Diabetics Doing Bikini Competitions with Devan D'Silva

[00:00:00] Rob Howe: Welcome to the Diabetics Doing Things podcast. We're back with new episodes in 2017 telling the amazing stories of type 1 diabetics across the world. I'm your host, Rob Howe, and if you'd like to get involved with Diabetics Doing Things, all you have to do is shoot me an email or reach out via Instagram. What's up, everybody? Rob Howe here. Just wanted to throw some gratitude your way this afternoon because we just crossed over 25,000 downloads all time for Diabetics Doing Things. and I owe that all to you. So thank you guys so much for listening. It totally makes my day whenever you tell me that the podcast has affected you positively in some way. So keep listening. I appreciate you to the max. All right, let's get back to the episode. Hello, welcome back to another episode of Diabetics Doing Things. We're back telling the amazing stories of type 1s and all the things that they do outside of their disease. But I'm very, very, very excited to introduce you to my guest today, Miss Devan D'Silva calling from Chicago today. Devan, how are you?

[00:01:05] Devan D'Silva: Good, good. How are you?

[00:01:06] Rob Howe: I'm doing just fantastic. Really, really excited to kind of get everybody in behind the scenes of the things that are going on in your life and hopefully gain a little bit of inspiration there. And I think for you specifically, and this is sort of what stemmed when you reached out to me, you are a fitness bikini competitor. And as a type 1, I feel like that puts you in a sort of rare group. And we're really excited to kind of talk through not only how you got to that point, but things that you've learned about yourself and your diabetes since then.

[00:01:43] Devan D'Silva: Yeah, absolutely. I'm excited to tell my story for sure.

[00:01:47] Rob Howe: So let's kind of start from the beginning as we do and kind of give us the background on your

[00:01:53] Devan D'Silva: diagnosis? Yeah, so I got diagnosed with type 1 diabetes when I was 16 months old. So I have had it, I'm now 26. I've had it for obviously pretty much my entire life. As far as my diagnosis, I actually just had my mom retell the story recently because she was really there for it. Her and my father were very instrumental in making sure that I was set off with a good road to start with as a diabetic, which it's so rocky, especially for two new parents, you know, with their daughter only being 16 months old at the time. So it all started actually at McDonald's.

[00:02:40] Rob Howe: So that's where great all great diabetic stories begin and end. Right.

[00:02:44] Devan D'Silva: Yeah, exactly. um and so we had gone I really it was a hot day I really wanted um a burger and or like a happy meal and and uh some milk and so my mom got the happy meal gave me the milk and I just drank the milk and typically kids will go for the fries or the toy you know something else besides milk and I finished the milk and asked for another one. My mom's like, well, that's kind of odd. So she thought about it a little bit and ended up calling my doctor and said, hey, listen, I feel like something's a little off. My daughter is acting really thirsty. My doctor's response was, well, I'm sure it's just because it's a hot day out. Don't worry about it. and I ended up, you know, going through, I was, I was peeing a lot. So I had gone through a couple of diapers and my mom's like, no, this is really strange. You know, I need to get her checked out, brought me into my doctor who then told my mom to take me immediately to the emergency room. And there I got my blood sugar tested and my blood sugar was about 600. And of course, the initial reaction from, you know, two new parents is what's happening to my child. And so they started this whirlwind of learning how to give their 16-year-old diabetic child shots. As a 16-month-old, you know, as a baby, it's difficult enough to get them to sit still. But to get them to sit still and also give them shots is very difficult to watch and also very difficult to do. So that's kind of where that all started. And it's very interesting just in general to see how far we've come with as far as diabetes education. so when you start out as a newly diagnosed diabetic, now I'm hearing of all these great stories of how children have learned how to give themselves insulin shots and they're really put through a specific program, whereas they were still trying to understand diabetes at that time. So you can understand it was a little bit of a rocky road, but they did a great job. I mean, here I am, so it worked out pretty well.

[00:05:33] Rob Howe: Yeah. And I think, you know, you make a great point that we've made so many huge strides in terms of diabetes education in, you know, really in the last 10 years since I was diagnosed even. And something that I talk about a lot is that my experience being diagnosed at Children's Medical Center was, you know, fantastic. It's an amazing hospital. It's, you know, a top pediatric hospital in the world. And they have an amazing endocrine team. and so I didn't know any other way and so it wasn't until later when I was started doing this podcast when I realized that so many people's diagnosis experience varies it's like either they got a dvd in another language and were said hey good luck or you know they had something like me where I spent four or five days in the hospital getting educated I kind of want to focus on something and I have a quick question for you are were you your parents only child at that point or

[00:06:27] Devan D'Silva: or maybe still? I was there one and only. I'm no longer. I have a little brother too.

