Nurse With Diabetes Aims To Help Diabetics Through A Second Career in Nursing

Rachel Zucker-Wong, a Diabetic issues Registered Nurse Professional from San Francisco, CA, is a nurse on a mission. Not only is she a 2nd-occupation nurse—she left an unsatisfying vocation in communications to go after nursing—but she’s also doing the job to share her individual journey of being a nurse with Type 1 diabetic issues, and sharing recognition together the way. 

Rachel, who operates @t1diabeezy, an Instagram account committed to sharing her journey with diabetes and now, as a diabetes educator, tells Nurse.org that doing the job with men and women with diabetes is her “true calling.” And now, as a recently-graduated RN, she’s making that transpire.  

Working with Diabetes—And a Aspiration To Grow to be a Nurse

Right after getting identified with sort 1 diabetes at only the age of 4 (her mother insisted she get tested irrespective of medical doctors assuring her almost nothing was erroneous), Rachel explains that she in no way seriously felt a potent connection to the diabetic local community, partly simply because she by no means understood a time when she did not have diabetic issues and partly for the reason that she was in no way really treated any differently by her peers. In actuality, she did not even actually know a diabetes community existed. 

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“I definitely do not don’t forget a time when I did not have to look at my blood sugar right before consuming or have a juice box with me when I still left the property,” Rachel suggests. “For me, diabetes has constantly been a element of my regular, day-to-day everyday living, and growing up I was lifted to never ever experience distinctive from any of the other, non-diabetic youngsters at my university.” 

In spite of her early and fairly beneficial working with diabetes, including a steady glucose observe (CGM) to her diabetic issues administration sparked a wish to join with some others who made use of the technological innovation. “I arrived throughout a few of people on Instagram who shared about residing with diabetic issues and resolved to create my very own diabetic issues-centered Instagram account,” she clarifies. “I promptly discovered that there is a large, flourishing community of people with diabetic issues on social media.”

Her delve into the diabetic issues group on social media helped her connect with some others domestically who have form 1 diabetic issues, go to meetups, and even volunteer with nearby diabetic issues companies throughout the Bay Spot. “I swiftly discovered that these meetups and situations still left me feeling energized and fired up, and I knew that functioning with people today with diabetic issues was my correct calling,” Rachel says. 

She made the decision that she desired to support others who also have her ailment, which involves sharing her personal story and journey with diabetic issues. “There’s just a thing about speaking with men and women who actually ‘get it,’” she notes. “It actually would make you truly feel found and heard.”

A Next Chance 

To make her goals of helping some others with style 1 diabetic issues occur real, Rachel decided it was time to go back again to university. Immediately after graduating from the Dominican University of California with a diploma in communications and media studies and functioning her way up to a role as Communications Director at a nationwide law organization, Rachel was successful—but not happy. 

So she made the decision to do anything drastic about it: she stop her task on the location in June 2020 throughout a international pandemic without having anything at all lined up. “I experienced no thought what to do future, but I understood I experienced to make a change,” she recollects. 

Soon after having some time off to do some soul-searching—something she adds she feels “extremely fortunate” to have experienced the opportunity to do—she came to the realization that soon after a lifetime invested intertwined in just the health care technique and coming to discover a relationship with the sort 1 diabetic issues local community, it was time to move even more into the world of diabetic issues treatment. 

“As I’ve gotten more mature, I’ve come to know that the unrelenting nature of t1d has built me into the individual I am nowadays: compassionate, liable, and able to get suitable back again up when I tumble,” she describes. “It’s also impressed my lifestyle mission to help other people with diabetic issues.”

She created the choice to go back to school to grow to be an RN and enrolled in an accelerated method to gain her BSN in only 12 months. Rachel jokes that while she often states that taking care of her diabetes is her “first comprehensive-time occupation,” heading as a result of a rigorous, 1-calendar year accelerated BSN application shortly became her next. 

The good news is, many thanks to her didactic classes staying primarily on-line, Rachel did not have to aim on added issues for her diabetic issues until finally she arrived at her scientific rotations. Even though she admits that she did have some problems in excess of the very long times and useful facets like wherever she could retailer treats and materials, simply because diabetic issues is an ADA-shielded incapacity, she registered with her school’s disability providers office to be certain that any added needs she had could be met.

She also took additional steps to connect with her medical instructors, informing them ahead of time that she was a diabetic and would be carrying additional supplies with her. She also notified the nurse she worked with, and her fellow pupils, and wore the two a medic inform bracelet and a nurse pack that carried glucose tablets and treats. And as a last preventive stage, she established her insulin pump to “exercise mode” to assist keep her blood sugars a tiny increased and enable prevent hypoglycemia. 

Landing a Job as a Diabetic issues Nurse

All of Rachel’s challenging work is at last setting up to shell out off: she just secured her first RN position functioning with diabetes people as a Diabetes Registered Nurse Expert. She took the exact same solution to her new function as she did in college by informing all of her new coworkers of her affliction and being proactive to maintain treats and supplies on her. “It’s surreal to believe that I’ll be beginning my profession in the industry I went to nursing faculty to go after,” Rachel comments. “I’m so grateful for this extraordinary chance.”

The prospect is also an critical to start with stage in the direction of her eventual goal to develop into a qualified diabetic issues care and training specialist (CDCES). “A diabetes educator is just what it appears like: a qualified who is licensed to teach individuals with diabetes how to ideal manage their problem,” explains Rachel. 

Element of Rachel’s passion to come to be a CDCES is that she is familiar with firsthand how unbelievably intricate and unique kind 1 diabetic issues is. She explains that just residing with the condition can take renewed toughness and resilience each and every one working day. And with far more than 42 various components affecting blood sugar—from slumber quality to hormones, to carbohydrate kind, to dehydration, to medicine timing, to liquor intake—she claims even if two people today with diabetic issues ate the very same foodstuff with the similar insulins and the exact starting up blood sugars, they could wind up with completely unique success. 

Dwelling with a condition like diabetes takes extraordinary persistence and knowing that it is some thing that will have to have to be managed every single working day. Rachel says that she “jumps” at the chance to teach other individuals about diabetic issues and hopes to share not only her private experience with the issue but also her specialist know-how as a nurse in the future. 

“I hope that acquiring form 1 diabetic issues will allow for me to be a much more empathetic nurse for my clients with diabetes,” she notes. “I live with the highs and lows of variety 1 diabetic issues every working day and know very first-hand how overwhelming the ailment can be. But I also know that obtaining a assist procedure can make a huge distinction, and I want to help others live their greatest lives with diabetes – specifically those who have not been afforded the similar privileges as me.”

She is passionate about dwelling her very best life with kind 1 diabetes and hopes to enable some others do the similar. 

“Patients with diabetic issues are legitimate warriors,” she says. “And every person is capable of dwelling a healthful, complete existence with diabetes.”

Pictures courtesy of Rachel Zucker-Wong