A Tauranga woman who suffers from type one diabetes is wanting to raise awareness about the signs and symptoms of the illness.

Phoebe Ball, 25, was diagnosed as diabetic when she was 12 years old.

'I had been extremely sick for a couple months,” says Phoebe. 'I went to the doctors and they couldn't figure out what was going on.

'I was constantly drinking, constantly going to the toilet and I was extremely lethargic, I just wanted to sleep the entire time.

'I'd been at a singing event, and I said to my mum that I wanted her to take me to the hospital.

'They tested my blood sugar and I was 37.9 mmol/l, a normal range is anywhere between 4.8-8 mmol/l.

'From then on they said that I had type one diabetes and that was a whole life changer.

'I didn't really understand it until they told me I would have to start taking injections every day.”

Phoebe says she feels a lot is unknown about the disease.

'Initially me and my family were in denial because we didn't know what type one diabetes was; you hear a lot about type 2 and how it's all about food, eating and exercise but type one is an auto-immune disease.

'Leading up to me being sick, my nanna had passed away, I was quite stressed, I was constantly sick and my immune system was so down.

'When your immune system is down, that's when your body is more susceptible to auto-immune disease.

'Type one diabetes takes a kind of battle, people think you should just not eat sugar and exercise but it's so much more than that.”

She says it's important she surrounds herself with people who understand her illness.

'It's a scary thing, and the reality is it's always in the back of my mind, the fact that I can go to sleep and not wake up.

'I try to make sure that everyone around me knows about my illness.

'I'm normally around people who do know me and I have a medical alert bracelet.

'At work all my work girls do know and they're really supportive, they know my signs now which is awesome.”

Phoebe says anyone who has recently been diagnosed with type one diabetes should give themselves time to process.

'If you don't give yourself time to breathe or give yourself space, it's quite easy to get quite lost.

'You need to allow yourself time to breathe, just stop and let everything sink in and realise that it's not your fault,” she says.

'You didn't cause it that's just how your body was, that's just how your immune system was at the time.

'Things will be ok in the end, it's not an easy ride, and it's never going to be easy but it can be managed with the right equipment and the right support.”

For Phoebe this equipment includes a Dexcom G5 Continuous Glucose Monitoring (CGM) System, which provides real-time glucose readings for patients with type 1 or type 2 diabetes every five minutes.

The device was donated to her by a local woman, after a crowdfunding page was set up asking for donations to help Phoebe purchase it.

'A woman named Jana donated it to me,” says Phoebe.

'Her son has diabetes and she initially purchased it for him, he wasn't using it to the best of his ability so he went back on injections and she offered it to me.

'The pump works through a cannula which is under my skin and every few minutes insulin goes into my body.

'The pump helps give my overall health a better chance and it helps stabilize my blood sugars.

'I can tell the pump if I'm sick, or going to the gym and I can work out different regimes for all different kind of things.”

The device has a running cost of $250 per month, which covers the cost of insulin pump consumables and the Dexcom G5 controlled glucose monitoring.

'I have to change those every three days,” says Phoebe.

Phoebe says the costs are completely self-funded as she does not fit the criteria for funding from Pharmac.

She says her crowdfunding page will be used to help raise money to cover the costs of consumables and CGM.

A friend of hers, Molly Goodeave, is also hosting a fundraiser concert on her behalf at Greerton RSA, Saturday November 18 from 2.30pm-10pm.

'Molly has been an amazing support and for a girl of 15 years old she's well-mature beyond her years,” says Phoebe.