long after that happened? Was the letter, like a year? Not even. Did you think about going back and trying to get the baby or No,

Stephanie 30:40
I did go back. I talked to a couple of lawyers. Basically, nobody wanted to take on the state. And I ended up figuring out what law office that lady had gone through. And they couldn't help me either, because I was like going after like, a specific child and not like a statutory issue. Yeah,

Scott Benner 31:03
they were able to help with the bigger picture, but not something specific. Right.

Stephanie 31:07
Right. So it was kind of a dead end. And that I mean, to this day that like, tears me apart. You know, I imagine

Scott Benner 31:16
instead of are you still harming yourself at this point when you're 21 years old? No,

Stephanie 31:21
no, that stopped when? When I really got out on my own and started just living life.

Scott Benner 31:28
Okay. You don't think about it. It doesn't occur to you? No, not anymore. I'm gonna say something strange. You're not bipolar?

Stephanie 31:35
No. I mean, I was diagnosed with bipolar at the time. But the therapist that I've been seeing says, I don't fit the criteria. Gotcha.

Scott Benner 31:45
By the way, that guess, is just because I've made this podcast for so long. Like I it's Monday. Let's go. Oh, I had a long weekend. You woke me right up? Don't worry. Oh, my gosh. So your second baby arrives? You're with the guy? Are you in a safe relationship? Or did you somehow pick your dad? Actually,

Stephanie 32:11
let me add to this story a little bit. That little stomach dropping, feeling. So when I hear

Scott Benner 32:19
like, hold on a second, I can hit you one more time and the God God.

Stephanie 32:23
So when I was still in the state where my first child was, my partner that I was with ended up going to prison. So I think that's why my mom showed up to help me with the papers. So I wouldn't have to be alone. He was gone. Like he was already in prison. So when I went to the new state, it was actually where his family was. And he was gone until my baby was about six months old. And then he got out. What was he in for? Theft, or burglary or something like that? Gotcha.

Scott Benner 33:01
And then he gets out. Does he come to be with you? Yes. Okay. And then you have another baby at some point. Yes. Okay. So are you living, what you would consider to be a fairly normal life between his release and the arrival of your next child, for example? Yeah,

Stephanie 33:19
more or less. He went back a couple other times, and I just never let him go, you know, oh, he missed it.

Scott Benner 33:28
Or he was really bad at being a criminal, which isn't actually

Stephanie 33:32
yes. You know. Funny,

Scott Benner 33:39
but yeah, sorry.

Stephanie 33:41
When I finally got like, arrested and charged and everything, he was so like, excited. He's like, you're finally gonna go down for whatever. And I was like, because I'm not bad at it like you. Okay.

Scott Benner 33:56
He's involved in theft, stuff like that. burglary. Yep. Okay. Yep. You're doing it too, but you're not getting caught. Correct. And he was happy you got arrested and we're going away because jealousy because I got caught. Yeah, he was actually jealous that you were better at being a criminal than he was. Yes. I love people. I'm gonna, I'm gonna make this podcast for the rest of my life just to hear these stories. Okay. What were you doing?

Stephanie 34:26
So, I mean, I was like, helping him he had kind of like a klepto issue. So I was kind of helping him steal stuff, but really what I ended up going to jail for and like, I lost my eligibility for Medicaid. When I got a job, right, okay. And I'm so scared. I was like, Oh, God, I'm gonna die can't afford insulin. And this is like that time when there was no cap on insulin and it was like 300 $400 And I was like, I can't live like this and I can't go rob a pharmacy. So what am I going to do? All right. So I ended up lying to the Medicaid office. I told him I wasn't working. I told them, like I had no income. And like, because of so prior to that I had changed my social security number, right? They changed my social security number. They were supposed to put my disability and my benefits and everything on the new number, but they didn't write. And it was my responsibility to tell them which I originally I was like, Hey, thank you guys messed up. But then they were like, Oh, it takes a minute. Don't worry about it. And I just never call them again, which that was not like, a mistake. I intentionally did not call them again, like, let's be clear about that, so

Scott Benner 35:45
that you could collect the money on both social security numbers. Right, right. So I

Stephanie 35:51
was working on one, and like, making money and whatever. And I was still getting Medicaid and my disability on the other number, right. At some point, I actually ended up telling myself, but at some point, I got caught. And they canceled my disability, they canceled my Medicaid, they canceled everything. And I was at that point I had known it was coming. Like I could just kind of tell that they were like on to me, you know,

Scott Benner 36:23
the jig is up. Yeah, basically, gotcha.

Stephanie 36:28
And it took about six months for them to like, really, like cut me off of everything. But at that time, I ended up going on to Obamacare. And I had a low deductible and everything was fine. But like that whole time I spent, like, I'm gonna run out of insulin and I'm gonna die. Like, yeah, I was scared. It's

Scott Benner 36:53
definitely your life, like at that point with two smaller children like, like when when two kids get up in the morning and they're like, Hey, we're gonna go to school now. Yeah, go go to school. Mommy's gonna go to work. And then you go to work in what go like shoplift? Or like, do you actually have a job? Like, how are you gonna show I'm trying to explain what your day to day is like, in that time. Okay,

Stephanie 37:12
so for a long time, before I got the new social security number, I was not working. I was on disability, right? I didn't actually do that the state that I was in foster care and did that for me. And I didn't know about it until I applied for like food stamps. And they were like, Oh, you have income? And I was like, What do you mean? And then then after that, the state ended up giving it to me instead of to themselves but like, that's a whole other issue. So, before I got the new number, I was on disability and I spent my days like, really just not doing anything. Like I didn't go to work. I didn't like go to school. I just did stuff at home, I guess.

Scott Benner 37:54
Do you like the kids off to school? And then you just hung out?

Stephanie 37:58
Yeah, basically. Gotcha. I like I'm super great at baking because that's pretty much all I did.

Scott Benner 38:07
So one thing I'm good I'm really good at baking. So what about klepto? Charlie? Was he out working or was he doing something?

Stephanie 38:13
Yeah, he was out working that was like his working was like he was addicted to it and after he stopped stealing he just put everything he had into his job. Okay,

Scott Benner 38:25
so stealing stealing stealing getting caught doing short stints finally decides I'm just going to get a job and do it right puts his effort into that was a good guy got up went to work every day.

Stephanie 38:34
Yeah, basically, we had separated after, like, four months after my daughter was born. So when When the police finally came knocking, I was in my own apartment, at that point.

Scott Benner 38:52
Separated right after your six year old was born.

Stephanie 38:55
Is that right? Yes. Okay. Yep. All right. Why did you separate? Um, he was a serial cheater. And I was always like, I never felt good enough. My whole life. You know, I never felt like anyone would love me like childhood trauma, whatever. So I like dealt with it and dealt with it and dealt with it. And then I'd like try and dish it back. But I sucked at being a cheater. So it just got to a point where I was like, I can't live like this. And I don't deserve this while

Scott Benner 39:25
he was cheating. You knew he was. Yeah, so he couldn't he wasn't a good thief. He wasn't a good cheater. Was he trying or did he know that you would take it?

Stephanie 39:34
Honestly, I don't know. Okay, I think at times he was trying to hide it but after a certain point of me like constantly taking him back you know, he got the picture.

Scott Benner 39:48
Okay, do you have more self confidence now?

Stephanie 39:52
Oh, little I mean, not a lot but I'm not gonna let someone sleep around on me. So I guess a little

Scott Benner 39:58
Have you tried like Talk therapy or anything like that? Yeah,

Stephanie 40:02
yeah, I've had a therapist for like 10 years. Does it help? In ways? Yeah. Like, there's some stuff I don't know how to fix. And I don't know if it will ever fix. I just have to kind of work around it, you know, gotcha.

Scott Benner 40:18
Okay. So you got you got a pinch for fraud, right? Yes, they didn't give you a chance to pay them back. They just locked you up, or you couldn't pay them back. I

Stephanie 40:27
couldn't pay them back. Originally, they were saying I owed like, 300,000 in medical.

Scott Benner 40:37
Jeez, okay.

Stephanie 40:41
hospital stays. This is the cost of insulin. This is the cost of all my pump supplies this everything right over the course of like three or four years. Okay.

