Beyond insulin: Diabetes has an unseen emotional toll in Atlantic Canada
- Judith Mendiolea Lelo de Larrea
- Nov 4, 2025
- 7 min read
(Story originally published by Postmedia Network - Oct 29, 2025)
When Heather Miller was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at age 20, she spent more than two decades before meeting another person who lived with the same disease.
She was in her last year of university when she fell sick. She started losing weight, couldn’t sit through an hour-long lecture without having to go to the bathroom and felt constant thirst.
She went to her doctor for a routine checkup and had blood work done.
“They called my work and said Heather needs to get to the hospital right away,” she said. “My mom drove down to pick me up and took me to the hospital. My blood sugar at the time was 45, which is very, very high because you’re supposed to be between four and 10.”
“I went the first 22 years of my diagnosis without meeting anyone else living with Type 1 diabetes,” she said. “It’s a 24/7 constant burden that you’re living with. There’s burnout, distress, sometimes you just don’t want to do it anymore.”
Miller is now the executive director of the Diabetes Hope Foundation, which operates across Canada and offers supports such as the Peer Support Program that connects young Canadians living with diabetes. The program, based in Ontario but reaching youth nationwide, offers mentorship for those transitioning from pediatric to adult care, a shift Miller said is one of the most critical and under-discussed moments in diabetes management.
Across the Atlantic provinces, more than one in 10 adults live with diabetes, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada. Rates are among the highest in the country: 10.5 per cent in Nova Scotia, with similar numbers in Newfoundland and Labrador and New Brunswick. Experts say high obesity rates, aging populations and limited rural access to health care contribute to the burden.
This year, Nov. 14 marks World Diabetes Day, which focuses on “Diabetes and Well-Being.” The theme highlights that health goes beyond medication, it’s also about emotional support, access to care and the right to live well.
A daily balancing act
For people with diabetes, whether Type 1, Type 2 or gestational, management is constant. It involves tracking blood sugar, adjusting diet, exercising and administering insulin or other medications.
“People don’t realize how complex living with diabetes is,” Miller said. “It’s more than just counting carbs and taking a shot. There are 42 factors that affect blood sugar.”
Laine Barnfield, a university student in Ontario, has lived with Type 1 diabetes since childhood. She described it as “kind of like a full-time job.”
“It’s a constant thought. It’s always on your mind,” she said. “Even if you’ve had it for 10 or 15 years, like in my case, I’m still learning every day.”
Barnfield said her experience changed when she joined the Diabetes Hope Foundation’s mentorship program as a teen.
“When you turn 18, a lot more responsibility is put on your shoulders as someone living with Type 1 diabetes,” she said. “So resources like the Diabetes Hope Foundation are amazing for the transition from adolescent care to adult care.”
She now volunteers as a mentor herself, helping teens from different provinces. “It’s a huge full-circle moment,” she said. “I was super grateful to have all the support as I transitioned into university, and now I get to pass that forward.”
Barnfield emphasized that living with diabetes doesn’t mean limitation but adaptation.
“I’m also an active individual. I really like to run,” she said. “So there’s a bit more complexity involved with diabetes management, because when you exercise, your blood sugar goes down. It’s all about taking a little bit less insulin or having an extra snack to help keep your blood sugars stable when you do physical activity.”
She uses technology to help manage that. “I’m on an insulin pump right now,” she said. “And I’m also on a continuous glucose monitor, or CGM, so that tells me what my blood glucose readings are all day, 24/7.”
Cost and access across Atlantic Canada
Each Atlantic province offers its own programs for people managing diabetes. Nova Scotia and New Brunswick have expanded insulin pump coverage for all ages. Prince Edward Island removed its age cap last year, and Newfoundland and Labrador is extending continuous glucose monitor coverage to all residents with Type 1 diabetes in the fall of 2025.
The P.E.I. Diabetes Drug Program now covers a broader list of approved medications and supplies. As of May 1, 2025, several insulin and oral diabetes drugs will also be included under the new national pharmacare program, reducing costs for many Islanders who previously paid out of pocket.