[00:06:34] Rob Howe: So, you know, like you said, being a new parent, you know, and that being your only experience, and maybe 16 months in, like just getting used to like the idea of having somebody else and learning to be a parent, but then, you know, throwing diabetes into that. What, when your mom and your dad talk about that, what kind of emotion, what were they going through? What were they thinking about? What was, you know, how did it, how did that affect them?

[00:07:01] Devan D'Silva: Um, depends on what day you ask my parents. So, um, I will tell you that it was very emotional for them because you never want to see your child put through any sort of pain, nor do you want to be putting them through what seemed like physical pain at the time, because you have this needle that when you look at it compared to a 16-month-old child seems absolutely huge, and you're trying to now stick your child's finger about 8 to 10 times a day, maybe even more because you're worried that their blood sugar is dropping because they might not be able to tell you, or you're giving them an insulin shot anywhere from 5 to 15 times a day. I mean, it really depends. So a very emotional time for them. Sometimes when we retell the story, you can kind of tell that it takes them a while to talk about it. And I think that's just because it makes them relive it a little bit And it was terrifying for them to see because ultimately you really don't know what's going on with your child. And so you want them to be healthy. You want them to lead a very fun, fulfilled life, and you really want the best for them. So what it brings into question is really what does the future of my child look like? And I think that was really difficult for my parents to figure out at the time because they didn't know. And so all they had to go off of was that maybe that week long that we were in the hospital. And then they spend time questioning, you know, well, what's going to happen to my child when I put them through school and I'm not going to be there? Or, you know, how are they going to handle this when they go away to college? I mean, all of those thoughts are going through their head when I got diagnosed.

[00:09:15] Rob Howe: And I think you hit it right on the head, right? And especially from that diagnosis point, you're going to get different opinions or, you know, medical opinions even on what the future of your child looks like. and then you you know it's it's your opportunity as a parent to react to that and you know and take and take that whether it's a good outlook a positive or an optimistic outlook or it's more on the pessimistic side I think I've I've had people on the show who talk about you know doctors saying that they wouldn't make it till their 30th birthday that you know from the start you know that's that's quite the diagnosis you know that's quite the downer walking out and I think you know where I see you know a lot of type ones are successful and myself included is that like their parents took ownership of hey I'm going to do whatever I can and learn whatever I can to make sure that my child can live their life to the fullest and also do whatever they want to do. So let's taking that sort of point of view how did how did that you know and your parents you saying, hey, what's the future of my child look like? How did that manifest itself? Going through and growing up, anything stand out?

[00:10:32] Devan D'Silva: Yeah, actually, a couple things. So our biggest roadblock or whatever you'd like to call it or challenge as my parents and I would like to call it was not our doctors. We had great doctors. and I actually had the same endocrinologist up until I was about 18. So they kept me on, I think it was a couple of years after I was 18 and it was a pediatric endocrinologist, but she was fantastic. They really provided the best care for me and new recommendations. I was one of one of their youngest patients that they put on a pump at the time. My biggest challenge and my parents' biggest challenge was school. So I went to Olive-Mary Stitt. It was an elementary school in Arlington Heights, Illinois. And I distinctly remember being in. And so they had our classrooms and they were combined with first through third graders. And so you really get a diverse group of students in those rooms. And as a diabetic, you know, you may have to take an extra trip down to the nurse's office. And kids don't really understand that. And when children don't understand something, it manifests itself in negativity. Because they automatically put you in a box of, well, she's not normal. And so like everyone else I'm sure has experienced, we had bullies at school. And at one point I was out on the playground minding my own business. I had a group of about five to eight little girls running around the playground following me, calling me diabetes girl. And as a third grader, you can imagine that is traumatizing. And so I was eventually backed into a corner where I turned around, stood my ground and said, back off. Now, what you'll find very interesting about this story is I got in trouble. I was the one that got in trouble. So I told these little girls to back off, and I was sat down by the teacher and then the principal with my mother and told that I shouldn't have done that. It was incredible. My parents were furious, ended up pulling me out of that school after third grade. and I went to St. James Middle School where we had a fantastic principal, Mr. Messina at the time. And we wished that the bullying would have stopped with a different school, but it didn't. It just came up in different ways. And I had become stronger from the situations that had happened at Olive-Mary Stitt. And so I found different ways to handle those situations, you know, ignoring it or standing up to bullies and saying, you know, cut it out. and at this school what the difference was is that I had support from my principal who would talk to these students and tell them you know you shouldn't be doing this this is not okay this is not how we bring you guys into this school and that was something that I didn't have