Scott Benner 40:51
Sounds like they marked it up a little bit. Okay, I got that.

Stephanie 40:57
And my attorney and I, we got it down to like, 56.

Scott Benner 40:59
Right. But there's no world where you're coming up with that. So then you have to just like, lose losing your first child. Like, they're like, look, you can pay us or come go to jail. So yeah, what kind of like jail slash prison? Were you in? What was the level of security there kind of people were you with?

Stephanie 41:20
So my lawyer was like a public defender. But he was great. He argued with the judge for getting me for not letting me go to county because there were two incidents in my county jail where diabetics had died. So he fought really hard to keep me out of there. And it worked. So I ended up

Scott Benner 41:43
I'm sorry, I'm gonna, I'm gonna cut you off for one second. I apologize. Okay. Look, I'm not saying you didn't do the thing. But it's still it's a financial crime. Right? Like, if you're a white collar criminal, you don't? You don't again, so there's no consideration for the fact that you have two small children?

Stephanie 42:00
No, they go with the Father? Nope. No,

Scott Benner 42:05
I was gonna say he's not a good, they're not going to put him with him either. Right. So where did Where do your kids go?

Stephanie 42:10
My kids ended up going to a friend of mine. They were registered foster parents. So they were like, automatically going to be cleared. And they were so good to me. Like, throughout my whole process, they were really wonderful.

Scott Benner 42:28
So I'm glad that a friend stepped up for you. But yeah, isn't it funny that no one sees the cyclical nature of this, like you're, you're clearly in this position, because of your lack of love in an upbringing, the foster system and what that process does to you. And then they're gonna put your kids in foster care.

Stephanie 42:49
Actually, because I found someone to take them even though they were foster parents, we were able to keep my kids out of foster care, thank God.

Scott Benner 42:59
But still, they took the they took you away from your kids, right? Like it's, it's just restarting the problem again, like it is yeah. And so I don't know, like, at some point, like, you would think that the 50 Grand wouldn't I'm not excusing what you did. But I'm the think the 50 Grand wouldn't be as important is not creating to have you tenure. So you know what I mean? Like, yeah, and let's be clear, you love your kids, right? Absolutely. You're not hitting them every time you get upset? No, no. Okay, so they're in a better situation than you were in? Absolutely. You think they will grow up? Better than you did? I hope so. You're trying for that.

Stephanie 43:41
I am trying I I can't say because they, they've really been through it. Especially with me being gone. For as long as I was gone, you know? Yeah. How

Scott Benner 43:50
long were you going for?

Stephanie 43:51
But my hope is that they're better. Yeah.

Scott Benner 43:56
And trust me, if you keep trying, they will be but what how long were you gone for how long? They put you in jail for the 50? Grand? What's 50 grand in costume time? years, two years. Okay. So, like, a little over $2,000 A month basically is what your what your debt is worth to them.

Stephanie 44:16
Now, right? But there's no such thing as debtors jail, so I still have to pay it. Oh,

Scott Benner 44:22
wait, the second, you didn't trade the money for the time?

Stephanie 44:28
I couldn't. It's illegal to do that.

Scott Benner 44:31
So they took the two years. And they took the kids and then they let you back out and told you go find a way to give us this 50 Some $1,000. Yep. Where do you want a payment plan of like $200 a month or something like that?

Stephanie 44:46
Yep. Yep. And then take my taxes and any gains that I have until it's paid off?

Scott Benner 44:53
What What did it cost to lock you up for two years?

Stephanie 44:58
That is a great question. I try had to like figure it out while I was locked up and it ended up being like five or $6,000 a month.

Scott Benner 45:08
I love government. Yeah, I mean, listen, why not put you on house arrest? Like you only mean like, throw an ankle like make your life miserable. But let you stay with your kids. Right? The lock in yet for two years is to punish you. To keep you for Yeah, you would think there'd be a way to punish you that wouldn't cost the state $5,000 a month on the $2,000 a month they're trying to get back from you. So they spent almost three 698 3660 They spent $70,000 to one day get $50,000 back from you. Yep, yeah. Okay. Okay. I'm glad everybody's making sense. Also, do you think you're a criminal if you're not financially incentivized to be one? Yeah, I think so. You would have been one way or the other. Yeah, yeah. So if I said to you, I mean, good. Go ahead. So I was gonna say like, if I went back then and I said, Stephanie, listen, instead of this nickel and dime stuff you're doing with with the guy, and the fraud and the government, everything, here's a job. And this job will pay all of your bills, you have little money left over, you have a place to live all this stuff. Just go to work every day. You think you'd be like, Yeah, I'm just gonna steal stuff.

Stephanie 46:21
No, I don't think so. But my issue at that point was, so I had always been on the disability. And I didn't like No one sat there and was like, hey, this how you go get a job. Hey, this is how you, like, live like a normal person. And I just didn't know. You're

Scott Benner 46:38
basically 16 in your head your whole life?

Stephanie 46:42
Basically, yeah, yeah. And then when I got this new social security number, I was talking to him and I was like, hey, I can get a job now. Right? And he was like, yeah, if you want. I was like, Will you show me how? You know? Like, I just didn't know. Yeah,

Scott Benner 46:58
so you're being abused at 14. You've somehow spent two years getting yourself out of that physical harm. And then you get flopped into foster care. And what do they usually say? Like what a therapist say you kind of get froze, intellectually at the spot where you have the trauma, that kind of thing. Yeah. So you're basically 14 to 16 in your decision making skills, but you're standing around, you're 2324 25 years old.

Stephanie 47:26
Exactly. Yes. Can

Scott Benner 47:27
I ask a difficult question? Sure. Well, you don't have, by the way, I don't know that one of these questions hasn't been difficult. But when you don't have money, and you're stealing to make a living, how do you not put more effort into not being pregnant?

Stephanie 47:43
That is a great question. Yeah,

Scott Benner 47:45
I know. I mean, I'm very interested in the answer. Yes. I

Stephanie 47:49
spent pretty much the time between my oldest and my middle child I spent on an IUD. Right. So I was I was very committed to not having another child and then I, honestly, and I hope she never hears this, but I honestly had my daughter so that my husband would stay.

Scott Benner 48:14
Oh, you pop the IUD out and got and got pregnant on purpose. Yeah.

Stephanie 48:19
I mean, he knew he knew I had taken it out. He actually took it out for me. But like, my hope was that, like, if we had a more nuclear family that he would want to be with me more

Scott Benner 48:32
and not, you know, not cheat on you and be around and that kind of stuff. Right. And it's that once she was there, the pressure hit him and he bolted. Yeah,

Stephanie 48:41
I mean, technically, I left him but he was like, he had a job where they close at 10. And he was gone until one in the morning. Like he just didn't want to be with me. And I was so heartbroken. Because it didn't work. My plan didn't work. Yeah.

Scott Benner 48:57
When the baby didn't fix it. You were like, Okay, I'm gone. Yeah, basically. I'm gonna be crass for a second. And I apologize ahead of time. But when, when this is your life, right. And you're not doing much of anything else. You're just basically like, stealing. Cooking. Gang sleeping, right? Yeah, yeah. Okay. All right. So it's basically the life that is basically the life an 18 year old would have if they had somebody not watching them. Yeah, basically. Yeah. All right. I'm getting all this. Did he grew up in a similar way? No, no. He just had an affliction with the wanting to steal. Yeah, yeah. And being a serial cheater. Yes. Oh, God, I I'd love to talk to one of the women that cheated with him. Like how do you how do I talk you into being my other personal

Stephanie 49:50
them? I was awful. I've actually talked to a few of them. He told them how horrible I was and how I neglect him and I don't have sex with him and we were getting a divorce. And they

Scott Benner 50:04
think they're saving him. Yep. Are they girls with low self esteem too?

Stephanie 50:09
Yes. And a lot of them were like barely 18

Scott Benner 50:15
Oh, oh, so he was? Yeah, okay. Yeah. Okay. All right. Hold on a second. Just let me just, we just watched that over me for a second before I ask you how prison was? Oh my god, we all need a minute. We should put a break here. What if I just played music for a couple minutes? So we came back and did the rest of it. Oh my god. Alright. Alright. Alright, hold on. I'm okay. I'm okay. This didn't happen to me. And I feel like up like crazed by it. Alright, so you surrender yourself. And you. They give you time, I hope to get your kids set up and everything before you have to surrender yourself. Yep. Okay. And they don't put you in County because counties killed a couple of type ones. So where do you end up?

