Are parents of juvenile onset diabetics (type 1's), over protective?

I read several diabetic forums. And I've noticed how the parents of the younger diabetics, seem to me, obsessive over their child being a diabetic. Now please don't think I'm being mean or judgmental.  Read my entire post before thinking I'm being a mean old bitch.

I've read that the parents will check their children's blood sugars at night, give them juice to drink when they are low, while they are sleeping!  This I cannot understand.  Why don't they wake the kid up??  Tell the kid they are in an insulin reaction (low) or have low blood sugar and need to ear something.  Not just give them a juice box to suck on.  I think this makes it harder for the child to learn how to tell when they are low at different times during their lifetime.

Then the parents worry when to give the control to their child. When is the best time, as in age, to do this they wonder? How do I get my teenager to wake up to check their sugar? To do their bolus'? To me this boggles my mind.  Why hasn't said child been helping with all of this all along?

Now for why I asked you not to call me a mean old bitch.

 

See, my parents didn't give a rats ass about me. I am really surprised that they got me diagnosed in the first place. I really don't know why they did. I went to two one week says at a Diabetic camp, called Camp Needle Point. When I returned after the second time, at the age of nine, I was told that I was now in control of my diabetes. Yep. Me. A nine year old was given total control of her diabetes. I was no longer allowed to ask my parents for help with how much insulin I should have.  It was up to me to make sure I was putting the correct amount of insulin in the syringe.  I had to check to make sure my urine sugars were okay and the ketones were always negative. It was all left on my shoulders. At the age of NINE.

The only training I had was from Camp Needle Point.  You could also add from my stay at the hospital at the age of 5, ha ha ha.  And if you want to push it, from me listening when my parents got their training from my “diabetic” doctor. The real sad thing is I saw my diabetic doctor maybe 4 times after my diagnosis.

I was given all my old medical records about 20 years ago and I noticed during my teenage years that several times when I went to get my yearly fasting I was well over 200. One time I was 450 and my MD said I should go visit the “diabetic” doctor. I was in my middle teens at this time. I know for a fact we never went to see him.

It is amazing I am still alive considering I was doing everything for my diabetics without any help from anyone. Everyone assumed my parents were in control of my disease. They only yelled at me not to eat things when we were with family at family gatherings.  And let me tell you, this was very hard on me when I was the one who was responsible for my care 99% of the time.  But when with family, mom and dad pretended to be the ones who were in control of me.

I can't believe I don't have any complications.

So I'm wondering if I'm tainted because of my past.  Are parents of diabetics really this caring? Because I didn't have this, it's just unbelievable to me. Do the parents of children of diabetics do everything I listed above and more?  I just don't know because I never had it.  I'm not trying to be mean or insensitive.  I just comprehend.