AJ Heineman

One of our goals with the Jim’s Team is to create more awareness about Type One Diabetes and bring to the forefront how crippling, costly, dangerous and life-changing this disease can be for a young child or teenager. 

With our first-ever segment, we want to introduce to our viewers, 18-year-old AJ Heimann from Germantown, Illinois. He is a recent high school graduate (May, 2022) who was first diagnosed with Type One Diabetes at age 11. Some of the difficulties he has encountered in his seven years since includes:

• Taking a dose of insulin, by needle, on average seven times a day (2,500 shots in a calendar year)
• Woken out of bed to low and high blood sugar alarms several times each week. 
• Restricted from spending the night at other kid's houses.
• Since the onset of T1D, diagnosed with Thyroid Disease, Celiac Disease, and High Blood Pressure. 

• On a yearly basis, schedules four diabetes, two celiac, and one thyroid checkup with specialized doctors.