Stephanie 51:04
I actually had to self report to the prison itself. And that was in Texas. And I live like, almost at the top of the country. And I had to fly to Texas.

Scott Benner 51:20
There's a little Minnesota or something in your voice, right? Whiskey. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I can hear it. Okay. Yeah.

Stephanie 51:30
That's not resent that a little bit.

Scott Benner 51:32
Listen, that's the I liked that. That's the one thing you've been upset by sorry. Okay. told me that. But you didn't. That's where the guy's family was. You were originally in the Dakotas. Then you went there. And then you had to go to Texas for prison? Yes. Okay. Do you think people are like, Well, Scott really does listen while he's doing this? Because

Stephanie 51:51
yeah, I think so I

Scott Benner 51:53
have to tell you, it's a lot to keep in your head. Because I'm basically trying to absorb your entire life so that I can ask good questions about it. And I swear to you, my body temperature is higher right now. Like I'm thinking, I'm thinking like, current plush, it's upsetting. You don't I mean, so. Okay, so now you go to tax. I do want to ask, how hard is it to voluntarily give yourself up to be like, because you'd have to come get me. I'd be like, Look, I know, I'm calm. And I know I agree to it. But if you don't come get me, I ain't showing up there. It's like so like, how, how difficult is that?

Stephanie 52:25
Honestly, like, and this might sound crazy, but for me, it was just another thing. It was like, just another traumatic thing that was gonna happen to me. And I was just used to it. You know,

Scott Benner 52:38
here's another thing on another day and whatever. Yeah, yeah.

Stephanie 52:42
And I mean, don't get me wrong. I cried my face off for like a month. Like, I when I dropped my kids off at my friend's house. I cried the whole way back. Like, it was hard. But I couldn't have not done it. I was just used to it at that point, you know, right.

Scott Benner 53:01
Alright. Listen, I dropped my son off in Atlanta after college. And I like I thought I was gonna have a stroke while I was driving away. Yeah. And I was leaving him in an apartment where he had a job and I was going back to my home, and we could see each other whenever I wanted to. And I was still, you know, you didn't visit with your kids the whole time. You were in jail, right?

Stephanie 53:19
No, I couldn't they were too far away.

Scott Benner 53:22
Did anybody visit with you? No. Jeez. All right. Is it prison or jail? What should we be calling it? Prison prison? What was prison like?

Stephanie 53:33
So I did not know what to expect. I had never been in County I had never been on a 24 hour hold. This was like brand new to me. Right. And so when I first surrendered, so the prison was on a base, right? And I'd never been on a base before either. So everything was just really brand new. So they had to call someone from the prison to come and get me and I'm sitting there and I'm waiting. I don't know if I can walk outside. I don't know what I can do. No one tells you anything. This lady this really really angry woman came to get me and she had me take everything out of my pockets and put it in the garbage. And then she drove me to the prison and they put you in intake and they check you in and they actually they do an x ray which I was not expecting but so they do an x ray on you to see if you have like anything that you're trying to hide I guess. And then they put you in the prison clothes and then you have to see a doctor right and I was like Oh good. So I was on the pump. Before I went to turn myself in and about two weeks before I went to turn myself in I put myself back on shots, just in case like they wouldn't let me keep my pump right I had it with me but just in case I figured out my dosing and everything was my doctor and I had been on a pump at that point for like four years so it took a little bit but we got there we got all the doses that I needed everything. But one of the things that the lady wanted me to throw in the garbage was my insulin pens. And I said no. And that made her more angry. But so when I got there, I had to like turn it all over to one of the officers. And then I got to see a doctor. And I was like, Oh, good, that's gonna be fine. They're gonna know I'm diabetic, whatever, whatever. So when I told her, I was like, Hey, I'm type one diabetic. And she was like, okay, so you take pills, right? And I was like, No, ma'am. Type one. So I take insulin. She's like, Oh, well, how long? Have you been on insulin? And I was like, my whole life, right? Since I was three. And she, for some reason is still like, in her head. It's still type two. Yeah. And I'm, I'm like, picking that up from the question. She's asking me and I'm like, Oh, my God, I'm gonna die.

Scott Benner 55:48
Because that is what they told me. I came all the way to Texas. I could have just died at home, you know? Oh, okay. So do you talk her into believing you have type one? How does that go? Yes,

Stephanie 56:01
it took a minute. And I was like, I've been on insulin for 25 years, blah, blah, blah. And she was like, Okay, well, we're gonna put you on NPH. And I was like, Yeah, okay. Better than nothing, I guess. Thanks. But I told her, and I brought a letter from my doctor with me that I watched her throw in the garbage without reading. So they put me on mph. And then for the AR, they didn't put me on, like carb counting or anything. They put me strictly on a sliding scale. So I could only take are if my sugars were high. That was it.

Scott Benner 56:40
So you're back. You're back to being three years old again. Basically,

Stephanie 56:43
yeah. I was scared. I was scared. So I spent and I was only getting one shot of mph a day. Right? Even though it's a 12 hour insulin, which it says right on the packaging, 12 hours. So spending 12 hours super low, and 12 hours super high. And I was sick. I was very sick. It took me about a week and a half to go into DKA. And I had so in prison. They're called Sick calls. So if you want to see a doctor or provider or a nurse or anybody you have to go to sick call, right? So sick call starts at 6am. And it goes until 8am. And I had just gotten there. So I didn't have like an alarm clock. I didn't have anything. There had been no commissary yet, right. So I'm like asking my cell mates to make sure I'm up so I can go to sick call. And I'm in there every day. And I'm like, Listen, I am sick. There's a 12 hour insulin. There's 24 hours in a day basic math people come on. Yeah. And they did not care. They did not care. They kept sending me away. And I was up there every single day for like a week straight. And the doctor that I had which there are some people if I ever see them on the outside, we're going to fight. And that's one of them that

Scott Benner 58:08
doctors one of them. Got

Stephanie 58:10
Yeah, trash. Like he had an ankle bracelet on his ankle. He didn't want to be there either. He was probably doing community service to be there. And he was killing as many people as he possibly could as quickly as he possibly could. It was disgusting. You

Scott Benner 58:26
actually think he was a physician who got pinched doing something else? And this is how he was paying back? Yes. You know what that would surprise me until I told you that the cold wind episode that went up today partially deals with a husband and wife, endocrinology team who's selling pills out of their practice. Yeah,

Stephanie 58:43
that would not surprise me at all. Yeah. And she was like, he did not have an MD he was like some other kind of doctor I don't know. Like, but he he hated us. All the inmates and he made it very clear. Right. He was very sarcastic. He was very I'm better than you. But that didn't work on me because like, I'm a genius. Like officially, like I have the genius. Scoring. What's your IQ? One ad? Oh

Scott Benner 59:12
my god. Okay. All right. So you were you were able to keep up with what was going on there? For sure. Right?

Stephanie 59:18
Yep. So he like he's trying to treat me like I'm slow. And I'm actually treating him like he's slow, which pisses him off more and I probably should have like dialed it back a little bit, but I was pissed. Wow. And so basically, he, like there was so much horrible things he did like he took an epileptic girl off her seizure medication because he said it was she was using it to get high and she wasn't actually epileptic. Then he put her on a top bunk like you can order people onto a top bunk. So she had a seizure on the top bunk fell off and broke her arm, right? And he could have avoided all of that. And he did it on purpose.

