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A life story(open toranyoneBOOK REVIEW■ Needles: A Memoir of Growing Up With Diabetes by Andie Domin ick. Scribner: $22By William R. WinekeWisconsin State JournalMost diabetics contract their illness in adulthood, where it becomes a nuisance.But many children are also diagnosed with diabetes and are forced to rely on daily insulin injections to stay alive.Andie Dominick is one of those and her story of how she coped and copes with the disease is moving and disturbing.When a person has diabetes, her body doesn’t digest food correctly and blood sugars rise to dangerous levels. Insulin maintains a proper balance.Dominick, as a teen-ager, quickly learns there are advantages to being diabetic — and dangers.“Diabetes has its benefits. I canforce my body to feed on itself if I don’t give it any insulin. I risk aci-Andie Dominickdosis, but I don't really understand exactly what that is anyway. ... High blood sugars for long periods of time can cause damage to my body, but I’m young. My sister is still healthy and she’s had diabetes a lot longer than 1 have.”Denise later dies of a heart attack caused by cocaine and diabetes abuse. The next paragraph finds Dominick in the hospital.The fact is that no one really likes taking insulin and young people, in particular, are often willing to gamble with ignoring their disease.She later almost loses the sight in one eye — and the eye goes out during a wilderness hike in Alaska, far from medical care. Treatment involves a number ofsurgeries.The reader shares with Domin-ck her stupidities, her fears and. hankfully, her triumphs as she finds a husband, Doug, who caresfor her.This is not a book about med-cine. It isn’t even a book about di-ibetes. It is a book about a fragile, /et determined, young woman whos willing to tell her life’s story for inyone who might find benefit int.
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