Post-Thanksgiving Lows

We don't do Black Friday shopping, so today we slept in. I woke up at 8 to LOW on Dex. No alarm from Nightscout. Does it look like compression low? No. 

I rushed to his room. Didn't even wait to watch for breathing. Touched his arm. It was cold, so I rubbed it and he woke up. Huge sigh of relief. I looked at the receiver and the sensor had been stopped. Why did you stop the sensor? Shrug. Are you low? No. He pointed to the juice box trash beside the bed. Not sure how many are from last night.

I noticed the sensor sitting there. Why did you pull your sensor? Another shrug.

I waited for my heart to restart then slept a bit more while I had the chance. 

Diabetes Awareness and Thankfulness

November is diabetes awareness month.  It is also Thanksgiving month, so many people do 30 days of thankfulness.  For 3 years, I've tried to resolve those 2 things in my mind. Sure, I'm thankful for insulin, glucose meters, Dexcom, and all those other things that make this disease more manageable than it has ever been.  But can I find something about the disease itself to be thankful for?  That's where I've struggled.  How can you be thankful for a chronic life-threatening illness?

Then I heard this song:

It describes so perfectly what life has been like the last 3 years.  We are so thankful every day for another day.  It would be poor manners to tell someone else that they aren't promised another day, but I can tell myself!

Our family has always valued our time together, but since diagnosis that time has been even more precious.  We've taken a couple of weekend trips as a family and even took a vacation last year, something we hadn't done in a very long time. We all worked together this past summer.  Jason and I teach at the same school, and the boys attend the same college. They even have a class together.  So yes, we are embracing living life and loving each other every day, more than ever before.  There aren't many things to be thankful for with diabetes, but I think living life to the fullest every single day is a pretty great thing!

Snow Ice Cream

For the past 2 1/2 years, 2 cans of sweetened condensed milk have haunted me from the top shelf of my pantry.  You see, those 2 cans were bought before Seth's diagnosis, when we thought he had mono.  He was losing weight and we were making shakes trying to put some pounds back on.  I couldn't throw the cans away, but I didn't have an occasion to use them either.  So they just sat there on the top shelf of the pantry, bringing back those scary, sad memories.

Today, we turned the sad memory into a happy one.  It snowed quite a bit overnight, unusual for Texas and almost unheard of in March.  We set out some big bowls in the back yard last night, and this morning I made snow ice cream.  I used both cans of that sweetened condensed milk.  Yum!

And with that, I can open my pantry for the first time since diagnosis without thinking about diagnosis.

Trying Dex

I decided to try Dex for a week.  I was using an old transmitter and receiver, so the first few days of my data isn't stellar (lots of gaps).  Even though I was only getting sporadic readings, the data was fascinating  enough that I decided to leave it on for a few days.  Then, on day 4 it sprang to life.  Don't know how long it will keep giving consistent readings, but I'll try to keep it on as long as I can.

Here are some things I have observed:

1) I have spikes after meals.  They aren't as large and don't last as long, but they're there.

2) I really need my 2 pm snack.  I eat lunch at 11, so I have gotten into the habit of eating a snack after my last class leaves (2:08 to be exact).  I was afraid it was just a bad habit, but Dex revealed that my blood sugar is actually getting pretty low at that time of day.  That snack is not just a bad habit.  I need that snack to make it through the rest of the day!

3) Apparently I need a snack at 10 as well.  I wouldn't have known except Dex buzzed below 55.  It was only an hour before lunch, but ate a snack anyway because I was giving a test and didn't want Dex to alarm!

4) I've seen lots of women/parents of t1 girls talk about how their menstrual cycle affects their blood sugar.  I can confirm that it affected me as well. Higher for the first day or 2, then lower.  Lower than normal?  I have no clue.  Maybe I'll be able to leave it on long enough to figure out what "normal" is.

5) Wake up is not my lowest fasting blood sugar.  It actually goes down a little bit between the time I wake up and when I eat breakfast (an hour or so).

6) Mexican food caused a pretty long spike for me as well.  Not as high or as long as it does for Jason or Seth (and I assume all PWD), but it's there.

Jason had one interesting observation.  He came in the bathroom when I was showering and said, "That looks weird on you."  I know what he meant, but doesn't it look weird on everyone?  I mean, I love the security/information/help it gives, but having something like that attached to a human just isn't normal.

The thing that keeps coming up in my mind over and over is how if things affect ME this way, how much more they affect those without functioning beta cells.  It is absolutely fascinating.  Strange, I know, but I'm a science teacher so all this data is really intriguing.

Stay tuned....if I get any more earth-shattering revelations I'll be sure to share!  I've had several requests of things to try out, and as long as I'm getting data I plan to try all the things I can.

24 hour graph.  It's not a flat line, and you can clearly see the Mexican food!

New Year, Fresh Start

I've been absent from blogging for a while, and today seems like a great day to get back to it!