Scott Benner 59:55
That's crazy. So that's now what you're dealing with. It's not it's not so much like people would want to believe like, Oh, it's this beautiful place where they're trying to take care of people. It's just harder because they're right. It's it's your your, every time you find yourself in a new situation, the levels of people around you kind of match to the situation to some degree or another. Yes, yeah,

Stephanie 1:00:17
very true. Is there a point I told them I was diabetic, right? And he, he made the same assumption that I was type two, he asked what pills I was on. I said, No, I've been type one since I was three years old. I don't take pills. I can't take pills. They won't do anything for me. And then he asked what my diet is like, and I just kind of looked at him. And I was like, Well, I'm in prison. So you kind of know, don't you, right? And then he was like, Well, if you eat better, your sugars will be better. And you might even not need to take insulin. And I was like, What is wrong with you? Like eat better prison food? Or like you're gonna magically cure my diabetes? Which one? Is it? Yeah, there's

Scott Benner 1:00:57
a lot of asks in there that are not actually rooted in any reality. Like, I'm not in charge, right? I'm eating I eat when I'm given. And that's not how type one diabetes works.

Stephanie 1:01:07
So right, yeah. So then. So I ended up I got to order a commissary. After I had been there for like four or five days, right. And luckily enough, one of my friends from the town I was in, had sent me $200 to just get what I needed to get, right. So I ordered three orange juices off of commissary in case I had a low blood sugar, right? So then when I'm in sick call, and this doctor is looking at my commissary list, he sees these orange juices. And he's like, Well, you definitely can't order that on commissary. And he put me on like some sort of restriction, some commissary restriction where I could not order food on commissary,

Scott Benner 1:01:53
really, so you couldn't even get most supplies. No.

Stephanie 1:01:57
And I ended up I'd had to pay my cellmates to order stuff for me, which is like common practice. There's, there's, like monetary value on things in prison. And that's just how things operate. But the fact that like, he had no concept of low blood sugar, like at all right, blew my mind. Like, how many people are doing Power job? Yeah, like,

Scott Benner 1:02:22
even the idea that by the way, if he blocked you from getting the orange juice that you could just get it in two seconds. But he wasn't he was just making it more difficult and expensive. He wasn't stopping you from getting the orange juice. Right. Yeah. Gotcha. All right. So God, okay, this is the like the first week, right? Yes, yeah, go ahead.

Stephanie 1:02:41
So, but I had not figured out like the money exchange thing yet. Like, I figured that out later. But at the time, I was like, they really are going to kill me. Like they're actually going to kill me. I'm taking one shot of mph a day, I'm only taking are if my blood sugars are high, which in the second half of the day, is the whole thing time?

Scott Benner 1:03:02
Are they testing you how frequently you're being tested? Three

Stephanie 1:03:06
times a day before meals. So basically, it's called insulin line. Yeah. So you go to the medication window, and there's like 400 women, and maybe two of them are type one, right? Yeah. So everyone goes to insulin line to get their shots or their pills. Okay. And you have to wait in the line, too. And then you get this like thing that says you went to insulin line, and then you get to go to the chow hall. So you can't go to chow hall until you go to insulin law and like, you can't skip it. Gotcha.

Scott Benner 1:03:41
I just interviewed somebody anonymously who works in assisted living for elderly people. And then a place where people who committed crimes, pretty serious crimes, but you know, they were they were able to plead like, not guilty by reason of insanity, where those people end up and your care, and that is very similar. Yeah, so it's the institutional care, like, I guess it must be, it must be what they do. So they're not going to like, I kinda understand no one's going to sit around with you and say, look, and I mean, where are they going to get somebody to like, really figure out your diabetes, but if you knew how to do it, then why not just put you in the insulin line and then let you take what you need it?

Stephanie 1:04:27
Yeah, well, then because people would abuse it or kill themselves or whatever, and they

Scott Benner 1:04:31
wouldn't be able to see Yeah, I see. So there's always going to be a bigger problem that stops someone from actually getting decent care.

Stephanie 1:04:37
Right? Yeah. Okay, gets worse, I promise keep going. So about a week and a half and I start to get DKA symptoms. I'm doing my best. I'm limiting what I eat, but I have to account for being overdosed on mph once a day, right. So I'm dealing the best I can and I end up so in prisons. Something I didn't know that no one ever like, mentioned before, in all, like prison movies or talking to my ex husband, like I didn't know anything about it is it's called count. Okay? It's where they shut down the entire prison and everyone has to get counted. And they do this four or five times a day. Okay? So during count, you cannot be in the bathroom, you cannot be in the shower. You cannot be doing anything except standing next to your bunk, right? First they call count, they'll say count time count time rack up, right? So I hear them calling count. And I'm in the bathroom throwing up because I'm in DKA, right. And I couldn't rack up. I couldn't go. Like I could barely stand up. I was so weak. Yeah. And I was like, I'm really gonna die in here. And I've said this to myself, like 50 times a day for the last week and a half, right? But so I walk out because I don't want to get locked up. In prison. You're like, oh, what can they do? So I'm going to jail. But yes, there's like a prison inside the prison inside the prison. Yeah. So I didn't want to get locked up. And so I come out of the bathroom, and I collapsed, like right in front of bathroom. So I had to stop the count for the entire prison to roll me into the medical portion of the prison. And they like, ended up giving me insulin because my sugar was high and giving me ice chips and being like, you're fine. And I was like, you I'm gonna die. So they did the Count with me on the medical side. And then I ended up having to go back. And in the morning, I went to sit call again to this trash doctor who hated me. And I went in, and I have a little throw up, cup thing in front of me. And I'm throwing up, and I'm looking at him when he comes in. And I'm like, Listen, I'm in DK, like, right now. And he looks at me, and he's just nasty. Oh, I hate him. And he's like, Well, there's no way you're in DKA because you're not sweating. Okay. And I was like, I had called my ex husband. At that time, like before, I went to sit call, and I was like, Hey, I'm dying. Like, I don't know what you can do. But I need you to know, like, I'm in DKA and need help something. He was he was like, trying to call my doctor on the outside to get them to contact the prison or just letting somebody know that somebody out there gave a talk about me, you know, I told the doctor when he said that about the sweating. I was like, listen, I already called my people and they told my doctor out there that you are killing me personally. And someone's going to come for you. And it was like an empty threat. But I didn't really give because I was dying. He like we went back and forth. I threw up on him kind of on purpose. And then I told him like, Oh, if you don't believe me, if you think I'm lying, just check my anion gap then. And he was like, Oh, she knows what she's talking about. So he sent me down to get a blood draw. And while the labs were coming back, I was like laying on one of the little stretcher things now screaming I was in so much pain. I couldn't stop screaming. My throat was dry. So my scream sounded like sickly. And I could hear like the other inmates in the hallway talking about how freaked out they were. And I was like, I remember like, passing out and I was like, This is it like, Dear God, tell my kids, I love them. I don't want this. And then the next thing I knew I was in the back of an ambulance. And I ended up going to the local hospital there. Emergent emergency room, hospital, whatever. And they had me like chained to the hospital bed. And like, there were six or seven nurses and doctors that came in to like start working on me. And I was like, it was like relief. I was so happy to see that I was not in there anymore. Yeah. And then I spent like six days in the actual hospital. Now remember, I've only been there for two weeks. So like, every one of the prisoners like, Oh, we've done something's wrong. We need to like cover this up real quick. But while this was happening, my ex husband had contacted my outside doctor here. And my outside doctor had sent like my medication list that I couldn't take NPH I couldn't take our I was only supposed to be on Lantis and human log and here were my little chart thingies and like he sent it all over and he's, I guess I never saw it but I asked him about it later he sent like a very strongly worded Like letter that was like, she's been under my care for the last 10 years, and she's had nothing but wonderful blood sugars and perfect a onesie. So I'm gonna know if you did something wrong, basically. Yeah. Which I was so grateful for that.

Scott Benner 1:10:15
Did that kind of write things? Did they put you on a different treatment course after that? Or are you still fighting,

Stephanie 1:10:21
there were two different things that happened that kind of made them get it together. One of them was that letter, and the other was that the Fort Worth hospital refused to send me back to the prison until they got the insulin I needed. Because

Scott Benner 1:10:36
they knew you're just going to end up back there. Right NBK. Again, your doctor at home and the doctors, the hospital kind of get to you their efforts keep you from going back until the prison's ready to take care of you. Yes.

Stephanie 1:10:50
And I guess because of this situation, the doctor that I hated that hated me like, some he must have gotten in trouble or something, because like, he would never see me again, he would always have like a nurse or a practitioner, see me instead of him. And he would like sign off on whatever they said.

