Did you ever wonder how the Pump Girls got their start? It all began in January of 1998 at a PADRE (Pediatric Adolescent Diabetes Research and Education) support group meeting at Childrens Hospital of Orange County located in Orange, California. Brittany Rausch was sitting with some friends, all of them were new pumpers. Her mom jokingly said they should start a new singing group called “The Pump Girls”, since The Spice Girls were the rage at that time. She made up the first verse of the Pump Girl song right there on the spot. Can you guess the song she based it after? If you listen carefully you can hear she was influenced by “Barbie Girl” by Aqua.
Brittany continued to write more lyrics, until about a month later when Brittany and her family were attending a diabetes family retreat in the mountains, she taught about 12 of her friends the song. The Pump Girl song had its first audience when it was performed as a skit for all the families at the retreat. Needless to say, Brittany and her family figured that would be the last time anyone would ever mention the Pump Girls again. Little did they expect to hear that 3 months later MiniMed (now Medtronic MiniMed) was trying to locate this group they had heard about - and had called Jackie Teichmann (the Executive Director of PADRE) to find out more about them. They had the gig, now they needed a group - a “real” Pump Girl group would have to be formed!
After many auditions the group was formed and the rest as they say is history. Colleen Cottrell, Sara Cronstadt, Janelle Munion and Brittany Rausch were chosen to be the Pump Girls, but did you know there was almost a 5th Pump Girl?? The girls spent the summer of 1998 learning and practicing songs and dances for almost 8 hours a day, but by the end of the summer it was clear that Jamie Khoury, the 5th Pump Girl, was not going to have the time to devote herself to both the group and to her senior year of high school. The other 4 girls remained, spending a lot of nights and weekends of the fall recording their CD after school, until by the first of the year it was done.
The man behind the music was HB Barnum, a musician with many years of experience behind him. Did you know H.B. Barnum wrote the song “Not Too Young to Rock n’ Roll” for Brittany Rausch right in the studio? She wrote the lyrics down as he sat at the keyboard and made them up - then she recorded the song!
The Pump Girl CD was released amidst much fanfare March 9, 1999 at Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles. Coverage included the four major networks, CNN, Telemundo and a morning program from the United Kingdom. That night they could be seen on every network and just about every channel in every city in America. The girls hoped that the enormity of their exposure would do two things; one would be to help other kids with diabetes learn more about pump therapy, which at the time was a relatively new form of treatment for children and the other was that they hoped kids could see you could be “cool” and still have diabetes. They wanted each child to believe that diabetes shouldn’t keep them from pursuing their dreams. They still believe in those goals and have spent every year since March 1999 trying to reach as many kids and adults as possible to spread their message of good health and hope.
Did you ever notice that some of The Pump Girls look different from time to time? You’re right, originally there were four girls, the four that you see on the first CD. Brittany is the only remaining original member and as each of the other girls left they were replaced with another “new Pump Girl”.
Did you know that in 2001 The Pump Girls released a new single called A1C? Every diabetic knows the meaning of A1C and for you diabetic novices out there A1C is a test done quarterly, the results of which tells you what your average blood sugar has been for the past three months. An important part of every Dr. visit. The A1C song was recorded with Sarah Carey, Nicole Kukruda and Brittany Rausch and is still given out at their concerts.
What started as a little skit so long ago has gone on to make a difference in peoples lives all over the world…it is the dream of the girls that the Pump Girls will continue on for many years to come…and if the emails they receive from Pump Girl wannabes from all over the country are any indication - there will be a plethora of Pump Girls!