Diabetes, torn ACL can't slow Hampton runner

By: Saturday, September 21, 2024 | 11:01 AM

Like everyone else, Hampton junior Marissa Bigante has good days and bad days.

But lately, there are so many more good ones.

Roughly one year since being diagnosed as a Type 1 diabetic and suffering a torn ACL in a one-month span, Bigante is blossoming as a first-year cross country runner on a talented Talbots' girls team.

"What she's done is amazing," girls cross country coach Heather Dietz said. "I am just so proud of her. ... I'm sure she had hard days, but she never let that show."

Bigante, the Talbots' No. 5 or No. 6 runner, helped Hampton to first place at the Red, White and Blue Classic on Sept. 7, finishing 45th out of 169 runners in the Class 2A field.

She placed in the top 100 out of 351 Division II runners at the Boardman (Ohio) Invitational on Sept. 14 as Hampton took third among 34 teams.

The Talbots are undefeated in Section 4-2A and hoping to finish in the top 3 at the WPIAL Class 2A championships and qualify for the PIAAs as a team for the first time since 2000.

"It's going pretty well," said Bigante, who this season gave up soccer to make her cross country debut. "The team overall is doing great, and we're excited."

Bigante began her path to overcoming adversity in the summer of 2023, when she seemed to be moving in reverse.

A longtime soccer player and distance track runner, she was always thirsty, tired and her training wasn't going well.

"Runs were very difficult," she said. "I felt like I was going backward instead of forward."

In late July 2023, just before the start of her sophomore year, Bigante learned she has Type 1 diabetes. Her older sister, Julia, had been diagnosed with Type 1 about five years earlier.

"I knew the symptoms," Marissa said. "I used her finger pricker to test my blood sugar. We saw it was high, roughly 800."

By comparison, a normal, insulin-producing person typically has a blood sugar of about 100.

Bigante spent two nights at UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. She began taking insulin shots and embraced the changes required of a new diabetic.

Then things got worse.

In late August, she suffered a season-ending right knee injury in a soccer game against rival Mars.

"It was definitely rough," Bigante said. "I was basically going to be starting over."

Bigante had ACL surgery Oct. 6 and spent five months rehabilitating her knee. All along, she was managing her newly diagnosed diabetes. After one month, she started wearing a continuous glucose monitor to keep tabs on her blood sugar levels and two months after that, she began wearing an insulin pump on her arm.

She returned to the track this past spring, competing in the 800 and 1,600, along with the 3,200 relay. She also decided to run cross country in the fall instead of playing soccer on her surgically repaired ACL.

"It was hard starting from scratch and rebuilding all of my muscle," Bigante said. "I had to work my way up."

While her right knee is 100%, she still deals with the daily battle of controlling her blood sugar levels.

"In the beginning, it was a little difficult, especially managing it and making sure I wouldn't go low while I was on a run or practicing soccer," she said. "But once I got a routine down, it became more easy to manage, especially when I got the pump."

Dietz, who has never coached a Type 1 diabetic in two decades, asks Bigante about her blood sugar levels before every practice and every meet. One glance at the Dexcom app on Bigante's phone will reveal her current number and whether she's trending higher or lower.

Because hypoglycemia, or low blood sugar, is a dangerous condition — and running or exercise often causes blood sugar levels to drop, sometimes very quickly — Bigante typically wants her blood sugar in the mid-250s before a strenuous workout or meet.

Dietz carries a juice box with her at all times during runs in case Bigante should need a jolt of sugar. So far, the juice box hasn't been needed, although Bigante had to sit out the Sept. 10 meet at Avonworth because her prerace blood sugar was "in the 80s and dropping."

"We are getting more comfortable. We have developed a system and she tolerates me asking, 'What are your numbers?' all of the time," Dietz said. "You can still be an athlete and be a Type 1 diabetic and still perform well. You just have to learn what your body can handle."