[00:14:48] Rob Howe: at the school I was at prior but I think an important lesson right from your from your parents at that point is that, you know, we're gonna, we're gonna have your back in and because you're right, this is this situation is wrong. We're gonna go where you know, where we can be successful and say, you know, rather than somebody who's maybe more small minded. Yep. So, you know, going forward, like with that, you know, and you mentioned, like, you did change the way that you responded to those bullies. And, you know, thankfully had more support behind you. What what difference did that make for you, you know, going forward as, as in not necessarily in a bullying, but maybe overcoming a stereotype or doing something that's more outside the box of what someone would typically think a diabetic or someone with type 1 or type 2 diabetes would do, you know, breaking that mold. I mean, and I'm, I think specifically now I'm talking about your fitness competitions. How, how, How did those formative years and those decisions and standing your ground there change the way you looked at the rest of your life and the rest of your possibilities?

[00:15:59] Devan D'Silva: Yeah, so what I really spent a lot of my time doing is instead of focusing on, you know, how do I handle the aggression I'm getting from these bullies and how do I turn this into a positive spin? And so my positive spin was educating people. And it was educating my friends at the time of how to handle a diabetic. And, you know, what happens if your blood sugar goes low? What does that actually mean? When I'm giving myself insulin, what does that mean? So my life started to become, you know, I was Devan the, you know, the student and Devan the daughter and Devan the swimmer. But I was also Devan, the diabetic who would help you understand what I was going through. And so as I went through high school and then into college, I really focused my time on breaking barriers that a lot of people said I couldn't do. A lot of people said I couldn't be a successful bikini competitor just because it's very difficult for diabetics to lose weight and cut down to a low body fat as a diabetic competitor. I tried to do my research and tried to find out as much as I could about type 1 diabetics competing and had a very difficult time. So I sought out my coach. Her name's Kelly Tenuta, and I joined her team called Divine Athletes. And she had never trained a type 1 diabetic before and said, you know what? That's fine. We're going to do this. She has now been my coach for three years. and we have broken barriers that people couldn't even think were possible. I have competed in nine shows, two of which have been national level. And so a national level show means I had to place at least top five in a local level show to be on that stage. and in five of my nine shows I placed in top five and I placed in the top ten in those other two shows that were not the national shows so we're clearly doing something right and I'm just here to share a little bit about how we've gone down that journey because it is very difficult. It is different. And it is something that I would challenge other diabetics to try if they're interested and just take the plunge and do it. You'd be amazed at what you learn about yourself.

[00:19:15] Rob Howe: Well, and I really want to focus on sort of that journey, right? So if I'm, and correct me if I'm wrong here, but just some of the research that I did. So really in 2013, you started this journey. And I think you mentioned you've been with your coach for three years. So you've, um, you've been doing this three years and you've had awesome success really right at the get go. So, um, talk about some of the challenges. Um, you know, I, with my athletic background as well, I know that there are days where either because you have had a tough blood sugar day or just from a fitness recovery or preparing for a workout and everything's been the same and or you but you have you've eaten the same you've gotten the same amount of sleep but your blood sugar is just out of whack or you crash after a after a workout for some reason and you can't figure that out talk a little bit about the day-to-day struggle so because obviously you don't become a bikini competitor with that type of success overnight take us through that sort of day-to-day yeah so when you

