If you're older and out of the house a lot, your parents may not realize how well you're actually able to take care of your own diabetes or all the tools you can use to control it. Or they may not realize that everyone with diabetes—and especially growing kids—has blood sugars that are out of range at least some of the time.

So, sometimes your parents' nagging can be needless or just plain wrong—and that can really bug you when you're just learning to take control of your own diabetes.

Jean Betschart, who works with children with diabetes in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, remembers one case in which the parents of a teenager who played soccer told her that he never ate candy. (As if!)

It turned out that he often had candy—but with good reason: He needed it to keep his blood sugar from going too low when he played soccer.

"I think there are a lot of things that go on when kids get to be older and they're not with their parents all the time," she says. "The parents don't really have an idea of how good a job the kids are doing sometimes."

So what can you do? The best thing, she says, is to prove to them that you can take care of yourself by being responsible.

For instance, always remember to carry your glucose tablets and your emergency medical I.D. And be sure to let your parents know what you're doing and why.

Do their comments make you feel frustrated? Angry? Speak up!

According to Dr. Barbara Anderson at Joslin Diabetes Center, part of communicating with your parents is learning to let them know when their comments make you feel bad.