A Special Note from Camryn: Please read!

Camryn speaking at JDRF Children's Congress, 2009

It's that time of year again, the time when we make our annual plea for donations to JDRF. This year Camryn wrote the walk letter (she's growing up in spite of it all!!). PLEASE read it. For those of you that are seeing this on FACEBOOK - please consider posting a link to this on your facebook page (http://www.enduromom.blogspot.com/). If we can leverage the power of FB and ask people to just give a few bucks - it will have a HUGE impact. Please consider helping by posting this link on your FB page!!

And now a word from the girl, herself (for those that don't know, she is a 9 year old little girl with type 1 diabetes):

Hi Everyone, it's me, Camryn . . .

Every year in August my mom writes "the walk letter" asking for donations for JDRF. She tells everyone how hard my life is with type 1 diabetes and asks people to give money to JDRF to help find a cure. This year, my mom was busy training for the 100 mile JDRF ride to cure diabetes, so I said I could write the letter this year.

This year I learned a lot more than I already knew about diabetes. I learned about kidney disease, heart disease, eye disease and nerve damage called "complications of diabetes". That's some seriously scary stuff! I knew that getting shots every day, insulin pump site changes, and pricking my finger 10-15 times a day was lousy but I really do not want anything to do with these complications.

I am doing everything I can to stay away from that. For one thing, I work really hard to take care of myself everyday. I have to watch my diet, exercise, check my blood sugar and take insulin. I have to be careful every minute of every day - no cheating, no days off! The other thing that is just as important to me is to help find a cure for type 1 diabetes.

Last year families like mine, all over the world, helped raise money for JDRF and we raised 150 million dollars! That's a ton of money!! JDRF is using that money to pay scientists to invent something called an Artificial Pancreas which is already being tried out on people. My grandparents got to meet a dude that is actually wearing one! It is like an insulin pump and a continuous glucose monitor that talk to each other and make decisions without the person having to do anything. If I had one of these things I could eat pizza and go for a bike ride and then go have some ice cream and jump on the trampoline all night long. I wouldn't even have to stop once to think about diabetes. How cool is that?!?! That might sound like pretty normal kid stuff, but I can't do that kind of stuff without diabetes getting in my way. JDRF raises a lot of money for other scientists too who are working on a cure, they are growing new pancreas cells that can make real insulin, right now!! They are trying to figure out how to put them into people. And, they are trying to figure out a shot that can keep people from getting type 1 diabetes in the first place. That shot could help my brother, Stratton or maybe your child, or someone you love!

Last year, my walk team, "Camryn's Team" raised over $10,000 for JDRF. I spoke in front of 4,000 people at the walk to thank everyone. I have been working really hard this year, I gave speeches at a bunch of JDRF fundraisers, I was in a parade, I was on the news twice, I went to Washington, DC (with JDRF's Children's Congress) and met President Obama and I learned what lobbying is. I went to meet with my Senators and told them how important research money and health care are for kids like me and how important it is to find a cure for type 1 diabetes.

And now I am asking for your help too. I have heard a lot about this economy problem, but even if you can help just a little bit - it's a really, really big thing for kids like me. Scientists are really close to finding better ways to live with type 1 diabetes and a cure. I am working really hard too. Can you please help?

Here's what you can do to help me out:

You can make a donation to JDRF (please!!!!)

You can donate on my Walk Page (<--- just click that thing that says Walk Page)

You can join my walk team and help raise money and come to Six Flags on Oct. 18th All you have to do is sign up to walk: You can sign up by clicking HERE

Ask your friends for donations

Then come walk with us (and ride roller coasters!)

And, my mom makes really cool T-shirts for everyone!

You can send a letter or an e-mail to everyone you know asking them to support our walk team and make a donation to JDRF - anyone can do that much, right?

We are trying to raise $10,000 again this year so we can use all of your help and fundraising ideas.

Thank you for all of your fundraising help in the past and now!!!

Love,

Camryn

Things I Learned in Killington, VT

At one point during the weekend, Tim St. Claire, the national coach for the JDRF ride to cure diabetes stood up and gave a little speech saying that if this ride does not change your life, please give it one more chance, next year. And if it still has not altered your existence to talk to him and see how he can remedy the situation. I'm the ultimate cynic, really, so I am sitting there thinking altering my existence would be like switching the earth's rotation to the opposite direction. As in not.gonna.happen. Well, ultimate cynic here to tell you, I am not sure which direction the earth is turning right now, but that one little bike ride did, indeed, change my life. No redo necessary, although I am looking forward to redoing it for as long as I am possible.

