ANNOUNCER: “Let’s all play, To Tell The Truth! Here’s your host, Gaaarry Moooooore!”

GARRY MOORE: “Thank you everyone. Let’s meet today’s team of challengers, shall we? Number 1, what is your name, please?”

#1: “My name is Type One Diabetic.”

GARRY MOORE: “Number 2, what is your name?”

#2: “My name is Type One Diabetic.”

GARRY MOORE: “Number 3, what is your name?”

#3: “My name is Type One Diabetic.”

GARRY MOORE: “Alright, audience, here is Type One Diabetic’s story. Although I might look well, I am a sick man. With little warning, my healthy existence ended suddenly and forced me into a life of constant vigilance to keep my blood sugar at normal levels. I give special thought to being Type One Diabetic before everything I do, because when I least suspect, I can lose consciousness quickly, and I face the possibility of terrible consequences from complications years from now. Every day, I deal with a blood glucose roller coaster, and guard against an onslaught of misinformation about my condition that is constantly left for me -- and others like me -- to correct. Signed, Type One Diabetic.”

“Let’s say hello to our panel. Peggy Cass, Orson Bean, Kitty Carlisle, and Tom Poston. Welcome, panelists. You’ve heard the challengers, all three of them claim to be the real Type One Diabetic, but two of them are imposters. It’s up to you to decide which one is telling the truth by listening to how the three of them respond to your questions. Let’s start the questioning with Peggy.”

PEGGY CASS: “Thank you, Garry. Number 1, how long have you been Type One Diabetic?”

#1: “Um, I think, um, about, um, since, long time.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 2, how long have you been Type One Diabetic?”

#2: “It was Friday. Last Thursday or Friday. I was hoping I’d be over it by now, but it’s a tough one.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 3?”

#3: “August fifteenth, nineteen sixty-one. Late that morning. A Tuesday.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 1, how did you find out you were Type One Diabetic?”

#1: “Uhh, dude on the street says that’s the song I needa be singin’ to Joe Friday when they cold bust the crack house next time.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 2, how did you find out about being Type One Diabetic?”

#2: “I gained a lot of weight in a very short time, so I knew right away I was Type One Diabetic.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 3?”

#3: “I dropped 43 pounds in one month for no reason. I couldn’t be away from a bathroom for more than fifteen minutes at a time. My vision went blurry, and I had a constant, insatiable thirst. I drank enough Coke to make myself sick, but it didn’t quench the thirst. Then I discovered Gatorade, and it was like a religious experience. Six quarts of it every day. There was a tiny scratch on my arm that turned into ‘The Festering Wound From Hell,’ and everything had a disgusting smell. The drug store had a free screening, and they told me that my blood sugar was seven times what is should be.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 2, do you know what causes people to become Type One Diabetics?”

#2: “Yes. There is really only one reason, and it’s quite simple. I am Type One Diabetic because I ate a Skybar once when I was a child. Oh, and I should have played a few sports, too. Maybe gotten out of the house and been active more.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 3, do you agree with that?”

#3: “No.”

PEGGY CASS: “No? Why not?”

#3: “Mark Goodson said I had to be nice and not tee off on anyone while we’re on the air, so I’m just not going anywhere near that drivel. Ask Number 2 if he works at Associated Press.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 1, how does your family feel about you being Type One Diabetic?”

#1: “Family? Huh, huh. Ain’t got no family. ‘Cept a half-brother at da Hot House down Kansas. Bank job got broke up bad.”

PEGGY CASS: “What about your family, Number 2?”

#2: “My family does not know that I am Type One Diabetic. It has always been best to keep it from them for fear of the stigma. I love them very much, and I would never want them to suffer from the shame.”

PEGGY CASS: “Number 3, what does your family think?”

#3: “My wife is my rock. She is supportive and has saved me from hypoglycemia more times than I can count. My immediate family also cares very much, and they are always concerned about my health, but at the same time, they treat me no differently than they would if I was not Type One Diabetic. I have some aunts and uncles who tell me I’m Type One Diabetic because of all the Sweet Tarts I ate as a kid, and they say I wouldn’t need any insulin at all if I would just straighten up, fly right, and stop eating carbohydrates. It’s hard to get through to them. One of them is also Type One Diabetic, but won’t see a doctor and insists he feels fine when his sugar is 450. There are also some relatives who find even more fault with the way I try to communicate the real nitty gritty facts about my condition. It makes for some pretty awkward Thanksgiving moments, particularly when the pie comes around.”