[00:20:17] Devan D'Silva: start, so typically my seasons are 15 to 20 weeks long. So that's 15 to 20 weeks of a training season. And the last about 12 weeks of that is a deep lead. And so a deep lead is where you're actually cutting weight. And that's where your focus is. And so you're also cutting your calories at the same time. So for me, previously, we have started out very slowly. And so what I mean by that is, unlike a competitor without type 1 diabetes, we have to give our we had to give ourselves a buffer time because I had I needed at least two or three weeks to figure out how my blood sugars were going to react to what I was doing. And to actually do that, what I did is I put everything in an Excel spreadsheet. And this is just like my type A personality. I put everything in Excel spreadsheets. It helps me keep things organized. But what it looked like is essentially you have your date, your time, your blood sugar, and then how much insulin, your insulin to carb ratio. And then you look at your correction factor and how much insulin you gave for your correction. And then lastly, what I was doing at that time. So if it was a pre-workout or post-workout. Now, the luxury that I got is that all of my meals were the same seven days a week. So that's something that my coach really likes to hone in on is that you're eating the same things, which makes it incredibly easy to manage my blood sugars. So I can take three to four days, look at it and say, OK, I'm always running low after this time or after this workout. I either need to move my meals. So I have a meal with carbs or I need to move my workouts. or I need to adjust my insulin. So it kind of allowed me to do that analysis that if I would not have put all of that down on an Excel spreadsheet, I wouldn't have looked at it as

[00:22:45] Rob Howe: closely. So really, I mean, consistency, obviously, I think is a huge thing there, but also commitment to tracking. Right, absolutely. And additionally,

[00:23:00] Devan D'Silva: it, it's helpful to know kind of that, you know, if you have a coach, it's good to know that they're there and they're listening to you and they're understanding and being flexible. So I am lucky enough to have a coach that actually gives me meal plans. Whereas most coaches will give you macros and say, good luck. So a lot of times if a diabetic is looking to compete and they get macros, they're like, well, I could have a Quest bar this day and salmon and potatoes at the same time the next day. And that really messes with your blood sugars because both of those types of foods will

[00:23:40] Rob Howe: interact differently. Right. And I think what you're saying really is that committing to a relationship with a coach or as you're preparing for really anything, whether it's a bikini competition or like a Spartan race or just a 5k or even, you know, even something simple, like going to play 18 holes of golf, like, um, understanding kind of where you're at from a blood sugar standpoint, what you've eaten and how that's going to react to your body

[00:24:09] Devan D'Silva: is, is going to give you some sort of success. Right. And so what, where it gets really interesting is as a type 1, I can put on muscle a lot easier than the non-diabetic competitor.

[00:24:28] Rob Howe: Now, is that a factor, and I'm sorry, I cut you off. No, it's fine. Is this an insulin factor? Are we going to discuss a little bit of that?

[00:24:35] Devan D'Silva: Yeah. So insulin being a hormone, it actually helps you to build muscle. and what it doesn't do though is help you lose weight so I have great off seasons because I can put on you know more muscle but then when it comes to you know shredding it down it's uh it's more difficult. And so because of the insulin injection sites, you actually, if you don't rotate your sites, you get scar tissue, which tends to show the appearance as you lean out of cellulite. So for years and years, I gave myself insulin shots in my legs. And now when I start leaning out, you can tell that it looks like I have cellulite, but I can assure you it's not. It's the years and years that I have of scar tissue on my legs. And so a lot of what our focus is on during my season, and when I say a season, it's that 15 to 20 week prep season where I'm cutting down. it's also a lot of um you know rolling out my legs trying to break up a lot of that scar tissue and i've actually started to spend you know full year off season staying away from my legs as far as injections go because i really need to allow those um allow those cells to kind of get back to where they were and allow some of that scar tissue to break up.

[00:26:25] Rob Howe: Well, and I think that's something that, you know, a lot of type ones, whether they're, you know, competing with their bodies or not deal with is like, when do I rotate? You know, how do I, because I feel like everyone has some sort of self-consciousness about scarring and about scar tissue buildup. I know for a long time, I only wore my pump sites on my stomach. So I have kind of like the sides of my stomach. So I have scar tissue there. And I've fortunately in the last year or so, thanks to the encouragement of one of my friends, have been moving my sites around more and varying them and have a more systematic approach to it so that not one particular piece of my, part of my body gets abused, I guess for lack of a better term from a site perspective. But I think, you know, obviously with you, as it could affect your score and the way you perform, you know, what other areas have you found to give yourself injections since you now no longer use your legs?

