Diabetes Daily

Sam Fifer grew up in a little town in west Connecticut–nowhere near the ocean–but he spent his summers in Nova Scotia where his friend Will Daniels was born and raised. The pair has been sailing “practically since we started walking” and have been in love with the sport since day one.

During one of his summers in Novo Scotia, Sam was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at age 11, but it has never interfered with his love for the water.

After finishing college, Sam and Will focused all of their energy on being out on the water, working on various boats, as sailor instructors in the Virgin Islands and in other bodies of waters: Will worked in “river restoration” in Novo Scotia.

“This summer, I moved back to Nova Scotia where we both lived in Mahone Bay on our boat, a 1982 C&C 32 named Tilikum,” explains Sam. “We’ve always had dreams of long distance sailing. We sat many nights in the garage talking about various islands we wished to visit, routes we wanted to take, and things we desired to see. We read all of the tales of great adventurers like Joshua Slocum, Francis Chichester, Robin Lee Graham, and their sailing escapades. These stories are what has inspired us to undertake this voyage, you only live once right? There’s no time like the present.”

Today, Sam and Will are raising funds through GoFundMe to sail around the globe, journaling their adventures at Sailing for Type 1 Diabetes.

In this interview, Sam talks about juggling type 1 diabetes as he sails his way around the globe!

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Tell me a your “diagnosis story”…how old were you? Were you terrified? How did your diagnosis impact your goals as an athletic person? 

Sam: When I was 11 years old my family and I took a vacation for Thanksgiving up to Nova Scotia Canada for a week or so. Along the 19 hour drive up is where I began to feel somewhat “off.” I kept having to tell my dad to stop the car because I had to pee every few hours or so, which seemed semi-normal to all of us at the time. And also I kept drinking lots of water (like two cases of 24 bottles in a day).

We figured these two things were just related to each other at the time because I didn’t really show any other signs of being sick. We got up to Nova Scotia and things started to get interesting. I no longer could drink the regular tap water from our sink because I complained of it tasting almost soapy. This resulted in us having to buy one of those purified water towers that you have to buy water from the store to fill.

This was fine for a while, but then it got worse. I started to feel very cramped in all of my joints, making moving a little harder and still kept drinking and peeing all the time (like every hour). This is when we finally decided it was time to go home because something was indeed wrong.

The trip back was brutal. I turned a ghostly pale white/grey in color, could barely move, still drinking and having to pee every 20-30 minutes and feeling very nauseous and throwing up a bunch of times. I couldn’t eat, could barely even stay awake as we made our way back Connecticut where my parents immediately took me to our doctor.
They couldn’t figure out what it was at first because there was no history of diabetes in my family so they almost ruled that out right away. After testing my blood sugar at the doctors office, the doctor said my parents needed to take me to the hospital immediately. We went to the nearby hospital where I was immediately brought into the ER and hooked up to IV’s and given insulin.

Apparently my blood sugar was in the high 1300s and I was about a day away from a coma. Scary stuff! I was terrified and confused. As an 11 year old I had no idea what was going on and had never even heard of diabetes. At the time, I didn’t realize what I had, and how this was no a life long disease I had to deal with.

I was in the hospital for a week and missed a bunch of school. Finally I went back to school and noticed everybody treating my a little different. Like I had just been given cancer or something. Every teacher was constantly asking if I felt okay and making sure I ate properly and such, but I still didn’t really know what I was dealing with. I went back to the hospital a few times for more training on giving myself shots and testing my blood and regulating food intake and such and that’s where I finally realized a little what I had.

I rejected the fact that I was a diabetic, of course as I went into those rebellious teenage years and my parents tried to help me so much, but I didn’t want to believe that I had this crutch. I didn’t stop doing sports at school or really change my lifestyle at all because I didn’t want to show my friends that I was different.

I hated being a diabetic. I still hate it, but over the past few years I’ve grown up both mentally and physically. I know fully understand that this disease isn’t going anywhere and I have to man up and deal with it. I wish I could have realized this years ago of course and not scolded my parents for only trying to help keep me alive and rejected anybody who tried to help me, but I guess that’s just the way it went down.

Now I have purpose though. I got tired of hearing from doctors “oh, there’ll be a cure in five years,” “five years,” “five years.” That’s all I kept hearing. Now I’ve decided to try and help make a difference in the best way that I can. I’ve gotten my A1C down significantly and am generally feeling a whole lot healthier and that I have a little more control on this. I still have a ways to go but I’m keeping my head up, and now taking any help I can get!

In a nutshell: can you describe your sailing expedition? What are you hoping to accomplish?

Sam: Our expedition has three goals. The first goal is sail around the world!

The two other goals we’ve set while we do this adventure are raise as much awareness and as many funds as we can to let people know a few things. This disease exists and to be fully honest, sucks, but you can’t let it get in the way of your life.

Life is possible, even as a diabetic. We fly a JDRF flag in every port we cruise into which catches people eye and they come up and talk to us. Through our story is how we’re spreading awareness and through our blog and website is how we are raising funds. We plan on taking the next 3-5 years to complete this venture and breaking it off into sections. My friend and I are at the point where we don’t have many ties in our lives right now so we figure we might as well take our time and enjoy it!

What are the biggest or perhaps scariest challenges when it comes to sailing with type 1 diabetes?

Sam: The challenges for sailing with Type 1 are similar to the everyday challenges everybody on land has to deal with, only we don’t have constant access to a pharmacy or a store. I’ve had to battle with insurance companies trying to override my prescriptions that I can basically stock up on all of my supplies for months. I’ve had to make sure I essentially have 1-2 things of instant sugar a day in case I go low.

I have 20 vials of insulin all kept in our boat refrigerator that we had to enhance to ensure it will always be cold. I have 8 months supply of pump supplies all kept in a lock tight, dry container because things tend to get a little wet on a boat—haha! It is rather daunting though. I ask myself every day what might happen if I run out of supplies or sugar while I’m out at sea. The key though, is preparation. Prepare for the worst and you can only go up from there. There is no such thing as over preparation when it come to this stuff, and for that reason, our boat is sitting a little low in the water with how much supplies we have on board.

What is one of the scariest or most challenging moments you’ve personally experienced on the open water as a person with type 1 diabetes?

Sam: My number one scariest challenge I hope to never have to deal with though, is if we have to bail on the boat. If our boat sinks on us, we will have to go to our life raft. We have what is referred to as a ditch bag that has everything essential to bring with us if the boat sinks, even supplies and insulin. My fear though is say we are at sea and don’t get rescued for longer than a week?

Say we have “Castaway” situation, then what happens then? You try not to think about that stuff, as hard as it might be, and all you do is prepare for it. If you dwell on things like that, then you’d never even leave homeport!

I haven’t had any scary moment yet, but something is bound to happen at some point. My sailing partner is educated in what to do if bad things happen and I trust him with my life!

The hardest part about this journey I would say, is just starting it. It took a lot of courage to just go out and do it, but that’s what I’m here to show people. It is possible. Life is possible! Don’t let diabetes get you down.

Best of luck to you!!! Safe sailing!

Photos courtesy of TeamTilikum!