Scott Benner 1:11:08
And was that better for you?

Stephanie 1:11:12
It was better. And then like, some other stuff happened, and I ended up, I ended up getting moved from the general population to the medical like floor, like the inpatient floor. And then once I was there, he tried like, taking over my care again, because like, so what happened is I had like this really bad low, because my like the chart, the dosing chart, so a long time ago, it would basically be if you're 100 to 125, you take zero units, right? And if you're 125 to 50, you take two units or whatever, right? So on that chart, they would always like, give me the insulin I needed for the high end, but I'd be on the low end, so I'd end up low, basically, I don't know if that makes sense. Yeah. God, it's just,

Scott Benner 1:12:11
I mean, I and I believe every word you're saying, and I have no reason to think that it would be any better for some reason, but it's still shocking. You know what I mean? Like, just Yeah. Did you just like, come up with a, I don't know, like a balance at some point that worked, or was the entire two years of struggle.

Stephanie 1:12:30
The entire two years was a struggle, and I had like, compliance issues. So like, people told me to do stuff, and I would just purposely not do it, because I was mad at the world or whatever. So I ended up in solitary, like, a lot, right. And I fought with officers and I fought with inmates, and I just, I was just mad, you know. So in solitary, it was like, the care was better, like medically, but being in solitary for so long. It like really? With me? You know,

Scott Benner 1:13:08
PMPM just like literally by yourself. So then you get kind of like, did you go back to hurting yourself?

Stephanie 1:13:14
In ways? Yeah. But not like, I mean, you couldn't cut yourself like you didn't have an option. But yeah, in ways.

Scott Benner 1:13:22
What about the rest of the prison experience was I mean, was the rest of it good. The medical part? I don't mean by the way, I didn't mean good, but there was like the rest of it more like you expected. Aside from the medical aspects of it, or was there Harz

Stephanie 1:13:37
there were a lot of things that like, just didn't add up, right. So you see prison movies on TV, and you're like, Oh, well, nobody snitches because then they end up murdered. That does not happen. Not in the ones I was in anyway. Like, everybody tells everybody's business to everybody. Right? Officers included.

Scott Benner 1:13:57
Yeah, it's the only thing to do probably just the probably Yeah, the

Stephanie 1:14:02
money thing was pretty on point. So either you could go into debt, and then like, buy someone whatever they wanted on commissary as a way to pay the debt. Or some people treated like postage stamps as money. Because you could write to someone or just because you could like cash them out when you get out.

Scott Benner 1:14:24
Oh, really? Oh, so I'm saving money. 50 cents at a time on my postage stamps. Because when I get out I'm gonna be postage stamp bridge. Yeah, I

Stephanie 1:14:32
guess I mean, when I got out, I tried to take them to the post office, but they wouldn't buy him but my grocery store would. It was weird.

Scott Benner 1:14:40
How much how much did you make selling your postage stamps at the at the grocery store? Like 80 bucks. You spent two years on that? Yep, yeah. Yeah. If I could put you in a time machine and take you back to the first time you stole something from somebody. Do you think you would? With all this knowledge you have you think you would do it again? Yeah,

Stephanie 1:15:00
absolutely not, not a chance.

Scott Benner 1:15:04
It's crazy. So that's the thing we were counting on your parents to instill in you during those years when they weren't doing

Stephanie 1:15:10
that. Yeah, it's pretty much federally. Yeah. Yeah, basically. Oh, and then COVID Oh, God,

Scott Benner 1:15:18
you were in prison during COVID. Yes. Go ahead, keep going. Okay.

Stephanie 1:15:26
So COVID started happening, right. And we got put on lockdown. And I was not on the medical unit yet. I was still in general population. And girls were like, no one was allowed to go to work. The only people that were allowed to go to work were the kitchen workers. And the commissary workers. Right. But one of my cellmates was commissary worker, and she would come back and she would bring back cleaner, right? I don't know where she got it. None of my business, but she'd bring back cleaner. And we, we would scrub everything. We were scared, right? And then the, the George Floyd thing happened. And we were all watching that on TV, because that kind of happened at the same time. And that put like, a very serious like, issue in the prisons. So we were not allowed out of ourselves at all for like three months, right? Yeah, because of George Floyd, because of George Floyd and COVID.

Scott Benner 1:16:25
Okay, so you guys drop in everything because you think COVID is coming for you're crawling up the walls, and you take you take care of that. And then the racial problem pops up, and then they keep you locked up until that dies down.

Stephanie 1:16:38
Right, gotcha. And like some of the things I never got COVID until I got out, which I thought was just wild. But so everyone that ended up getting COVID They had to go to this like isolation unit. Right? And like the stories they would come back telling just broke my heart, right? So some of the girls in there, they were like, they were sick, they couldn't get up, they like couldn't go to the bathroom. They were just like laying there, they couldn't move, right. And instead of like, getting them actual medical care, they would just like put them in a room by themselves. And then they'd like open the little hatch and like, kick their food in or like throw it on the floor. And like, it was King terrible. And I think officially we had like six COVID deaths. But that was a lie. Do you think there are more? It depends, because how many people died of COVID. And how many people died of like lack of medical care. So there was a lady in there. My name is Martha and she died for lack of medical care. Right. She was my cellmate. And she she had like a, like a hernia. And she had been complaining about it for like two years and they finally got sick of hearing her complain about it. So they sent her out to get a surgery. But the surgery went bad and she literally died. leaning over her toilet which coming out of her mouth back in her cell. Yes. Jesus, what did she had just went like to the nurse's station to be like, hey, I need help. And they sent her back to her room to die. Wow.

Scott Benner 1:18:21
I mean, I don't. Jesus. I mean, what kind of medical care you're getting? You don't I mean, at that point, right? It's not right. So the same thing. Awful. That's crazy. So you feel just generally lucky to be out of there alive. Yes,

Stephanie 1:18:35
absolutely. I am amazed that I made it. Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:18:41
What about just like camaraderie in there? Was there any was there any, like human kindness between soulmates or anything like that?

Stephanie 1:18:49
It's appended like people had friends. Just as a side note here. Yeah, everyone in prison is gay. Oh, okay. I don't care what anyone wants to say everyone in prison is gay.

Scott Benner 1:19:02
So at some point, you look for comfort, you're like, I'm not gay, but I'm gonna be while I'm here.

Stephanie 1:19:08
Right. And I didn't do that. Because I was like, I had, like, just found religion. And I was like, really strongly standing on that. But like, there was a girl. I was like, just talking to her, like randomly and I was like, Wow, your hair is really long. That's really pretty. And this king lady comes out of nowhere, like, King appears behind her and she's like, are you talking to my girlfriend? I was like, No, bye. Sorry.

Scott Benner 1:19:36
There's more stories you're saying.

Stephanie 1:19:41
Gotcha. So with that a lot of people would like get in there, like gay relationships, whether they were doing on the outside or not. I don't know. Basically, the ones of us that weren't being gay, all kind of like, ended up in the same spot. Anyway, so we were like, being Friends and like comrades and whatever. But mostly everyone had a girlfriend. I ended up making this friend and she was, man, she was awesome. She, like, always bought me food. She like that first time when I was going into DKA in the bathroom, she was like holding my hair up and like screaming at the officers to come help me like she was she was awesome. Whole

Scott Benner 1:20:26
thanks. I mean, the whole I mean, that's great that you found somebody but the entire, there's nothing positive. I was gonna ask this one question. So kind of trying to take yourself out of yourself for a second Forget it. It's your life, you're talking about the entire process of being imprisoned and now not being in prison? Did it do what society meant for it to do? Like, are you going to be a better citizen and not defraud the government again? Like, was it that much of a deterrent? Or do you think there was like, was there another way to deter you than to have put you through? This is what I'm asking. Honestly,

Stephanie 1:20:58
it did its job. Because like, I'm too scared. Now.

Scott Benner 1:21:07
You just would never do that. Again.

