WHEN best friends Ellen Watson and Beth McDaniel decided to experiment with making TikTok videos about getting ready for a girls' night out back in 2019, little did they know they would go viral.
They have since gone on to post weekly videos on the platform, shining a positive light on living with type 1 diabetes to their almost 23,000 followers.
The glamorous 21-year-olds have also set up an Instagram channel calling themselves the Diabetic Duo and have become the 'poster girls' of type 1 diabetes, making a number of media appearances, including on BBC's The One Show.
"TikTok was relatively new and as we love being in front of the camera we just did a wee video of us dancing about in our going-out clothes and suddenly overnight that video got 700,000 views," says Beth.
The girls were wearing their glucose tracking Dexcom G6 devices on their arms. It monitors their blood sugars automatically, doing away with the need for pin prick test, and sends alerts to their mobile phones.
The videos opened up a really good communication channel with both the online diabetic community and the non-diabetic community, who questioned what they were wearing.
"We get so many messages from girls saying we have helped them to feel comfortable wearing their glucose monitors in public or to tell people they have the condition," says Beth.
"We just want to make sure no one feels ashamed to have type 1 diabetes and encourage them to wear their devices with pride.
"By bringing a bit of humour and light-heartedness to our videos we are hoping to get across the fact that although you're living with diabetes you can have fun, be glamorous and still look after yourself well."
Both are currently studying marketing at Ulster University and finishing off internships at L'Oreal and Disney, and say their dream job is to "become the female equivalent of Ant and Dec".
"We want to show people you can still live an amazing life, go to uni, get a dream job, drive a car, go out at night and have boyfriends," says Ellen, who was first diagnosed with type 1 diabetes as a six-year-old.
"My mum is an ICU nurse so she was so on top of the symptoms during my childhood. She did everything for me - carb-counted my meals and set up my insulin and made sure there was always someone who knew what was going on.
"But when I got to high school a lot of that responsibility was handed to me. As a young teenager you don't want to be different to everyone else, so it was hard.
"It was really isolating and I wouldn't always have said when my blood sugars were low, which was dangerous."
Ellen admits that when she was growing up "there was nobody to look up to for inspiration", with former Prime Minister Theresa May being amongst the very few public figures with type 1 diabetes.
"We want to help get rid of the stigma which surrounds diabetes, so I think it's really great that Beth and I can be an inspiration for others.
"The amount of messages we get on social media is crazy; we always have to apologise that it has taken so long for us to reply.
"We love helping people cope emotionally with their diabetes. People really open up to you so you have to make sure your response is perfect."
Beth knows all too well the impact her videos are having on young diabetics, as her 13-year-old sister Grace, a student at New-Bridge Integrated College in Loughbrickland, was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes just nine days before her.
"She had all the symptoms which we call the four Ts - tiredness, thirst, going to the toilet and thinness," explains Beth.
"When dad took her to the doctor her symptoms were so bad they admitted her to hospital.
"It is so freaky that me and my sister were diagnosed barely a week apart, and that my best friend also has it," adds Beth, whose own symptoms, when she was diagnosed at 19, included blurry vision.
"What Ellen and I have done through TikTok and in our lives is give Grace a confidence boost and a belief that her diabetes does not need to hold her back from achieving her life goals."
Diabetes is an autoimmune condition caused when the body can't produce the hormone insulin, which controls blood glucose (sugar) levels. Type 1 diabetes causes the level of glucose in your blood to become too high.
Unlike type 2, which is generally influenced by lifestyle, type 1 cannot be prevented and is the most common type of diabetes in children and young adults.
Approximately 400,000 people are currently living with type 1 diabetes in the UK, including around 29,000 children.
Ellen and Beth need injections of insulin up to eight times a day to keep their blood glucose levels under control and have filmed themselves injecting in unusual locations.
These include standing at the top of a human pyramid, hula hooping, in front of a police riot van and in the Marble Arch Caves.
"We like to show that with diabetes you have to bring it into your public life; as you never know when and where you will have to inject yourself with insulin," says Ellen.
"We've had to inject everywhere, from the top of the Eiffel Tower to nightclubs and festival portaloos.
"It looks even more strange when we're putting make-up on together and injecting at the same time, so you get some funny looks."
Behind the giggles the girls admit that keeping on top of their condition and being careful about their diets does involve "careful management" and they have to be prepared for the possibility of a hypo (hypoglycaemia), when their blood sugars get too low.
"It's different for every diabetic, but for me whenever I'm in warm weather it can make my sugars quite low. I enjoyed that on holidays as a child because they're my mum let me have an ice lolly every hour or so. But I remember when I was about nine fainting in the middle of the Colosseum in Rome because they got too low," recalls Ellen.
On a less serious occasion, Beth recalls sitting together in their university lecture theatre pre-Covid.
"My crush - who is now my boyfriend - was there and I could feel myself on the brink of a hypo. I was getting all tired, sweaty and confused," Beth says.
"But Ellen was beside me and said not to worry as she had a bottle of Coke with her.
"But then Ellen's blood sugars also got low and we were fighting over the bottle of Coke and causing a commotion.
"Yes it was embarrassing, but it's funny to look back at now. It's at times like that we are so grateful to have a bestie who understands."
:: You can follow Ellen and Beth on TikTok and Instagram @the_diabetic_duo.
:: For further advice on living with diabetes visit Diabetes.org.uk and Diabetes.ie.
