When he goes to the cafeteria at the Denver Broncos training facility in Englewood, Colorado, quarterback Jay Cutler carries two things: a black binder full of offensive assignments and a small zip-up pouch. He used to think the black binder was the key to life. Now he knows it’s the zip-up pouch.

Six weeks after being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes and going on insulin, Cutler says he feels much, much better than he did a year ago, when he dropped 33 pounds and felt weak and fatigued.

“The pouch goes everywhere with me,” Cutler says. “The first thing I do in the morning is test myself to see where I am, and it’s the last thing I do before I go to bed. The whole thing is a little scary sometimes, but it’s not like I have a choice. It’s part of my life.”

Cutler knows the pouch will be with him for the rest of his life. It’ll be at practice, on the sidelines during games, at dinner, and on every plane he boards. The bag is essential to his survival because he needs it to monitor his insulin-to-carbohydrate levels.

Now back up to 230 pounds, Cutler says he feels “ten times better” than he did in April, when he was first diagnosed.  Those close to him notice a positive change in his demeanor from a year ago. “Since he got diagnosed, his [mood] is like night and day,” says Marty Garafalo, Cutler’s business manager. “He even smiles now.”

The 6-foot-3 Cutler reported to training camp last summer at 242 pounds and struggled to get down to 235 by the season opener. But he suddenly began losing weight in October and dropped all the way to 202 by the final game. By then he was showing many symptoms associated with untreated high blood sugars, including severe thirst, dry mouth, fatigue, frequent urination and ravenous hunger.

“I was just inhaling food,” Cutler says. “I was eating six meals a day—I’d eat a meal and 30 minutes later I’d be ready to eat again. Yet I kept losing weight, and they were telling me it was the stress. I was [saying to them], ‘I’m not that stressed.’ I mean, my jeans were falling off my body. I looked like hell.”

Cutler is still transitioning to life with diabetes. He recently went to dinner with friends, broke the needle off the only syringe in the bag, and then had to drive home to get replacements.

Cutler says he was initially very self-conscious about injecting himself in public. He recalled the scene he caused while attending a wedding shortly after being diagnosed.

“I went into the bathroom to test and give myself a shot, and I had all my stuff laid out on a table,” he says. “Some guy walked in and saw me and those needles and high-tailed it out of there. He probably thought I was doing some hard drugs!”

He’s also learning to deal with the unsolicited advice and analysis he receives as a public figure with diabetes.

“Everyone’s got a special drink or something for me to try that’s supposedly either going to ‘cure’ it or ‘help’ it,” Cutler says. “Or people say, ‘Hey, you’ve been eating bad’ or ‘You’ve been drinking alcohol, and that’s what brought it on.’ They mean well, but they don’t understand.”

In fact, Cutler leaves the training facility every day with a bag full of prepared meals that include pre-measured carbohydrate counts. Both Broncos trainers and Cutler check the quarterback’s blood sugar levels before, during, and after practices and games.

While regular exercise is recommended for people with diabetes, the intensity of competitive sports can cause sudden large shifts in blood sugar levels. Because athletes must be cautious about exercising when blood sugar is high, moderating Cutler’s levels going into games and workouts is the first priority.

Cutler says he’ll need carbohydrates right before games, and possibly during them. He will also eat immediately after games to make sure his levels don’t drop too much.

Team doctors are unwilling to name the type of insulin Cutler is taking or his dosages, citing his right to privacy. Cutler himself says it remains a fluid matter, as they are still determining a plan to suit his unique needs.

Meanwhile, teammates and coaches have rallied to support their quarterback. Although the team lost its last four games of the season and missed the playoffs, Broncos Coach Mike Shanahan does not blame Cutler in the slightest.

“First of all, he played pretty well down the stretch, actually. But we didn’t play well as a team,” Shanahan says. “I just feel sort of guilty that I didn’t see what was happening. But I don’t think anybody really knows what it is until it happens to someone close to them. Now I’ve started studying exactly what the effects are, exactly what the disease is.”

“I’ve learned a lot about it,” says Shanahan, “And we’re taking the disease head on as a family. And knowing Jay and his discipline, he’ll whip it. He’s already feeling so much better. His teammates have been super-supportive, and I know they’ll continue to be.”

Cutler, however, says he deserves a lot of responsibility for the team’s underwhelming season. “Those last six or seven games, I was finished,” he says. “I’d go into games tired and didn’t really understand why. I lost a lot of zip on my passes.”

The problem only grew worse during workouts this spring.

“I’d get through about half the workout and just be done,” Cutler says. “I’d go home and sleep all day long, and it’s not like I’d been out partying the night before. I was taking every nutritional pill and drink known to man, and they weren’t working.”

Last month, when he returned to Denver, Cutler took a blood test and discovered why he'd been feeling so lousy. His first emotion was relief. Then everything turned surreal: He was sitting in a doctor's office getting an intensified course in introductory diabetes management and, before going home, injecting a dose of long-acting insulin into his thigh.

To help Cutler with the changes, his mom, Sandy, moved in with him for a while. She was terrified he would overshoot his insulin dose, go too low, and need her help. But Cutler says that he’s not had any low counts thus far. His issue has been with high counts, which have reached 500 to 600 mg/dl. (Normal glucose levels are generally between 70 and 120.)

But there comes a point where a young man doesn’t need his mom around all the time. Cutler is 25. “I pretty much had to force her to leave,” Cutler says.

Cutler realizes that as a public figure with type I diabetes, he'll likely receive more attention than he did before. He's embracing the opportunity. "This is something I'm going to have to live with forever," he says. "I'm going to try to use it as a positive and help as many people as I can."

"I've read books about parents waking up three to five times every night to check their kids' sugars, and it blows my mind. I've gotten emails from kids that have touched me so much. Once I get all of my stuff a little bit more under control, I'll definitely get involved. I know I can affect a lot of kids in a positive way."