PEGGY CASS: “Are you eating something, Number 3? You look like you’re chewing somethi . . .”

<<DING>> <<DING>>

GARRY MOORE: “Time’s up, we go to Orson.”

ORSON BEAN: “Challenger Number 1, do you take drugs or medicine of any kind because you’re Type One Diabetic?”

#1: “Uhh, drugs? Yeah. Medicine, uh, no, uhh, I don’t take nothin’.”

ORSON BEAN: “Number 2, any medicines?”

#2: “Yes. Geritol. Every day.”

ORSON BEAN: “Very nice, it’s always good to keep the sponsors happy. How about you, Number 3, same question.”

#3: “Humalog insulin administered from a Medtronic 522 insulin pump connected to my subcutaneous tissue through a forty-three inch flexible tube linked to a Silhouette quick-connect infusion set and a teflon cannula that I change out every three days. Sometimes it irritates my skin.”

ORSON BEAN: “What? But this is 1971. The world hasn’t even heard of Humalog.”

#3: “I also use a Continuous Glucose Monitoring System that clips to my belt. It doesn’t administer medication, but it . . .”

ORSON BEAN: “Of course, of course. Alright already. Thomas Edison over here. Number 1, do you have to be careful about what you eat?”

#1: “About whuh? Oh. No. Whatever’s in the Chili’s dumpster.”

ORSON BEAN: “Number 2, are you active, I mean, physically active?”

#2: “No, it’s best for Type One Diabetics to stay calm and quiet, and not perspire.”

ORSON BEAN: “Number 1, do you test often?”

#1: “Yeah, you gotta test the stuff first, or the big man start cutting it with Ajax, you know? Benzocaine? That’s Badville, USA, you know what I’m sayin’?”

ORSON BEAN: “Number 2, how important is it to test your blood sugar?”

#2: “Not important. It just gets me anxious, depressed, and worried. So it’s better just not to test at all. It’s only a number. There’s no meaning to it.”

ORSON BEAN: “Number 3, how often do you check your sugars?”

#3: “Look at these Swiss cheese fingertips. Ten, twelve times a day. It’s the first thing I do when I get up, the last thing I do before bed, and I even get up in the night sometimes to check my sugar. I check it before and after exercise, before and two hours after meals, and always before I get behind the wheel of my car. It’s the single most important piece of information I need for maintaining good control of my blood glucose levels, because it tells me whether I need to eat something, or if I need to take something called a ‘correction’ bolus of insulin to bring my blood sugar back down to where it belongs. Anyone who is Type One Diabetic and doesn’t do frequent blood sugar tests because of anxiety or depression is barking up the wrong tree. With that kind of thinking, nobody would bother to look at their car’s fuel gauge, either. Sure, you can avoid getting nervous about running out of gas by ignoring the gas gauge, but what are you going to do about the complications of being stuck later on down the road when it’s too late to help yourself?”

<<DING>> <<DING>>

GARY MOORE: “Now to Kitty to pick up the questioning.”

KITTY CARLISLE: “Number 1, what are all of those ghastly marks on your arms?”

#1: “Huh?”

LITTY CARLISLE: “Are you by chance a junkie?”

#1: “Geez, lady. This ain’t ‘What’s My Line,’ you know what I’m sayin’?”

KITTY CARLISLE: “Number 3, I’d like you to answer Orson’s questions. What can you eat, and how active can you be?”

#3: “I can eat just about anything that a person who is not Type One Diabetic eats, with some special considerations. I count carbohydrates in grams, and try to balance my diet with specific daily percentages of proteins, fats, and carbs. I calculate my insulin doses according to a carb/insulin ratio that was determined by me and my Type One Diabetic support team, and it’s always being fine-tuned because change is a constant for any Type One Diabetic. I exercise every day for at least half an hour, and I’m in a weekend softball league.”

KITTY CARLISLE: “Most impressive, Number 3. I’d like to ask Number 1, it seems there’s a lot to learn about being Type One Diabetic. Where do you find your information?”

#1: “Uhm, there’s a dude down the soup kitchen, and he knows . . .”

