Emily Saar

My mother was going to the dialysis center three times a week and suffering from end-stage renal disease when I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. I was only 24 when my doctor told me I had it. I remember crying constantly the rest of that day.

I took care of my mother for two years until she died while sleeping in the dialysis chair. Up until then I really never questioned what type 2 diabetes was, what its symptoms were or what I could have done to prevent it.