Diabetes

type 1, insulin pump, blood glucose

New kid on the block

Diabetes, Uncategorized

For someone who doesn’t like change, my gawd, I sure did make a HUGE one this week. After nearly three years, and two identical replacements, there’s a new pump in town my friends. Gone is the tried-and-true, goes-with-everything, boring black beauty (which really isn’t so beautylicious these days), and in her place, an in-your-face, eye-popping, green hornet of a new insulin pump. That’s right, GREEN! A pump with pizazz. A couple weeks ago I noticed that the rubber covering over the arrow buttons on my pump was peeling back, and given that we’re going into the rainy season here on the West Coast, and that I typically wear my pump on my pant pockets, I thought uh oh, probably not the best thing to have the mechanics of the pump fully exposed. That just will not do. I emailed Animas last weekend and within 45 minutes I had a customer […]

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Don’t kill Shelby, kill the movie

Diabetes, Pregnancy in Diabetes, Uncategorized

Steel Magnolias? A remake? Are you freaking kidding me? Who in their right mind would go out of their way to remake that gawd awful flick? I mean, unless they were bullied by a diabetic, or had a nasty run-in with a gang of diabetics, or just have a plain ol hate on for us T-1s, there’s no plausible reason for putting this movie out on the shelves again. Strong opinion on something seemingly small to the majority, you bet I do! When Steel Magnolias was released in 1989, I was a young, impressionable, fairly newly diagnosed type 1. And let’s just say, it probably wasn’t the best film for me to be viewing at the time. Thanks to this movie, I spent a good part of my adolescence thinking I would be punished with kidney dialysis if I made one screw up with my disease (and believe me, I

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Nightmare on T-1 street

Diabetes, Uncategorized

It’s not like it should have come as a surprise, but it did, and my gawd, it scared the freaking bejesus out of me. Last night I woke up in a panic. I couldn’t find Little Ring, I thought I’d fallen asleep with him on my chest, but he wasn’t there. I started frantically overturning my fortress of pillows, so sure I was suffocating my boy underneath. I shook Big Ring awake, I needed help, but I couldn’t get the words out, my tongue was twisted, my body was shaking, I had a fountain of sweat coming down from my forehead. On the verge of tears, I lifted my dead weight of a body up, and desperately shot my eyes over to the bassinet – where my sweet boy was sleeping ever so peacefully. I hadn’t yet clued into what was going on, but Big Ring had. Not showing an

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Hospitals, the sewers of health

Diabetes, Pregnancy in Diabetes, Uncategorized

Hospitals, a place of health? I don’t think so; they’re more like the sewers of health! It had been years since I had had to stay overnight in a hospital prior to Little Ring’s birth day, and I don’t know if I’d forgotten what it was like, or just didn’t care back in the day, but I tell you, I haven’t felt quite so unhealthy as I did there in a long, long time. A three-day stay and my diabetes was on the most rickety roller coaster around. The reason: The food. The first nurse I saw was set on putting me on the diabetes meal plan. I knew this was a bad idea. I had learned years ago, on my first plane ride, never to opt for the diabetes-specialty meal over a “regular” person’s meal, because while everyone else was eating hearty sandwiches and Kit Kat bars, I was

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TSAB 3 of 3: But what about the diabetes?

Diabetes, Pregnancy in Diabetes, Races

So let’s review: so far we’ve covered Little Ring’s speedy arrival on earth, and the non-diabetes related hiccups that arose during the throes of labour, but what about the diabetes? A girlfriend once told me, following the completion of my first marathon, that if I could do that, I could give birth to a kid no problem. And she was right… to a point. I did go into marathon mode when the time came, I breathed like a marathon machine, and just as I do when coming into the finish, I kicked my pushing up in the home stretch. But the thing is, none of that took into account the diabetes equation. Unlike training for a marathon, I didn’t have months to condition my body or my diabetes for childbirth. And I felt completely unprepared, diabetes wise, going into the delivery room. Even though I attended a diabetes in pregnancy

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