We arrived in Killington knowing no one. There was one other person riding from our JDRF Chapter, Julie, but she was from CT and we had never met. Aside from knowing no one, and feeling like a 7th grader at summer camp alone, I also was feeling pretty lame about my 3 weeks of training as I saw about 349 other riders who had spent their summers training and were chomping at the bit to get out on the road. I was secretly praying that the ride would be called on account of the weather that was due to be rolling into town. I was thinking we could all just get dressed in our tight little spandex super hero costumes and hobble through the mud in our gimpy little bike shoes and then be told it was no go on account of the rain, wind and cold. I'd say - oh man, that stinks - and then run back to the condo and go back to bed!

Let's set the scene a little more here. There are about 88 JDRF chapters throughout the USA. 44 Chapters were represented at this ride. There were large teams from Michigan, Wisconsin, South Carolina, New Jersey, The Northwest, you name it, they were all there. They had matching T-shirts and were cheering. Lot's of them drove in with their cars painted up with JDRF logos. Some teams rented trucks to send their bikes in, others packaged and shipped their bikes. The amazing guys from Velo Bikes in Michigan set up a full service bike shop in a ski shed - and would you believe that not only did they put together all of the bikes, but they also checked every set of brakes in the shed and they filled every tire (all 700 of them!!). These guys were amazing. They were in there at work until midnight every night. The volunteers are a whole other subject here - back to the riders for a moment - there were about 350 riders and together we raised a total of $1.3 million for JDRF!!! Now there is something to alter the universe, right there. I could go on and on and on about this group of 350 people and I certainly only had a chance to meet and spend time getting to know a fraction of them but I can tell you this - anyone and I mean ANYONE who wants to ride - can and should ride. To me, this is the perfect sport, it can be done for exercise, it can be done for relaxation, it can be done to lose weight, it can be done recreationally, it can be done to race and compete, it can be done inexpensively, it can be done very expensively (for the gear lover). It can be done socially, it can be done for solitude, it can be done fast or slow, by young and old. It can be done to get somewhere, it can be done to go nowhere at all. And, you can do it for a long, long time.

So here are a few people I met:

A woman from OK who bought a bike a year and half ago and on one of her first rides, crashed and shattered her leg. She had 5 surgeries and ended up with one of those hideous hospital borne infections. She could not even walk for over 6 months - she has a teen-age diabetic child. I had the pleasure of riding with her.

A woman from PA who has a 25 year old diabetic son who was just diagnosed a couple of years ago. She has a hybrid (as she called it a "fitness" bike). She had trained with her husband and they decided amongst them that she would do the ride. She rocked that fitness bike up 12 mile hills!! Watching her could only be described as a mother's love. I had the honor of riding with her.

A little girl who was so anxious to ride (you have to be 13 to participate) that she signed up for the ride closest to her 13th birthday which was only 3 weeks before the ride.

Every person there had a story - I guess I can't tell them all but there were parents of diabetic children, an aunt and uncle from NJ who raised $8K to ride for their niece, a type 1 diabetic who is training for Iron Man Kona!, there were people with no connection to diabetes at all who raised money as tirelessly for the cause as if it were their own. And so on and so on times 350!

So ride morning comes and it is 50 degrees, hurricane Danny had rolled in, high winds, pouring rain, not such good pavement lay ahead and some massive hills. The first 12 miles was down, down, down hill, cold, wet, slippery, a little dangerous but otherwise not terribly taxing. But as we descended over the course of 12 miles we all knew that no matter how long we stayed out there we'd have that 12 miles to climb in the end.

The rest of the course was pretty manageable with nice rollers and what would likely have been beautiful scenery - I saw nothing but sheets of rain and fog and the spray coming up from the tire in front of me. I was adopted by the most wonderful team from Seattle. These folks held me up the entire way. Let me draft off them, trained me on how to be part of a paceline and were so genuinely wonderful that I nearly followed them home to Seattle. As for the rain, I learned that it is no big deal, once you are wet - you just have to roll with it and be a little extra careful. Oh, I also learned that putting plastic baggies inside your bike shoes is good for little more than carrying pet gold fish on the ride - best to let the water that enters the shoe, exit the other side, holding onto it for future use is rather miserable. I also learned that sun glasses do little good on a bike ride in a hurricane. And although it is still important to stay hydrated, it is even less fun visiting the porto-potty in the pouring rain. Did you know that TP actually disintegrates when touched with soaking wet bike gloves?

Those are just a few of the many things I encountered on my fabulous trip to Vermont. I would not have changed one minute of any of it. I would not even trade it in for sunshine and flat roads. It was absolutely perfect, just the way it was. And when I got back to the condo and finally got clean and dry and warm, Camryn looked at me and said: "Mom, thanks for doing this for me!" And I promised her that I will keep doing it over and over again until we've got the diabetes monster beat!!

If you want to consider having the a bike ride, and a weekend that will indeed change your life - consider the JDRF Ride to Cure Diabetes. For more info, visit http://www.ride.jdrf.org/