The teenage years are full of change and confusion, creating tensions for parents and children. How much worse can things get when a long-term illness becomes part of the mix?

May is fourteen years old and has type-1 diabetes. After being diagnosed at the age of seven, she initially copes well but, within a few months, she struggles to take her insulin regularly.

The diabetic team try on numerous occasions to help her, and her mum, to manage May's diabetes better, but she doesn't see the point. The risks don't seem real to her and she wants to be normal, like her friends.

At the age of eleven, May is admitted to hospital three times with dangerously high blood sugars. By the age of twelve, the long term complications the team have warned May about, start to appear.

Now on the brink of adolescence, May can't cope. She feels controlled by her diabetes and when those around her try to help, it feels like pressure.

What lengths can the medical team go to to encourage May to take the treatment she needs? Can they force her to take insulin?

Joan Bakewell and her panel discuss the issues.

Producer: Beth Eastwood. Show less