My beautiful sister has had type 1 diabetes since the age of 6. Now 45, she got it at a time when syringes and scare tactics about never touching sugar were the norm and blood monitoring was approximate. I remember going to the hospital when she was in a coma at the very beginning and watching her practice injections on an orange. She had lots of little lumps on her body from all the injections and regularly woke up screaming with nightmares from bad blood sugars throughout her early childhood. While I was always sympathetic, I couldn’t really appreciate how it actually felt. Now that I too have type 1, the physical toll is all too clear. Worse perhaps though, is the mental burden of constant self-monitoring and the complex balancing act of maintaining control. Imagining anew what it must have been like for a little girl of six using what now seem like prehistoric tools to take all this on is what makes me put her forward as a champion; that and the fact that she is always investigating better ways to manage her health. After years of erratic sugar levels that had turned her into a “brittle” diabetic, she is now on the pump and enjoying more health stability than ever before. I champion her courage, perseverance, hopeful energy, and all the great things she has accomplished despite dealing with this difficult disease for most of her life.