BELLVILLE — For Clear Fork’s Luke Watson, there’s more to a round of golf than selecting the proper club or deciding when to aim for the flag and when to lay up.
The game is a juggling act for Watson, a junior and the Colts’ No. 1 player the past two seasons. And finding the right balance is essential.
“It is the game within the game,” Watson’s father, Jim, said.
The younger of Jim and Peg Watson’s two sons, Luke was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes when he was 9 years old. He wears an insulin pump on his belt and must check his blood glucose level two or three times a round.
“I have to monitor it all the time. I keep my blood sugar level a little higher than normal when I’m on the golf course so I don’t bottom out,” Luke said. “If I bottom out, I can’t play. All I can do is sit or lay down until I get my blood sugar back up.
“If if drops suddenly, I’ll get weak and start to shake. I have to take sugar pills, which are called glucose tablets.”
According to statistics provided by the American Diabetes Association, approximately 29.1 million Americans, or about one in every 11 people, have diabetes. Only about five percent of people with diabetes have type 1 diabetes, (formerly called juvenile diabetes).
“It’s basically where the pancreas doesn’t produce insulin the way it is supposed to,” Luke said. “Normally, the body uses insulin to move sugar from the blood into the cells where it is converted into energy.
“Because I don’t have the (naturally produced) insulin, the sugar builds up in my blood and the cells can’t produce energy for everyday life.”
The cause is unknown and there is no cure.
“It was a scary thing, especially when he was first diagnosed,” said Jim, who retired from GM after 32 years and attends all of Luke’s matches. “We didn’t know what all it entailed.”
Jim can see the warning signs when Luke’s sugar level begins to fluctuate.
“Like I said, it’s the game within the game. We have the golf game we have to prepare for and then we have the sugar game,” Jim said. “I always have his sugar meter so when he makes the turn he’ll check it. Sometimes he will come up to me in the middle of a round and say, ‘Dad let me see the meter so I can see what it’s doing.’ It has been a learning process for us.
“When he first started playing, he wouldn’t like it when he was on the tee with the other players and I would come up and tell him he had to check his sugar,” Jim said. “He wouldn’t want the other kids to know he had the (insulin) pump on.”
The pump has been the cause of some confusion.
“We were playing in a tournament down in Columbus when Luke was a little younger and one of the dads of the kids Luke was playing with said, ‘The kids with the green shirt on has a cell phone,’ Jim said. “I turned around and told him, ‘It’s not a cell phone. It’s an insulin pump.’ The poor guy was looking for a hole to crawl into.”
Clear Fork coach Jeff Gottfried has been impressed with the way Watson has handled himself.
“He controls it himself. I just have to be aware of it and know what’s going on,” Gottfried said. “I have to keep an eye on him because sometimes in the middle of a round you can see something is not quite normal.
“When his sugar levels are where they are supposed to be, he looks like anyone else out there.”
As for Watson, he wants to prove diabetes isn’t debilitating.
“Maybe if some younger kids who have diabetes see me out here, they will realize you can live a normal life,” he said. “You can stay active and be athletic as long as you take care of yourself.”
Follow Curt Conrad on Twitter @curtjconrad.
