Blood Sugar

THRIVING WITH TYPE 1 CATHERINE MILLER, who is 26 and lives in West Chester, was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at age 15. "I wasn't really surprised because my mom has it, my grandmother and grandfather had it, a couple of my uncles have it, so it was inevitable for at least me or my brother to get it, and I was the lucky one. " It threw her for a loop initially. "I was 15 and they were giving me all sorts of medication," she says. "But I knew it was going to come. " Taking the time to eat right for blood-sugar control was her major challenge as a teenager.

When doctors told 28-year-old Nakia East that her 1-year-old's sudden weight loss and unusual thirst were caused by diabetes, she found herself thrust into a whole new level of parenting. "They told me everything was going to change," said East, who lives in Upper Darby. Since then, she has learned to inject her son, Yanaan, with insulin four times every day. She tracks every ounce of food he eats and measures his blood sugar after each meal. And then there are the terrifying moments when the readings plunge far too low. "They told me he's going to have this his whole life," she said recently, resigned to her son's fate.

THERE ARE always at least two desserts on the Feury family holiday table. That's not because chefs Terrence and Patrick Feury and their families are mad for sweets - if anything, the two brothers - who are on the verge of opening Maia, a restaurant, market and cafe in Villanova - prefer their desserts on the savory side. But their mother, Frances, who lives in North Jersey, has Type One diabetes and can't eat regular desserts. So for her they make a sugar-free dessert, usually something featuring seasonal fruit.

It was a mob scene worthy of Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie. Nearly 1,000 people pushed into a Washington ballroom at the American Diabetes Association's annual convention, causing security guards to turn people away. The object of adoration wasn't a movie star or even a person, but rather a diabetes drug called Byetta, which helps to lower blood sugar. The new drug sold nearly $100 million in the last three months, partly because of an intriguing side effect: It helps people lose weight.

The evidence against nurse Jean Saxon was circumstantial, but overwhelming. It took a Bucks County jury only an hour to convict her yesterday of first-degree murder in the insulin-induced death of her husband, Jerry, 52, in March 2003. The prosecution argued that Saxon's weapon was unusual, but her motive wasn't: She injected her nondiabetic husband with insulin, causing his blood sugar to drop to a remarkably low level. She did it to gain $152,000 in life-insurance benefits, her husband's pension, their new home, and the freedom to be with the married coworker with whom she was having an affair, said Michelle A. Henry, chief deputy district attorney.

Bob Maher's diabetes was shutting his body down. He no longer got the shakes or the sweats to warn him that his blood sugar was plummeting. Instead, he would just pass out. It made him scared to drive, to be alone, even to sleep. Chewie's going to change all that. The 2-year-old dog, an auburn Labrador mix named after the Star Wars character Chewbacca, has the ability to detect changes in Maher's blood sugar that are unrecognizable to Maher himself. Chewie then alerts Maher to correct it. To see the phenomenon "just makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up," said Jennifer Kriesel, director of development at Canine Partners for Life, a Chester County organization that trains service dogs for people with impaired mobility and medical conditions.

Like many teenagers, Brendan Hager doesn't have to be dragged out of bed to go to school. He sets his own routine when the morning bell tolls. "Wake up in the morning, see how my blood sugar is and then give myself the first shot," Hager said. It is the first of what commonly are four injections of insulin for Hager, a junior at Conestoga and a Type 1 diabetic who learned long ago to cope with his disease, and succeed despite it. Hager is the starting point guard for the Pioneers boys' basketball team, which opens play in the PIAA Class AAAA state tournament tomorrow against District 3's Red Lion at Carlisle High School.

Hugh McCann pulled up his T-shirt and asked if it was OK to hold in his belly. "That would be cheating," said a nurse as she put a tape measure around his waist. McCann, 49, an out-of-work truck driver from Clifton Heights, was taking part in a University of Pennsylvania study to screen people for metabolic syndrome, a potentially life-threatening but often unrecognized condition that puts people at increased risk for cardiovascular disease and diabetes. He knew nothing about metabolic syndrome until he saw an item in his union newsletter and feared he might fit the bill.

Angela Koerper plays with purpose on the golf course, but her mission is to raise funds and awareness for juvenile diabetes. The Mount St. Joseph Academy senior, diagnosed with juvenile diabetes at age 11, once again is taking a central role in the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation's annual Walk to Cure Diabetes. This year's walk is scheduled on Oct. 31 at McNeil Consumer & Specialty Pharmaceuticals in Fort Washington. This is the sixth year Koerper is participating; she has raised $50,000 with the team Angela's Mission of Hope.

Anthony Sciamanna said he just wanted to get some sleep. The condition of his wife, Rose, who suffered from Alzheimer's disease and diabetes, had deteriorated in the last six months, and caring for her had become a "nightmare," he said. After finding some decades-old morphine pills, Sciamanna, 74, said he thought of making a sleeping potion, not realizing it would set off a chain of events ending with his 71-year-old wife dying and him being charged with first-degree murder.