Lucky To Have Type 1

After 900 posts and nearly 10 years since the launch of this blog, it is time for me to officially pull the plug on Type1Rider.  The blogger site will stay up as reference material until the new admins change that, and I will also leave the @Type1Rider twitter feed around.  I will still be doing what I do, and launching into some new ventures (like tonycervati.com), but I will be shelving this volume of my book.  This will be my very last update on each.

I have been Type 1 since 1976, and over these past 42 years I have experienced almost everything a person with Diabetes could have.

 The massive changes in technologies - from Diastix to the Artificial Pancreas - to the rise of the internet and how it was leveraged by passionate people to change the face of public acceptance and awareness of this disease. 

I have experienced hypos that have tempted fate, and, on the other end of the spectrum, have manipulated the technologies of available treatment devices to yield to my will in winning mountain bike endurance championships.

I have also viewed this disease from the side of a parent of a child with Type 1 when my youngest got diagnosed in July of 2014 at the age of 6.

Through out all my 15,200+ days of living with Type 1 so far - including 100,000 finger pricks, 1000+ pump site changes, 725,000 units of insulin, and 70,000 injections - I have as of yet not a single diabetes related site affect.  Not one.

Creating Type1Rider in 2008 has provided a vehicle allowing me to meet some of the most amazing people on Earth.  Thank you ALL who have followed me on this journey, and those who have supported all of our efforts.  Through T1R we, as a team, a community, have hopefully inspired a few others to pedal a bike regardless of the degree of incline of the hill they are facing. 

I am without words to express how much you all mean to me.

In particular I want to mention Steve McGuinn for pushing square pegs through round holes to make things happen, George Scott for just freaking EVERYTHING (without you sir, T1R never happens), Michael Sullivan & Kristin Brewer for telling the world a story, everyone at Trek Bikes (the greatest bicycle company in the world) for the opportunity to represent you and ride rigs of dreams, The UNC Diabetes Care Center for listening when I told them I wanted to try the seemingly impossible, and Mr. Travis Goodman.   TPG you sir, my friend, believed at your very core when literally no one else on earth did (sometimes not even myself). 

You all believed for no other reason but the power of a guy on a mission to redefine the believed limits with a mountain bike.


 Over 4 decades with Diabetes has shown me the world, and afforded me opportunities that most cannot say they have had.  Type 1 has taught me that I can face and conquer ANY challenge that will ever be presented to me in life.  Any. 

It has shown me that I am, indeed, quite fearless, strong, and simply unbreakable.  It taught me to squeeze the absolute very most out of each and every day, to take risks, deal positively with setbacks, look at things from unique angles, and to always, always believe. 

Those aren't just nice words.  They are core components of me now.

Am I lucky to have been diagnosed with Type 1?  Yes.  Yes I most certainly am.

I honestly and truthfully wouldn't want it any other way....

 Keep Choppin'!