Still, affordability remains a challenge. According to Diabetes Canada, an insulin pump can cost up to $7,000, and supplies between $2,400 and $4,000 a year. CGM sensors, small devices that track blood sugar in real time, add another $3,000 to $4,000 annually.
In smaller communities, wait times can stretch for months. Some patients must travel hours to meet endocrinologists or certified diabetes educators.
“It’s a little sad that that’s not accessible for everybody with diabetes,” said Megan Mulrooney, a Newfoundlander mother living in Charlottetown, who developed gestational diabetes during her pregnancy. “It should be an option considering that, you know, they don’t really have a choice in the matter.”
Mulrooney said her experience managing diet and blood sugar through pregnancy was emotionally exhausting. “Me being a French girly, having to get rid of my bread, my pastries, and my pasta was detrimental to my mental health,” she said. “I basically ate like a rabbit for the last three months of my pregnancy.”
She had to check her blood sugar six times a day. “Pricking my finger and checking my blood really stressed me out,” she said. “Your skin develops calluses, it gets harder. So then you have to go up for a stronger prick.”
She was supported by the P.E.I. Diabetes Education Centre in Charlottetown.
“I would send them a weekly report on my numbers, and she and I would collaborate on what needed to be adjusted if my numbers were too high,” she said.
Mulrooney’s condition resolved after childbirth, but she knows many women aren’t as lucky. “A lot of the time, people are undiagnosed, like women are undiagnosed with Type 2 diabetes, and they don’t find out until they get pregnant,” she said.
Type 2: The growing epidemic
Type 2 diabetes accounts for about 90 per cent of diabetes cases in Canada, and rates are climbing in the Atlantic region. Aging populations, food insecurity and limited access to recreation in rural communities have made prevention a challenge.
“Atlantic Canadians are more likely to be obese and physically inactive than the national average,” noted a 2024 Canadian Institute for Health Information report. “These lifestyle factors contribute significantly to Type 2 diabetes incidence.”
Each province runs prevention programs such as Nova Scotia Health’s diabetes centres, New Brunswick’s Live Well initiative and P.E.I.’s Wellness Grant Program, aimed at improving nutrition and physical activity. But in many communities, access remains uneven.
People with Type 2 often face stigma and misunderstanding, said Miller, whose foundation also supports those with later-onset diagnoses.
“The statements people make can make you feel ashamed to have diabetes,” she said. “So you hide it, and you stop treating it.”
Finding connection in community
For many young people, community can be as essential as insulin. Barnfield has spent more than a decade attending D-Camps, a national network of summer camps for children and youth with Type 1 diabetes.
“I know you definitely have D-Camps on the East Coast as well,” she said. “They’re all across Canada. You can go to summer camp, but everyone there is living with Type 1 diabetes. You’re surrounded by other people your age who are going through the same thing.”
She said that sense of belonging was empowering. “There’s no more explaining what you’re doing to someone who doesn’t know,” she said. “And there’s no more feeling self-conscious if you’re taking an injection or reading labels in public because everyone’s doing the same thing.”
Miller said those spaces of understanding are harder to find in rural areas. “Especially for families with young kids, if they're in a rural community, going to see the endocrinologist in the pediatric diabetes clinic is like a full day event,” she said. “Which puts strain on the family, puts strain on the kids.”
That lack of access, she added, can extend into classrooms and workplaces. “The schools are especially difficult for young families because a lot of parents will have to leave their jobs so that they can come at lunch to give them their insulin,” Miller said. “Public awareness is still so low. Sometimes it’s the simplest support that makes the biggest difference.”
For Miller, World Diabetes Day should recognize that quiet persistence. “Diabetes is an invisible illness, so not a lot of people know that you live with it unless you tell them,” she said. “Just being aware of supports… to offer a juice box, or to sit with us while our sugar comes up.”
Barnfield agrees. “Sometimes you can feel like you’re the only one, or you feel a bit alone in the process of managing your diabetes, but to be introduced to a community and have those peers who are going through the same thing is really fulfilling.”
Comments