[00:27:28] Devan D'Silva: Yeah, so I, when I took my off season this past year, I was like, you know, I'm going to stop doing my legs. I'm going to stop putting insulin in my legs. And then I'm like, all right, well, I need to find a different system. And so originally my system was, okay, well, Mondays I'll do the back of my left arm. Tuesdays I'll do the back of my right arm, you know, and so forth. And I decided that's way too complex because then you forget. And like everyone else, I'm busy. And so I'll end up doing my right arm on a Monday when I did that yesterday and I shouldn't have. So I decided to keep it simple and just do left side, right side. Super easy to remember. And I will do the backs of my arms. My long acting will always go in my glutes. And I try and stay away from my hips because, again, those were my favorite spots to do insulin shots. but what I've the place that I've actually found that a lot of people don't like is like right on your side because I have just enough there um where it isn't an area that's been touched before it's like right above my hip and like right below my rib cage and you can kind of go in a um a line as far as like when I'm doing them throughout the day so I'm not doing the same site over and over again. And then I know also if I notice that like my blood sugars are running a little bit higher that day, that maybe I'm hitting some scar tissue there. So my backup site is always my stomach because that I know if I need insulin and I need it to react quickly, my stomach I never touch. So I know that that's where I do my injection site. It's kind of like an emergency injection

[00:29:32] Rob Howe: site. It's like the pull this in case of, uh, in case of fire, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And,

[00:29:38] Devan D'Silva: and it's worked well. So, um, I keep up with it and that system, that system's worked for me. Um, I know that a lot of diabetics say it's so painful, like wherever I do injections, it's painful. You really just have to kind of try and, and find the place that works for you because I never in a million years would have guessed that that little spot right above my hips would have worked for me, but it does. And so it's just more of a challenge as a diabetic to say, okay, this might be out of my comfort zone, but let me try it once, see if it works. And if it does, then you found a great new spot.

[00:30:21] Rob Howe: Oh, absolutely. And I think, you know, you came down to it. It's all about what works best for you, whether that's pain or convenience or whatever the case may be. I want to shift gears a little bit. I want to talk about, as you were going through this process over the last three years and really putting in this work, were there any other type ones? I know there are a lot of type 1 bodybuilders or people who run Spartan races or do a lot of cycling. Anybody in particular that you looked at and were like, wow, if they can do it, so can I.

[00:30:54] Devan D'Silva: I have had amazing people reach out to me. And I've learned a lot about what other people go through as type 1 diabetics that are either just looking to stay in the gym or they were just diagnosed and they're trying to figure out how to figure it out. Those are the people that are more impactful to me are the ones that reach out to me. because ultimately they're seeing me as somebody that they can talk to and kind of pick their brain. I actually just had somebody reach out to me recently and say, hey, I'm looking to compete. Where do you do your injections? Like, I don't see that you have scar tissue. Where do you do those? and it's amazing to see the support from one type 1 diabetic in the fitness world to another and that support really kind of warms your heart it's something that you don't see in all sorts of communities especially the fitness community the fitness community can be very dark sometimes. It can be very competitive. But us type 1 diabetics, we really like to stick together. And it's something where I have type 1 diabetics that comment on my pictures and like my photos on Instagram. And they're saying, hey, listen, I see you. You're doing a great job. Teach me what you do. Let me understand what you do. And at the same time, I'm here to support you. Like I'm here in your corner cheering for you and I may be halfway across the world. And that's something that is so amazing that you find in this sport, that little group that is sitting there and really watching you from afar. And they're always there to be a listening ear or to understand your journey and they know what you go through and they understand it, which is just, it's so incredible. I can't even put words to it. It's just so great.

[00:33:14] Rob Howe: Well, and it's interesting. I talk to people a lot about different types of communities online in my professional career, and then also talk a lot about the diabetic community when I do interviews and things. It's very unique. I think we take it for granted sometimes, but it's so encouraging. It's so selfless, and everybody's so willing to lend a hand. And I think it's also really like reached kind of not critical mass, I would say, but it's grown a lot in the last year, year and a half, especially on Instagram. And I think, you know, that's a benefit of like hashtag searching. Like people can find find what they're interested in and find the people and then like reach out directly and talk to them and have a conversation. And I think, you know, ultimately, that's that's what's so cool about, you know, everyone is, you know, in myself included. The only the only way I have the interviews that I have is just to ask if they want to come talk about it. And like nine times out of 10 in the type 1 community, you ask somebody for help. Like they're going to respond and like and be willing to help you. And I think that's so, so rare. And, you know, you don't you don't get to pick your family and nobody picked to have type 1. But I'm glad that we're all in this together just because it's everyone's so giving and so welcoming and it's just so unique. And I always really want to make sure that people know that. Like if you're out there feeling alone, like there are a million, you know, 1.25 million of us here in the U.S. and, you know, millions of others around the world who are totally willing to have a conversation. All you have to do is reach out.