Stephanie 1:21:08
I don't know if there was another way. I'm sure there was. I just could not tell you what it was. Because

Scott Benner 1:21:14
I'm going to tell you like, I know, for me, from a very young age, I've made all of my decisions based on not wanting to ever be in prison. I swear to you, like I thought like what keeps me uninvolved with the police? What keeps me on what keeps me on involved with lawyers, but you don't mean like, I don't want to be in that world. And so I'm not saying that I woke up one day, and I was like, Oh, I'd like to murder a hobo. But I'm not going to because I don't want to go to prison. Like I didn't have this. You know what I mean? Like, I didn't have those general thoughts. But yeah, but I, I will like, if anything I'm doing. I'm like, I don't want to get in trouble. Like, I don't want that problem. You didn't have that? Because I mean, for reasons we've already obviously discussed. When you couldn't find them. In your adult years, you weren't surrounded by people who were going to help you find them. You've more or less been stuck in high school arguments of one kind or another for most of your life, even in prison when it's like, hey, get away from my girlfriend. Yeah. Yeah. This is a group of people who have for one reason or another, not grown up or not grown up. Well.

Stephanie 1:22:16
Yeah. Okay. That's 100% True. Okay.

Scott Benner 1:22:21
I take, I take all those people in that. I'm so sorry. Good. That's

Stephanie 1:22:26
okay. On the other side of it, there were a lot of people in there that like, their whole goal, when they got out was to go commit more crimes. Yeah. But there were also people that were like never paying again, ever. So

Scott Benner 1:22:40
there's, they're bad people, right? And they're in there. And they're bad people who are not making mistakes and put them in prison. There's good people, and there's good people making mistakes to put themselves in prison. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Jeez. All right. Well, you're not getting until you don't have any other options, then. Then let's go. I gotcha. All right. Well, do you have anything else you want to tell me? Or can I just go jump out the window behind me?

Stephanie 1:23:08
I think what I would say more than anything, is I really, really, really want there to be more transparency. Because like, like I was saying before, one of my soulmates died, like for my cellmates died, like, one after the other, you know, in two

Scott Benner 1:23:30
years for people who were just in your cell passed away. Yeah. Or you didn't kill him. So what happened? No,

Stephanie 1:23:37
no, I didn't ask to just clarify. No. One was Martha, who, like something was wrong with her intestines. One lady, they said she died of COVID. But she had cancer. And the two together like killed her. Okay. One of them. I don't know what killed her. She just left one day and did not come back. And then the last girl, she had gotten into a fight, and then she ended up on the medical wing, because her fight was so bad. And then she had like bleeding inside of her brain. And she was never treated for it. And she died.

Scott Benner 1:24:22
She got into a fight and she died from a head injury. Yes, gotcha. But it

Stephanie 1:24:28
was something again, everything was something that could have been prevented. Had someone like, given any type of at all.

Scott Benner 1:24:37
And do you think is there any been ever been a time in your life where you saw the other side of it like that? Have you ever looked and thought, you know, if I was the guard, I, I wouldn't do that. Like it's just a paint like it's constantly it never stops happy. People get into a fight and they get a head injury and then they want to get the gig that kind of thing. Like, do you see their side of it, or? No,

Stephanie 1:24:57
I can't because like it tried at the time, like, I spent, like months in solitary, just like watching these officers be being terrible. And I couldn't imagine being an officer and either letting it happen or doing it. I could not imagine looking at someone in pain and being like, yeah, go yourself. Yeah, you know, I could not agree. That's not like in me as a person. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:25:25
I'm trying to decide how you mess up a hernia operation so bad that it's the time of someone's death. Their own feces is coming out of their mouth. That's, that's pretty tough. You know what I mean? Yeah, you gotta mess up pretty good there.

Stephanie 1:25:37
And then like, anyone that speaks up, yeah, anyone that says anything about the prison, like, while you're inside, if you talk to a reporter, you get put in solitary, if you like, are trying to talk to your family about what's happening. They cut your phone calls. Like, why? Why is it like that? If you're doing everything you're supposed to do? Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:25:57
no, well, that's pretty obvious. So yeah, well, I'd like to say this to 70. And be real sincere with you for a second. Okay, I want to say thank you, you are easily the sixth or seventh person who has told me that they were going to come on the show and tell me about being imprisoned with type one diabetes. And you're the first one that follows through. So thank you. I've been trying to do this for years. Yeah,

Stephanie 1:26:21
I know, you reached out to me when I first got out. And I just I was not ready. No,

Scott Benner 1:26:25
it's fine. Most of the time, though, it's because like, either there's still legal things going on, or I imagine it's very difficult. Or maybe, maybe you got to get back to boosting cars. I don't know. But like, you know, like, it's, it's, um, I appreciate that you spent so much time because you reached out to me. And you were like, hey, I can come on now. And I gotta be honest, I was like, Who is this even if it had been that it had been that long, you know? And I really want to thank you because it's a it's a, an important thing to talk about. I yeah, I really, I've just I genuinely appreciate you taking the time. So let's just spend a couple of seconds now. You're doing well, your kids are okay.

Stephanie 1:27:03
Yes, we are doing well. My kids are okay. And we're making it work and

Scott Benner 1:27:09
you met a guy who doesn't cheat on you. And you've had another baby, right? I don't

Stephanie 1:27:13
want to talk about that.

Scott Benner 1:27:17
She's not cheating on you. Or you have a new baby.

Stephanie 1:27:19
I do have a new baby. He is beautiful.

Scott Benner 1:27:24
Are you married at the moment? No, I'm not. No. Are you with the baby's father? No, I'm not. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. All right, definitely. Listen, what are you doing for work? Okay. It's okay. It's okay.

Stephanie 1:27:37
Like, when I got out of prison, I was very vulnerable. I was like, so scared. I lost all my, my ex husband went and had a baby with some other lady. And that was done. And it was like, it was really hard time. Right. And then during this time, because I was so vulnerable, I kind of just latched on to the first thing that threw itself at me. Yeah. And it was like, I've never been in a violent relationship before this. But I was in a very, very violent relationship. And I am out of that, and we are me and my three kids, and we are okay. Like, I actually have some time to breathe and heal and be okay. And that's really why I reached out to you. I was like, I need to talk about this. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:28:22
I'm sorry. That happened. I'm glad you're away from it.

Stephanie 1:28:24
Thank you. Yeah, of course.

Scott Benner 1:28:25
Are you working? Or how are you managing the rest of everything.

Stephanie 1:28:28
I was working like three weeks ago, and I applied to be at a hospital to be like a patient care tech at a hospital. And I'm having some trouble because the state needs to like send my information to the FBI and I have an FBI numbers. I know it's gonna take a while. But hopefully, when that comes back, they'll clear me to work.

Scott Benner 1:28:57
I see. They gotta get you cleared and then you'll be able to take that job. Oh, that's great. Oh, I wish you a lot of luck with that. It'd be nice for you to help people to after all you've seen happen to yourself, and to other people. You'll be I imagine very compassionate in that position. Yes. Yep. Okay. All right. Savvy. I can't thank you enough for doing this. Did we miss anything that we should have talked about? I don't think so. Okay. Do you ever make toilet wine?

Stephanie 1:29:23
No good. Good for you.

Scott Benner 1:29:25
It's definitely listen through all this. You weren't a drinking or drug person. Huh?

Stephanie 1:29:29
No, I wasn't that actually amazes some people amazes

Scott Benner 1:29:34
me. But yeah. Did you ever think like I need an escape, or you didn't need the escape? I

Stephanie 1:29:42
didn't really need it. And I was like, so for me it was always like I'm I've been in fight or flight mode for like 15 years. Right. So in that thinking, I don't want to be out of my mind. I don't want to miss something. Should I need to move immediately. You know, yeah,

Scott Benner 1:30:00
I hear what you're saying. I mean, I think there's part of me that believes that you grew up so like, in such a tough way that this terrible stuff. Isn't I mean, it pushed you to cutting at one point. But that was a long time ago. And you stopped it pretty quickly, like in so yeah, yeah, I think you, you might just be ready to fight a war. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Like, you're like, you're one of those peoples. Like, I got discharged. I did my sin. I'm gonna go back and do it again. Like, you might, you might be like, be careful that by the way, that you're not always looking for problems, because you're good to deal, right. Yeah, I have thought of that. I have. Yeah, you got to make sure that you're like you're not one of those people who's more comfortable when everything's upside down. Right. Yeah. So find a way to be happy with boring. You know what I mean? All right. Absolutely. Well, listen, if you can stop your children from being on the path that you were put on, I would call I would call your life a really great use of your time. You know what I mean? Thank you. Yeah, yeah. Is that how you think of it? Do you think like, I have to raise these kids in a way that isn't going to put them in the position I was in?

