Page 18 - South Mississippi Living - September, 2021

COAST NOTE
Why
A good ol’ Mississippi boyhood: swimming, team sports, hunting, and
– for one indomitable kid – a regime
of insulin and dietary restrictions that, after five years, fits his life like a worn-in baseball glove.
We
Walk
It wasn’t always so. As registered nurses, Will and Mayra Rocha thought their education and experience would prepare them well for bringing up a family. But they were caught unaware when their four-year-old son, Evan, was diagnosed in 2016 with type 1 diabetes.
The Rocha Family
story and photos courtesy of
Diabetes Foundation of Mississippi
Diabetes Foundation of Mississippi
601.957.7878 www.msdiabetes.org
Diabetes is a complex and daunting world for parents to navigate, and the Rochas were no exception. Counting carbohydrates, calculating insulin dosages, performing multiple needle sticks each day, and more to keep their son alive was no small adjustment.
But now, five years since the diagnosis, the disease is just part of Evan’s daily routine, and Evan lets it neither stop nor define him. A typical 10-year-old, he goes deer hunting in the woods with his dad and twin brothers, plays on a youth baseball team, swims at waterparks with friends and family, and does just about anything else he wants to do. Diabetes may be part of Evan’s story, but it’s not the theme.
And since Evan was diagnosed, the Rochas have participated every year
in Mississippi’s Walk for Diabetes in Gulfport with an ever-growing team
of family and friends. Under the 2021 banner “Lean on Me,” their group again plans to walk in honor of Evan and reassure him that he is not alone in
his daily reckoning with diabetes.
Held each year to support the Diabetes
Foundation of Mississippi, the walk helps sustain programs like Camp Kandu, which the Rochas attend annually. At the weekend retreat, kids with diabetes get to bond with others like themselves and spend the day in activities like karate lessons and relay races while parents hear from experts in areas like pediatric endocrinology and psychology.
Mississippi’s Walk for Diabetes
also supports initiatives to help Mississippians in need of diabetes supplies like life-saving insulin they may not be able to afford.
Saturday,September 25,2021
Jones Park in Gulfport
18 | September 2021
www.smliving.net | SOUTH MISSISSIPPI Living
The Rocha family.