[00:34:44] Devan D'Silva: Right. And I mean, oftentimes it's crazy because you get the type 1 diabetics that will reach out to you and saying, I got diagnosed when I was a teenager. It turned my world upside down. and that really I mean it really puts things in perspective because I I've had diabetes for almost my entire life this is all I know and you know sometimes you just kind of have to understand that everybody comes from um well while we all have the same disease everybody comes from a different place. You know, they may have started and not been bullied. You know, they may have been diagnosed and not been bullied. Or like I said, some people, their lives get turned upside down and they're really just trying to grasp what life used to be like and how to go back to feeling like they belong sometimes. And really, I would challenge anybody, if you have somebody reach out to you and they're looking to pick your brain or they're just looking to talk or they really just want to understand your journey, don't shut them out. It's not worth it. It only takes about five to 10 minutes to talk to somebody and to keep an open mind and to let them know that you're there just to listen and that you're there to also share your story and let them know that they're not in it alone. And it's something that, you know, we're really, we're really blessed with.

[00:36:30] Rob Howe: It is. And I, and I think, you know, it's certainly worth like, you know, just continuing to mention over and over. And like you said, it doesn't take that long. Continue to be open, continue to grow. I always ask this question. And, and I, and lately I've been trying to figure out how to tailor it to get maybe a little bit different responses. But for you, somebody who was diagnosed very young, I'm sure you don't remember life without diabetes. What would you tell either someone who's been just recently diagnosed as like a teen or a little bit older or the parent of a young child with type 1? What's the one thing that you would tell them?

[00:37:11] Devan D'Silva: I would tell them never to give up. Don't let this disease think, don't think that because of this disease, you are not going to be able to accomplish wonderful things. Do not for a second. And as a parent of a diabetic, don't ever think that. And make sure that you're there and you're supporting your child and and you're there telling them that everything will be okay they will still accomplish great and wonderful things and while some aspects of their life may change it will build them up it will build their character it may not seem like it right then and there but it will and you will you will be stronger from it and oftentimes people don't believe that right you know you go through an obstacle in your life and you're like gosh when is this going to let up but it happens for a reason and you will get through it and you have a support system and if you don't know where to go something you can ask your doctor about you can use your friends as your support system and just keep a positive and open mind and do your best to continue on with the life that you have and try not to lose sight of that.

[00:38:46] Rob Howe: I couldn't have said it better. And, you know, I think it's really important, like maybe that reinforcement of that idea of like never give up. I think, you know, we're, and we're all in this together. Right. Um, and, but I really, really liked what you said about, um, like for parents of diabetics, like, you know, it will pay off in the long run. And it's hard to see that now in that moment, but, um, yeah, really strong words. I appreciate it. Yeah. Devan, uh, thanks so much for coming on

[00:39:17] Devan D'Silva: the show today. Yeah, no problem. This was fantastic. This is great. Well, it was great

[00:39:22] Rob Howe: to get to know you a little bit and um you know i'm really interested to kind of follow you in your journey as well um for our listeners uh who want to follow you or get in touch with you on social media uh where this is your chance to sort of plug your profiles yeah so my um instagram

[00:39:41] Devan D'Silva: name is at d dev dev so d d e v d e v um and then instagram or uh facebook is Devan D'Silva so um i was just talking to rob about this before um but i'll spell it out because i get lost a lot of times on social media, but it's Devan, D-E-V-A-N, and D'Silva, D-apostrophe S-I-L-V-A. And so I'd love to connect with any of you guys. Please feel free to reach out to me. I'd love to hear your story. I'd love to share mine. And I really appreciate you guys listening.

[00:40:22] Rob Howe: That's awesome. And yeah, just for the record, for the listener's record, I did pronounce Devan's name correctly the first time. So I will go on record saying that. He got brownie points. I love it. Thanks again, Devan. And, you know, I'll obviously include links to your profiles in the show notes, but I really appreciate you coming on. Perfect. Thanks. Thanks again for listening to Diabetics Doing Things. I'm going to try a new thing. I'm going to start sending out a Friday newsletter with just my thoughts for the week and some questions that you guys have asked, either on social media or that you emailed me. So if you want to do that, just subscribe on the website, DiabeticsDoingThings.com. See you again next time.