Cassey Campbell shares how Type 1 diabetes hasn’t stopped her from accomplishing her goals

By Sarah Dills

Published April 25, 2021

Watching the 60-pound golden bundle of energy running around the room, jumping from the couch to the floor and sprinting around the table, one might forget for a moment his insane intellectual abilities. Lony, a 3-year-old goldendoodle, is trained to alert his owner of oncoming low or high blood sugar episodes.

“He’s probably the funniest dog you’ll ever meet,” Cassey Campbell said with a smile. “As a service dog, he knows when he’s working and when he’s not. So when his vest comes off, he’s just Mr. Personality. He is very energetic and sweet.”

Campbell, a Type 1 diabetic, has had Lony working as a Diabetic Alert Dog for two years. After receiving seven months of training, Lony reacts to the smells emitted from chemical shifts caused by low or high blood sugar in Campbell’s body.

Cassey and Lony, October 2019. Photo by Chrissy Campbell.

Since she was diagnosed six years ago, Campbell’s life was flipped upside down and inside out. Yet through the difficult times, she is able to feel grateful for the blessings she has.

“When I was diagnosed, my life was changed forever,” she said. “And my perspective changed; I’m a lot more thankful for the life I’ve been given, even though I deal with constant challenges that normal people don’t.”

Nick Keitel, Campbell’s boyfriend of two years, recognizes her hard work and the ways she has persevered through the difficulties her autoimmune disease has created.

“She’s a very driven individual who has never made any excuses in life and is someone who inspires me to be better,” Keitel said. “She got diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at a young age, but never let that stop her from going after her goals.”

Not letting the diagnosis get in her way, Campbell pursued her passion for playing soccer. She spent three years playing on a national team that traveled around the U.S. and played other countries’ teams. As a starting center back, Campbell played her best, rarely leaving the field, game after game, even if that meant consuming a glucose tablet or a juice box as she did.

“I was one of the first Type 1 diabetics to [play for a national team] in the United States,” Campbell said. “So that was pretty cool.”

Campbell also graduated from high school a semester before her peers in December 2018. The following August, she moved from her hometown, Monument, Colorado to Fort Collins, Colorado to study Spanish and International Studies at Colorado State University.

While Campbell keeps up with her studies, she enjoys hiking, cooking, camping, kayaking and spending time with her friends and family. She continues to impress those around her as she perseveres and fights for the life she wants to live.

“Every day,” Chrissy Campbell, Cassey Campbell’s mother, said. “I’m proud of her literally every day. She is very brave.”

“She’s already made great accomplishments and strides in life by the age of 20 with a disability that ruins people’s lives,” Keitel said. “But she rose above that struggle and didn’t let the disability define her. She is writing her own story while being a positive influence in the lives of everyone who knows her.”

Along with all of her successes, Campbell has also overcome many struggles and difficult periods.

“Later in my high school life, I started having mental issues with my physical disability,” Campbell said. “I started rebelling against myself after realizing how different I was from the students and peers around me. And that ended up putting me into a bad cycle of substance abuse, depression and mental instability.”

Luckily, Campbell was able to get herself back on track. She decided she needed to focus on herself and her well-being. By cutting ties with a lot of friends and creating more stable relationships with those who cared about her, she was able to pull herself out of that dark place.

Chrissy Campbell said that she could go on and on about how incredible her daughter is and how proud she is of her.

“Most people don’t realize how hard [diabetes] actually is on the body and how grueling it is,” Chrissy Campbell said. “You’re literally pressing your body from the second you wake up until you go to bed; and it doesn’t even stop there. It’s all night long in your sleep as well. Then you have to get up and do it again; it’s just so much work. And I don’t think everyone knows that. So for me to watch her do that for so many years repetitively and never complain; to succeed while doing it and accomplish so much… It’s amazing.”

Cassey Campbell, 4/21/2021. Photo by Sarah Dills.

Even with her daily challenges, Campbell said she knows that there are many other Type 1 diabetics in worse positions.

“I’m really blessed with proper medical equipment, and a family that supports me with all of my daily struggles, and they provide for me as well,” Campbell said. “[Other Type 1 diabetics] are constantly suffering from financial instability or mental and physical instability because they cannot afford medical care or anything like that.”

She is currently working on a Type 1 diabetes awareness project for one of her classes. It is important to her that there is a better understanding of the differences between Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes, as well as the limited accessibility to treatments.

“[Type 1 and Type 2] are actually very different from each other and they should not be categorized under the same disease,” Campbell said. “And people do not understand the severity of both of them and the challenges and financial burden that it inflicts onto people.”

In addition to spreading awareness of the disease, Campbell loves to learn about diverse communities and how they have come to be what they are today.

“I’m passionate about learning all about different histories, languages, literature, cultures,” Campbell said. “That’s the career I’m pursuing, and that’s what I’m loving at the most right now.”

As she is about to finish her sophomore year at CSU, Campbell looks to the future and is excited to continue moving forward.

“At the moment, I just want to get my degree,” Campbell said with a chuckle. “I also want to continue maintaining my health and prioritizing my health. And long term, I just want to have financial stability and comfortability. And lead a happy and healthy life.”

As she continues going through her days with a positive attitude, a strong support system and Lony following close behind her heels, Cassey Campbell counts her blessings and enjoys all of what life has to offer.

Listen to a portion of an interview with Cassey here: