What are diabetes?

Diabetes is when your body has trouble keeping the right amount of sugar in your blood.

Imagine you have a juice box that you drink every morning. Normally, your body takes that sugar from the juice and uses it for energy. But if something goes wrong with how your body handles that sugar, it can cause problems.

Your body uses something called insulin to help move sugar from your blood into your cells, where it’s used as fuel. It's like a key that opens the door for sugar to get inside your cells.

If you have diabetes, either your body doesn’t make enough insulin or it can't use the insulin properly, kind of like having a broken key or a locked door. This means the sugar stays in your blood instead of going where it needs to go.

Over time, too much sugar in the blood can cause damage to parts of your body, just like leaving spilled juice on the floor for too long might make the carpet sticky and stained.

But with help from doctors and healthy habits, people with diabetes can still live happy, active lives, just like anyone else!