Stephanie 1:31:06
I do actually I'm like, everything I do is constantly like, how is this gonna affect them? How are they going to take this? How is this going to go when they're 30? And I think because of that I'm doing really well.

Scott Benner 1:31:20
Good for you. All right. Well, congratulations on I don't know somehow, like being here to be able to do this. And I hope being honest. I hope this conversation was was helpful for you. Yes. Great. Great. Hold on one second for me.

A huge thanks to touched by type one for sponsoring this episode of The Juicebox Podcast. Check them out on their website touched by type one.org or on Facebook and Instagram. You can use the same continuous glucose monitor that Arden uses. All you have to do is go to dexcom.com/juicebox and get started today. That's right. The Dexcom g7 is sponsoring this episode of The Juicebox Podcast. Jaylen is an incredible example of what so many experience living with diabetes, you show up for yourself and others every day, never letting diabetes define you. And that is what the Medtronic champion community is all about. Each of us is strong, and together, we're even stronger. To hear more stories from the Medtronic champion community or to share your own story visit Medtronic diabetes.com/juice box and look out online for the hashtag Medtronic champion. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoy my full conversation with Jalen coming up in just a moment. If you're living with type one diabetes, the afterdark collection from the Juicebox Podcast is the only place to hear the stories that no one else talks about. From drugs to depression, self harm, trauma, addiction, and so much more. Go to juicebox podcast.com up in the menu and click on after dark. There you'll see a full list of all of the after dark episodes. Thanks for hanging out until the end. Now you're going to hear my entire conversation with Jalen don't forget Medtronic diabetes.com/juice box or the hashtag Medtronic champion on your favorite social media platform.

Speaker 1 1:33:24
My name is Jalen Mayfield. I am 29 years old. I live in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where I am originally from Waynesboro, Mississippi. So I've kind of traveled all over. I've just landed here in the Midwest and haven't left since

Scott Benner 1:33:39
ice. How old were you when you were diagnosed with type one diabetes?

Speaker 1 1:33:41
I was 14 years old when I was diagnosed with type one diabetes

Scott Benner 1:33:46
15 years ago. Wow. Yes. Okay. 14 years old. What are you like? Do you remember what grade you were in?

Speaker 1 1:33:51
I actually do because we we have like an eighth grade promotion. So I had just had a great promotion. So I was going straight into high school. So it was a summer heading into high school

Scott Benner 1:34:00
was that particularly difficult going into high school with this new thing?

Speaker 1 1:34:03
I it was unimaginable. You know, I missed my entire summer. So I went to I was going to a brand new school with, you know, our community, we brought three different schools together. So I was around a bunch of new people that I had not been going to school with. So it was hard trying to balance that while also explaining to people what type one diabetes was,

Scott Benner 1:34:24
did you even know or were you just learning at the same time? I

Speaker 1 1:34:27
honestly was learning at the same time. My hometown did not have an endocrinologist. So I was traveling almost over an hour to the nearest you know, pediatrician like endocrinologist for children. So you know, I outside of that I didn't have any type of support in my hometown.

Scott Benner 1:34:45
Was there any expectation of diabetes is somebody else in your family have type one? No, I

Speaker 1 1:34:49
was the first one to have type one of my family. And do you have children now?

Scott Benner 1:34:53
I do not know. Do you think you will one day, still

Speaker 1 1:34:56
thinking about it? But right now I've just been traveling by Sit on my career and myself. So what do you do? What's your career? Yeah, so I am a marketing leasing specialist for a student housing company. So we oversee about 90 properties throughout the US. So I've been working for them

Scott Benner 1:35:11
for about eight years now. And you get to travel a lot in that job.

Speaker 1 1:35:15
Yes, I experience a lot of travel, it's fine, but also difficult, especially with all your type one diabetes supplies, and all your electronics. So it's a bit of a hassle sometimes. What

Scott Benner 1:35:26
do you find that you absolutely need with you while you're traveling? diabetes wise,

Speaker 1 1:35:30
I have learned my biggest thing I need is some type of glucose. I have experienced loads, whether that's on a flight traveling, walking through the airport, and I used to always experience just being nervous to ask for some type of snack or anything. So I just felt, I felt like I needed to always have something on me. And that has made it my travel a lot easier.

Scott Benner 1:35:52
So growing up in the small town, what was your initial challenge during diagnosis? And what other challenges did you find along the way?

Speaker 1 1:36:02
Yeah, I think the initial one, I felt isolated, I had no one to talk to that it was experiencing what I was going through, you know, they were people would say, Oh, I know, this is like hard for you. But I was like, you really don't like I, I just felt lonely. I didn't know you know, people were watching everything I did. It was like, You can't eat this, you can't eat that. I felt like all of my childhood had been, you know, I don't even remember what it was like for life before diabetes at this point, because I felt like that's the only thing I could focus on was trying to do a life with type one diabetes, when

Scott Benner 1:36:37
you found yourself misunderstood? Did you try to explain to people or did you find it easier just to stay private?

Speaker 1 1:36:44
I honestly I just held back I didn't really like talking about it was just, it felt like it was just an repeating record where I was saying things and people weren't understanding it. And I also was still in the process of learning it. So I just, you know, kept it to myself didn't really talk about it when I absolutely had to,

Scott Benner 1:37:01
did you eventually find people in real life that you could confide in.

Speaker 1 1:37:05
I think I never really got the experience until after getting to college. And then once I graduated college, and moving to an even bigger town, that's what I finally found that was people where I was like, Okay, there's a lot of other people that have type one diabetes. And you know, there's a community out there, which I had never experienced before, is

Scott Benner 1:37:27
college where you met somebody with diabetes for the first time, or just where you met more people with different ways of thinking.

Speaker 1 1:37:33
So I met my first person with diabetes, actually, my freshman year of high school, there was only one other person. And he had had it since he was a kid like young once this was like, maybe born, or like, right after that timeframe. So that was the only other person I knew until I got to college. And I started meeting other people, I was a member of the band, and I was an RA. So I was like, Okay, there's, you know, there's a small handful of people also at my university. But then, once I moved to, I moved to St. Louis. And a lot of my friends I met were like med students, and they were young professionals. And that's where I started really getting involved with one of my really close friends to this day. He was also type one diabetic. And I was like, that's who introduced me to all these different types of communities and technologies, and which is really what helped jumpstart my learning more in depth with type one diabetes,

Scott Benner 1:38:24
see think? I mean, there was that one person in high school, but you were young? Do you really think you were ready to build a relationship and around diabetes? Or did you even know the reason why that would be important at the time?

Speaker 1 1:38:36
I didn't, uh, you know, I honestly didn't think about it. I just was like, Oh, there's another person in my class that's kind of going through the same thing as I am. But they've also had it a lot longer than I have. So they kind of got it down. They don't really talk about it. And I was like, Well, I don't really have much to, like, connect with them. So sorry, I connect with them all. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:38:56
no. So now once your world expands as far as different people, different backgrounds, different places in college, you see the need to connect in real life, but there's still only a few people, but there's still value in that. Right? Correct. What do you think that value was at the time?

Speaker 1 1:39:11
I think it was just what making me feel like I was just a normal person. I just wanted that. And I just, I needed to know that. Like, you know, there was other people out there with type one diabetes experiencing the same type of, you know, thoughts that I was having.

Scott Benner 1:39:27
When were you first introduced to the Medtronic champions community? Yeah.

Speaker 1 1:39:31
So about two years ago, I was, you know, becoming more I was looking around and I noticed stumbled upon the Medtronic community and I was like, this is something I really really I kind of need, you know, I said I, all throughout these years, I was, you know, afraid to show my pump. You couldn't I would wear long sleeves. Like I didn't want people to see my CGM because I didn't want people to ask me questions. And you know, I just felt so uncomfortable. And then I noticed seeing these people really, in the Medtronic community, just They embraced it, you can see and they weren't afraid to show it. And that was something I was really looking forward to.

