HUMBOLDT — A Humboldt group is going to be recognized nationally for its efforts to raise money for research about type I diabetes.
Maria Strasser and Caitlin Hergott of the Humboldt and Area Team T1D will go to Toronto at the end of April to accept the JDRF community volunteer of the year award at their annual conference.
The team didn’t expect to receive the award.
“We were just really taken aback from it, to be honest. It was unexpected,” said Strasser, who added they did the work because many of the members either had type I diabetes or have family members with it. “We certainly don’t do it for an award, but it’s just really, really great to be recognized.”
In 2018, the Humboldt and Area Team T1D raised more than $41,800 to fund research about type I diabetes through events like the JDRF Humboldt and district walk to cure diabetes, bad moms’ movie nights, Duke Brochu’s skate-a-thon, a Broncos puck toss, a hockey draft, a kitchen fundraiser and a golf tournament.
For Strasser, she’s involved in the team because she has a 13-year-old daughter who was diagnosed with the condition when she was three.
“It’s an autoimmune disease, and there is currently no cure for it, so every little fundraising thing we can do, and the awareness that we raised, just goes to help improve the lives of those who are living with type I diabetes.”
The team, which has families from Humboldt and surrounding towns like Watson, Annaheim, Wadena and Munester, has been around for 14 years.
At first, they focused on hosting the walk, but decide to become more of a support group for type I diabetes in 2017 after they found they spent time at the organizational meetings just to talk about things that were going on in their lives and with their condition.
“So we thought, well, there’s other people out there who who need the support and so that’s why we started to change our group a little bit to be more of a support and education group,” Strasser said.
The Humboldt and Area Team T1D is also focusing on planning the annual walk, which will be held at the Uniplex on June 2. Registration starts at 10 am and the walk starts at 11 am.