KITTY CARLISLE: “OK, Thank you. What about you, Number 2? How do you educate yourself about being Type One Diabetic?”

#2: “I read People, the Enquirer. And the morning shows, too. I like The View. And Oprah. She’s such a journalist. Dr. Phil, too.”

KITTY CARLISLE: “Number 3, tell me where your information comes from.”

#3: “I attend monthly support group meetings run by a local chapter of a major Diabetic Foundation. I read several periodicals on my disease, including a medical trade journal, and I prepare important questions for my endocrinologist and his Certified Diabetes Educator before every visit. I subscribe to daily online updates from several excellent sources of medical news from all over the globe. I also attend seminars whenever I can, and I read lots of blogs written by other people just like me.”

KITTY CARLISLE: “Blogs? What’s a blog? Oh, never mind. Do you watch GMA or the Today Show, Number 3?”

#3: “Not any more. Every day, it’s the same ol’ same ol’. How to beat constipation, how to let your kids in on mommy’s facelift, what’s in fashion for sunglasses. There’s nothing there, unless I feel like crying over someone’s personal tragedy.”

<<DING>> <<DING>>

GARRY MOORE: “Tom Poston, your questions for the challengers.”

TOM POSTON: “Number 3, you said you take medicine using some strange, 2001 Space Odyssey suborbital disconnecting tube thing. Do you have to take that medicine forever, or will you be able to wean yourself off of it someday?”

#3: “Nobody weans when you’re Type One Diabetic. It’s here for the duration.”

TOM POSTON: “Number 1, does it cost a lot to be Type One Diabetic?”

#1: “Uhm, not since they opened the nail exchange at Ward and Watson in the Bronx. I get ‘em free now. Share my toys with some dudes for a week, then jus’ bring ‘em back, they give ya new. As many as you want, bro. Huh, huh. If it’s for free, it’s for me. Huh, huh.”

TOM POSTON: “Number 2, does it cost you much?”

#2: “No, prices are very reasonable, and insurance pays for all of it with no questions asked. Most other Type One Diabetics will say the same thing.”

TOM POSTON: “Number 3, what does it cost you to be Type One Diabetic?”

#3: “Plenty. Between my 522, the CGMS, and my cell phone with an ICE number, I’ve got five figures worth of technology hanging off my belt. Then there’s the insulin. Sometimes I accidentally pull the reservoir plunger too far back and get a Humalog bath. What a waste. And I could talk for an hour on the topic of ‘When Infusion Sets Go Bad.’ It adds up, believe me. I can’t even blink without having to fill a script for some new statin or thyroid pill. And Geez Louise, don’t even get me started on test strips. Then it seems I’m always in a battle to the death with the insurance company for reimbursement. I’m not looking forward to telling them about the Symlin I have to start taking for my postprandials, either. Like I said, it costs plenty.”

TOM POSTON: “An ICE number?”

#3: “I.C.E. In Case of Emergency. You put it into your phone’s memory with a contact number of a family member. It’s for paramedics if I’m found unconscious and unable to talk. Sometimes they’re trained to look for ‘ICE’ on people’s cell phones because they have no other way to reach the family, and the ordinary names in a phone mean nothing to them. If they find ICE, they just hit call.”

TOM POSTON: “Number 2, do you ever get bothered by the police because you carry syringes and needles?”

#2: “No, it has never been a problem.”

TOM POSTON: “Number 1, any police problems?”

#1: “Rollers? Uhh, you’re kiddin,’ right? You mean this week? Man, the bull’s around, like, all the time now.”

TOM POSTON: “Number 3, any trouble with the law because you’re Type One Diabetic?”

#3: “Generally, no. I carry two copies of a signed letter from my endocrinologist when I’m traveling, and most law enforcement officials use their heads and understand my need to treat my condition. But that’s not to say I won’t run into problems in a public place if a policeman mistakes my hypoglycemia for alcohol intoxication. Airport security is usually pretty good, too, but they vary from city to city on how much OJ they’ll let me carry aboard an airplane. I have to be sharp in order to argue my case with them quickly, politely, and effectively. Those are just another couple of reasons why I need to keep tight control of my blood sugar.”

<<DING>> <<DING>> <<DING>> <<DING>>

GARRY MOORE: “Alright, the votes are in. Will the real Type One Diabetic please stand up.”