Pilgrim High School Senior Megan Driscoll didn’t have to look far to find a topic for her senior project. Her exposition revolves around her experience being a teenager with type-one diabetes.

Over her senior year, Megan has produced a dining manual tailored towards individuals with diabetes. Titled “Dining With Diabetes,” Megan’s exhibition is an effort to raise donations to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, as well as the personal awareness of her peers at Pilgrim about a condition she lives with every day.

With a long family history of diabetes and as a type-one diabetic herself, Megan feels that she has a responsibility to help make a difference within her community, be it a monetary difference or simply a raise public consciousness.

“No one really seems to know the difference between type-one and type-two diabetes,” said Megan, “that was a big part of it, trying to educate people about the differences.”

Helping to inform her peers and teachers while creating a practical resource to help improve her own quality of life was part of the distinct learning curve of her exposition.

Diabetics are responsible for counting and regulating their carbohydrate intake. This is the basis upon which diabetics take their insulin.

“[The recipes] are very simple. There aren’t a lot of ingredients in each one,” said Mrs. Driscoll, Megan’s mother.

Megan mentioned that the recipes in “Dining With Diabetes,” include only low-sugar or sugar free ingredients and focus on limiting carbohydrate intake by avoiding breads and heavy starches. A unique feature of this cookbook is the chapter discussing the formation of diabetes and what exactly type-one diabetes is.

“There are a lot of cookbooks out there that say ‘this or that is good for a diabetic diet,’ but we actually include all the nutrition facts as well as general information about being a diabetic throughout the cookbook,” said Megan.

By including the nutrition facts of each recipe, the dining process is expedited and made a little less stressful for the diabetic audience.

When asked about their favorite recipes in “Dining With Diabetes,” both Megan and her mother immediately mentioned the “pizza cones.” Found in the appetizers chapter, the dough is made from scratch, primarily from zucchini and other low-carbohydrate ingredients.

Megan is to present “Dining With Diabetes,” the culmination of a year’s hard work, to a private panel of judges at Pilgrim High School today.