First and foremost - Seth was featured in the blog Happy Medium last Monday!  Stephen is doing a series of blog posts about Champion Athletes with Diabetes.  You can read his awesome article here.  I'm so proud of Seth and his accomplishments. Thank you Stephen, for recognizing these awesome type 1 athletes!  Leave a comment on Stephen's blog thanking him, if you don't mind. And read the others in his series.  There are some type 1 athletes out there seriously KDA every day!

Second - last semester in school was really difficult.  Jason and I were both taking a graduate chemistry course and it pretty much consumed every spare second.  Also, starting back at the beginning of the school year, Jason is now the swim coach for our campus (assistant coach for the district). That takes quite a bit of our time as well.  Grad school is over, at least for now, so hopefully I can get back to regular posts.  As I'm sure you know, diabetes has not been silent or easy these last few months, so I have lots to tell!

As a preview (and because I think every post needs a picture), here's a pic from our recent vacation.  Cruising with diabetes is definitely a challenge, but what isn't with diabetes tagging along?  That's just one of the things I have coming up to write about!

Happy 2015!  May it be the best year yet!

State Lifeguard Championship

Earlier in the summer, Seth was on a lifeguard team that competed and won the regional lifeguard competition.  The top 3 teams from each region advanced to the state competition. Last Monday was the Texas Amateur Athletic Federation State Lifeguard Championship.  This is the first time a team from Jason's pool has competed in the state competition.  Being the only team from a small town (and a small facility), they were by far the underdogs.  Competition was fierce, with several teams that have been to state before and many that come from year-round facilities with hundreds of guards.  Also, if you remember, this team not only has a member with type 1 diabetes, but also a team captain that had a liver transplant 3 years ago.

Each team had 4 events to complete.  The first event was a spinal scenario.  The guards not only had to respond to a spinal injury (fake, of course) but they also had to address rule violations in and around the pool as well.

The next event was a big pool scenario.  There were several incidents the guards had to respond to: an active drowning, a baby in the pool, an unconscious person, and a "shadow baby."

The final part was actually 2 events: first aid and CPR.  The first aid event was crazy!  There were 3 victims.  The first was a baby (doll) that was unconscious, so it only needed to be monitored until EMS arrived.  Victim 2 had heat exhaustion, a bee sting, a broken ankle, asthma, and a seizure. Victim 3 had a gash on the knee, a bloody nose, diabetes (hypoglycemia), and was spitting out teeth.  It was brutal!

The CPR event was immediately after first aid, in the same location.  The mannequin was lying beside what looked like broken glass, with a giant insect on its chest, and a bottle of bleach and an electric cord on the other side.  All hazards had to be dealt with before CPR could begin.  Intense!

After all teams completed the events, scores were tallied and winners announced.  Seth's team didn't place in the top 3, but they weren't last either! They placed 9th, which was so amazing considering it was their first time.

Diabetes did not play incredibly nice, of course.  Seth woke up over 200, and then there was the breakfast spike.  I'm sure he didn't feel his best, but he never complained and he didn't allow it to affect his performance in the events.  He did a conservative correction, knowing it was probably adrenaline. He still crashed on the way home.  I watched Dex while he napped, and woke him up when he was below 70 with diagonal down.

I am so proud of this team!  They worked hard and did a great job.  Watch out for them next year, Georgetown and The Woodlands!  This team may knock you down in the rankings!

Superman

This post isn't about diabetes, just so you know.

I met you in the summer of 2007. I fed you, and you were mine.  Jason says it was like feeding a stray puppy. 

You were a big brother to my boys, and a little brother to my husband.  I loved our twisted "family tree" and how you called the boys "brophews" and they called you Uncle Bubba.  I know you had lots of "moms" and I'm so proud I was one of them.

You were a role model for all the other guards.  They looked up to you, respected and loved you.

And sometimes you were not such a great role model.

You freaked me out when you wore the sunglasses contacts.  I loved seeing your blue eyes.

I loved your deep voice, deeper than it seemed it should be.  And the way you sang just a little tiny bit off key.

And for some reason you loved putting on tiny clothes from the lost and found.

In most crowds, you were the biggest one there.  I think you cried a little bit when Seth passed you up and you became the runt of my litter.

Cancer came back.  We all got scared.  The surgery got it all, but the chemo after was rough.  I hated taking you the couple of times I did.  Hated watching them put that poison in your body. I couldn't even feed you anything that made you feel better. But we all hoped that poison would kill the cancer before the cancer took you from us.  And it did, for a while.

And we had some more fun times.

Then it came back again. We all thought/hoped you would beat it again.  I never gave up on you and held out for a miracle until the very end.  And at the end, we were there. I hope you felt the love as you took your last breath.

How do I heal the hole in my heart?  I will never be the same again.  But I would do it all over again, even knowing I'd lose you.  I could certainly do without this pain, but I wouldn't have wanted to miss the dance of having you in my life.  I'll love you always, and you'll always be my Superman.