Jenny's Story - a gift for future generations

Geraldine resident Jenny Watts was just 16 in 1954 when she was first diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.

“I would drink water until my tummy was like a football”, says Jenny now 86. It was only when she collapsed from a high blood sugar episode that she was finally diagnosed.

Back then the only way to know if you had high blood sugar levels was to add a caustic tablet to a few drops of urine in a test tube. If the urine turned orange, then blood sugars were high. Jenny had to inject herself using a glass syringe up to five times a day and then boil the syringe to sanitize it. “It was either do that or die, so you just had to get on with it”, says Jenny.

Her biggest diabetes heartbreak was the impact it had on her pregnancies. Back in the 1960s much less was known about the impact of high blood sugars on the developing fetus. Her first child was stillborn. Her son was born prematurely but survived and her third child, a daughter, was born alive but died the next day. “That was really traumatic, I wouldn’t wish that on anybody”.

Receiving a CGM has been the biggest medical breakthrough for Jenny. “It’s been a gamechanger for me. I can now take my sugar levels in the middle of the night easily, or even just standing in the queue at the supermarket. Before I had to prick myself and be at home.”

Jenny joined the South Canterbury Diabetes Association as it was back then, when she was just 25 years old, more than 60 years ago. Her lifetime commitment to supporting people with diabetes is something she wants to see continue when she is gone. That's why Jenny has decided to leave a gift in her Will to Diabetes New Zealand. She wants progress to continue for the next generation.

“I thought we might have seen a cure for diabetes by now. But I believe it’s possible and with the right research we will just continue to see breakthroughs. I want that for other people. I have seen many improvements in my lifetime, but it’s still always there. I still get lows; I still have to think about my diabetes every day. To be free of that would be a marvelous gift for future generations. I want to do my part to make that happen.”

Find out more about leaving a legacy to Diabetes New Zealand.