James Talarico

It was a 25 mile walk.

And I wasn't worried about my...

my ability to do the walk.

I hike Big Bend every year and I was perfectly healthy.

I was 28.

And halfway through the walk, I started to feel fatigued and nauseous.

I threw up a couple times along the walk.

Somehow I finished the thing.

And when I went home, I figured I was just dehydrated and I needed a good night's sleep.

I went to bed and I slept for 36 hours straight.

And so my family got concerned.

They took me to the ER where nurses checked my blood sugar.

I don't even know if I'd ever had my blood sugar tested before.

And they told me a normal blood sugar is 100 or lower, and mine was 900.

So I was in a state of diabetic ketoacidosis, which leads to coma and death without insulin.

and I was in the ICU for three days.

When I got out, I went to Walgreens to pick up my first 30-day supply of insulin, this new medicine that I now needed to live, and it cost me $684 for a 30-day supply.

And I didn't have that kind of money, still don't have that kind of money.

And so I put it on a credit card.

And many Texans with diabetes face the same kind of cost pressure.