Sherri Shepherd has used her platform throughout her career to tell stories that many people can relate to. From award-winning roles in her illustrious acting career to hosting Sherri, Shepherd has consistently used her talents and personal testimonies to shine a light on realities for multiple people. It’s precisely why the talk show host’s latest collaboration falls in line with her legacy of highlighting issues that afflict individuals daily, including diabetes. Shepherd recently teamed up with Abbott Laboratories to launch Countdown at a Crossroads during National Diabetes Awareness Month, a campaign that supports broader awareness and access to Continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) technology. For Shepherd, the opportunity to help others impacted by the disease live a healthier life is one of the reasons she’s excited to get involved.
“I want to spread awareness of using a CGM to help folks monitor their glucose levels and to help them live a successful life because I see that many people are unaware of wearing a CGM. What I love about Abbott Laboratories is that they’re really trying to increase awareness. What also excites me is that, for every person who goes to www.crossroads.abbott, Abbott will donate 99 cents to the American Diabetes Association towards their Health Equity Now program. That represents 99 cents for 99% of people living with diabetes globally who don’t use a CGM.”
This collaboration is a personal one for the actress, as she was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes in 2007.
“I’ve been dealing with diabetes since 2007, and before that, I was prediabetic. For me, the campaign is so personal because when I got the official diagnosis that I was diabetic, I thought that my life was going to go downhill. I thought this meant that I was going to die like my mother, who passed away around 41 or 42 due to diabetic complications. I also thought of the lives of my family who have diabetes because I’ve lost many family members to complications from it. I went through a depression, and it truly was a crossroads for me because I had a newborn son. It was a crossroads for me because I had to figure out how I would navigate life with this kind of devastating news.”
While Shepherd battled depression as a result of the diagnosis, she decided to shift her perspective and look at it as a blessing as it changed her outlook on life. It’s one of the reasons why she’s so passionate about this partnership with Abbott.
“I chose to see it as a blessing of sorts because the diagnosis completely changed my life and the course of it. This is why I now look at labels and focus on my health. It’s why I’m now posting videos of me being in the gym at 5:00 in the morning, and I attribute that to the diagnosis of diabetes. It saved my life, and I just want to let people know that it’s not a death sentence. You can take this diagnosis, and you can choose to live successfully with it and let it guide you into making the right choices. I also partnered with Abbott Laboratories because I love that I had never heard of a continuous glucose monitoring device except when I used to prick my finger, which I hated doing because it hurt. I was excited when I found out about this CGM they have where you can just pop it on your arm, giving you all of your stats. And if I do something unusual for me, there’s this alarm that goes off to signal the change.”
The Chicago native feels like her life truly started to change when she made the decision to deal with the diagnosis directly as opposed to ignoring it.
“I think a lot of times with diabetes, or at least for me, I chose to ignore it for so long because I didn’t want to deal with it. That is what got me in front of a doctor, where I discovered the ramifications of what could happen should this go unchecked. It was only when I opened my eyes and said, ‘Okay, how am I going to deal with this? Because it’s not going away. What do I need to do?’ when my life just started to change.”
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