Scott Benner 1:40:06
How is it knowing that your diabetes technology is such an important part of your health and your care? And having to hide it? What did it feel like to have to hide that diabetes technology? And how did it feel to be able to kind of let it go,

Speaker 1 1:40:19
I will refuse to go anywhere, like, Hey, I would run to the bathroom, I just didn't want to do it in public, because I felt like people were watching me. And that was just one of the hardest things I was trying to overcome. You know, I was fresh out of college, going into the professional world. So you know, going out on work events and things like that. I just, I just didn't think I just didn't think to have it out. Because I was so afraid. But then, once I did start, you know, embracing it and showing it that's when the curiosity came. And it was actually genuine questions and people wanting to know more about the equipment that I'm on, and how does this work? And what does this mean? And things like that, which made it kind of inspired me? Because I was like, Okay, people actually do want to understand what I'm experiencing with type one diabetes.

Scott Benner 1:41:04
What did you experience when, when the internet came into play? And now suddenly as easy as a hashtag, and you can meet all these other people who are living with diabetes as well? Can you tell me how that is? Either different or valuable? I guess, compared to meeting a few people in real life? Absolutely.

Speaker 1 1:41:22
I think if you look back from when I was first diagnosed to now, you, I would have never thought of like, you know, searching anything for someone with, you know, a type one diabetes. And now it's like, it's all I see, you know, you can easily search Medtronic champions, and you see people that pop up, and you're like, wow, look at all this content. And I think that's something that, that kind of just motivates me, and which is how I've kind of came out of my shell and started embracing more and posting more on my social media with about, you know, how I'm able to type one diabetes. And I think that's something that I hope can inspire everyone else. What

Scott Benner 1:41:56
was it like having more personal intimate relationships in college with type one,

Speaker 1 1:42:00
I think it was kind of hard to explain, you know, just, for example, like, no one really knows, it understands like what alo is. And I think that was a very hard thing for me to explain, like I, you know, it can happen in any moment. And I'm sweating. I'm just really like, not all there. And I'm trying to explain, like, Hey, this is what's going on, I need your help. And I think that was something that was hard for me to, you know, I did talk to people about it. So when this happened, they were like, oh, you know, what's going on with your mate? I'm actually a type one diabetic? This is what's going on? I need your help. What about?

Scott Benner 1:42:38
Once you've had an experience like that in front of someone? Was it always bonding? Or did it ever have people kind of step back and be maybe more leery of your relationship? After

Speaker 1 1:42:51
I would tell someone I had type one diabetes after some type of event or anything like they were kind of more upset with me that I didn't tell them upfront? Because they were like, you know, I care about you, as a person I would have loved to knowing this about you. It's not anything you should have to hide from me. And that was a lot of the realization that I was going through with a lot of people.

Scott Benner 1:43:08
Okay, let me ask you this. So now we talked about what it was like to be low, and to have that more kind of emergent situation. But what about when your blood sugar has been high or stubborn? And you're not thinking correctly, but it's not as obvious maybe to you or to them? Yeah.

Speaker 1 1:43:23
So I also I go through my same experiences when I have high blood sugars, you know, I can tell like, from my co workers, for example, I didn't really talk to you know, when I go out backtrack, when I visit multiple sites for work, I usually don't announce it. And so sometimes, I'm working throughout the day, I might have smacked forgot to take some insulin, and my blood sugar is running high, and I'm a little bit more irritable, I'm all over the place. And I'm like, let me stop. Hey, guys, I need to like take some insulin, and I'm sorry, I'm not I didn't tell you guys. I'm a diabetic. So you may be wondering why I'm kind of just a little bit snippy, you know, so I like to make sure I do that now going forward, because that's something I noticed. And it was kind of hindering me with my career because I was, you know, getting irritable, because I'm working nonstop. And I'm forgetting to start take a step back and focus on my diabetes, right.

Scott Benner 1:44:14
Hey, with the advent of new technologies, like Medtronic, CGM, and other diabetes technology, can you tell me how that's improved your life and those interactions with people? Yeah, I

Speaker 1 1:44:25
can. I feel confident knowing that it's working in the background. So when I always at least said it, I have been showing that's really bad. We're counting my carbs. So sometimes I kind of undershoot it because I'm scared. But it allows me to just know that, hey, it's going it's got my back if I forget something, and I think that allows me to have a quick, have a quick lunch and then I'm able to get back into the workday because it's such a fast paced industry that I work in. So sometimes it is easy to forget. And so I love that I have that system that's keeping track of everything for me.

Scott Benner 1:44:58
Let me ask you what One last question. When you have interactions online with other people who have type one diabetes, what social media do you find the most valuable for you personally? Like what platforms? Do you see the most people and have the most good interactions on?

Speaker 1 1:45:14
Yeah, I've honestly, I've had tremendous interactions on Instagram. That's where I've kind of seen a lot of other diabetics reach out to me and ask me questions, or comment and be like, Hey, you're experiencing this too. But I've recently also been seeing tic TOCs. And, you know, finding on that side of it, I didn't, you know, see the videos and upload videos, and I'm like, I would love to do stuff like that, but I just never had the courage. So I'm seeing people make, like, just the fun engagement videos now, which I love, you know, really bringing that awareness to diabetes. Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:45:44
Isn't it interesting? Maybe you don't know this, but there's some sort of an age cut off somewhere where there is an entire world of people with type one diabetes existing on Facebook, that don't go into Tik Tok or Instagram and vice versa. Yeah. And I do think it's pretty broken down by, you know, when that platform was most popular for those people by age, but your younger people, I'm acting like, I'm 100 years old, but younger people seem to enjoy video more. Yes,

Speaker 1 1:46:11
I think it's just because it's something you see. And so it's like, and I think that one thing, and obviously, it's a big stereotype around diabetes is you don't like you have diabetes. And that's something I always face. And so when I see other people that are just, you know, normal, everyday people, and I'm like, they have type one diabetes, just like me, they're literally living their life having fun. That's just something you'd want to see. Because you don't get to see people living their everyday lives or diabetes. I think that's something I've really enjoyed.

Scott Benner 1:46:40
What are your health goals? When you go to the endocrinologist, and you make a plan for the next few months? What are you hoping to achieve? And where do you struggle? And where do you see your successes, I'll

Speaker 1 1:46:51
be honest, I was not someone who was, you know, involved with my diabetes, I wasn't really focused on my health. And that was something that, you know, you go into an endocrinologist and you get these results back. And it's not what you want to hear. It gets, it makes you nervous, it makes you scared. And so I have personally for myself, you know, I was like, This is my chance, this is my chance to change. I know, there's people that are living just like me, everyday lives, and they can keep their agencies and their blood sugar's under control. How can I do this? So I go in with, you know, I would like to see it down a certain number of points each time I would love for my doctor to be like, Hey, I see you're entering your carbs. I see. You're, you know, you're not having lows. You're not running high, too often. That's my goal. And I've been seeing that. And that's what motivates me, every time I go to the endocrinologist where I don't dread going. It's like an exciting visit for me. So

Scott Benner 1:47:39
you'd like to set a goal for yourself. And then for someone to acknowledge it to give you kind of that energy to keep going for the next goal.

Speaker 1 1:47:46
Yeah, I feel as a type one diabetic for me, and it's just a lot to balance. It's a hard, hard journey. And so I want someone when I go in, I want to be able to know like, Hey, I see what you're doing. Let's work together to do this. Let's you don't want to be put down like you know, you're doing horrible you're doing it's just, it's not going to motivate you because it's you're you're already fighting a tough battle. So just having that motivation and acknowledging the goods and also how we can improve. That's what really has been the game changer for me in the past two years. Jaylen,

Scott Benner 1:48:24
I appreciate you spending this time with me. This was terrific. Thank you very much.

Unknown Speaker 1:48:27
Absolutely. Thank you.

Scott Benner 1:48:29
If you enjoy Jalen story, check out Medtronic diabetes.com/juice box. The episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording. Wrong way. recording.com