Food ~ Worst Enemy & Best Friend

It seems food can be someone with type 1 diabetes best friend or worst enemy.  It can literally save the person's life or put them in the hospital.  For example, if someone with type 1 diabetes eats and forgets to take their insulin that person could be at risk for DKA.  It doesn't mean that will always happen, but it is a possibility.  If someone with type 1 diabetes has a low blood sugar (known as hypoglycemia) eating something can get them out of the danger zone and save their life.  At times, it is difficult to watch someone you love go through this but with good control people with type 1 diabetes can be very healthy.

  

Up All Night

When he has a number in the 40's, its very hard to sleep that night.  I will usually stay up and check him mid-night to make sure he's ok or I will set an alarm to get up and do a check.  I especially worry when the low was out of nowhere.  No extra activity, carb counts were right, I always want an answer to an unexplained high or low, but I guess I'm not always going to get one..

A Battery is Our Lifeline

Most people use batteries and think nothing of it but the person I love's life depends on an AA battery.  His insulin pump is powered by 1 AA Energizer Lithium Battery.  We need to change the battery about every other month and when the battery is low it will give him an alarm.  The alarm means he has a minimum of 30 minutes of life left in the battery.  What is the maximum?  I don't know (haven't got around to reading hundreds of pages in the manual yet) but all we really need to know is that we need to get a new battery asap & hopefully within 30 minutes, don't want to risk any longer than that.  So I go to our supplies drawer and no extra battery, then I look in all the other drawers, still no battery.  So we hop in the car and off to get one.  I'm usually pretty good at making sure all the supplies are stocked but sometimes life gets in the way.  Thankfully our car started up and we are close to a store.  The "what if's" are usually what give me anxiety.  What if the car didn't start, what if there was a snow storm and we couldn't get to the store, what if the store was out of those batteries?

My Heart Aches

He's so tired.  He brushes his teeth then lays down to go to sleep but he forgot to check his blood sugar so I do.  He's at 94 so I go in the kitchen to get him some juice.  As I'm sitting there watching him drink the juice my heart aches & tears fill my eyes (but he can't see that without his glasses).  I know how bad juice tastes after you just brushed your teeth (ick) but my heart aches because he HAS to drink juice before going to sleep.

Most days I'm fine and go about the day as we always do, but there are those moments when you just look at the person you love that has type 1 diabetes and wish there was something you could do.  I often feel helpless.  I try so hard to get his basals right, carb count accurately, but sometimes it just doesn't work and they end up with a high or a low.  Just today, he was at 43.  Why?  He carb counted correctly, no more activity than usual, his basals have been set for a while....There just seemed to be no reason.  Was it a bad strip?  All these questions go through my mind.  My heart aches for him right now but he doesn't know it.

I feel like I hit the lottery!!

There are test strips scattered all over our house.  Before I throw them away I always check to make sure they are used first.  With test strips being about $1 per strip, can't afford to waste any!!  Today, for the first time I actually found one that wasn't used, I felt like I hit the lottery!!  LOL!!  Hey, if you saw $1 laying on the floor you'd probably pick it up to.  ;-)

Type 1 Diabetes Awareness Video

Bedtime is the Scariest

His blood sugar check before bed was 86, so he drinks some apple juice to bring him up.  We are in the process of trying to figure out what will bring his blood sugar up and keep him steady.  It seems that when he drinks juice at night, it will bring him up during the night then by the time he wakes up he's on the low end again (80's).  Bedtime is the scariest for me, he does not have a CGM yet.  Our health insurance would not pay for the Dexcom.  I guess it wasn't "medically necessary".

This is what I have to say to ALL HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANIES - Live in our shoes for a day, 1 day.  Then tell me how it feels to wake up in the middle of the night to check your loved one's blood sugar, you will soon realize that you don't even need to set an alarm most of the time, instincts kick in and you "just know" you need to check.  Tell me how it feels to run around outside, play, go for a walk, to do something spontaneous, only to come back home to a low blood sugar.  Tell me how it feels to lug "your emergency pack" around with you, AT ALL TIMES.  Tell me how it feels to have to suspend your insulin pump before getting in the shower.  Tell me how it feels when your loved one is in the emergency room because his or her blood sugar got too high or too low.  Tell me how it feels to look at an emergency glucagon pen thinking that one day you may have to inject that in someone you love if they are unconscious due to a low blood sugar.  Tell me what it feels like to have tears fall from your eyes because you love that person so very much and it breaks your heart into a million pieces to see them deal with this every minute of every day. THEN TELL ME IT'S NOT "MEDICALLY NECESSARY" TO APPROVE A CGM THAT COULD IMPROVE THE PERSON I LOVE WITH ALL MY HEART'S LIFE, SOMETHING THAT COULD POTENTIALLY SAVE HIS LIFE.  TELL ME!!