Year-round friendship for kids with Type 1 Diabetes

When a child is diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, the family gets an endocrinologist, a nutritionist, a pump trainer and a binder. What they don't get is someone who has been the kid at the lunch table doing math on a sandwich, or the teenager deciding whether to tell a friend. That gap is why braveONE exists. Founder Brandi Pillow started the organization in 2025 after her daughter was diagnosed. She could see how much support surrounded the medical side of the condition, and how little of it addressed the emotional side. braveONE's answer is one child, one adult, and no expiration date. Every mentor is an adult living with Type 1 Diabetes who has been screened, trained and matched to a specific kid. Not assigned to a group. Not handed a curriculum. A mentor becomes the person a teenager texts when they're frustrated, or calls when they need advice from someone who won't need the background explained. In a year, that model has produced more than 50 matches across 19 states, with nearly 400 adults raising their hand to mentor and more than 150 families in the queue. Pillow is quick to point past those figures to the one that isn't countable: parents telling her their child finally has someone to talk to who just gets it.