Wanna Be

If you're going to go through hell... I suggest you come back learning something.
Drew Barrymore 

Grace's numbers have been all kinds of wacky this past week. Ever since I jinxed myself and her with the perfect 87 after swimming for 4 hours. I only pretended to know what I was doing :0) I knew as soon as I put it out there in the universe - 'I shoulda never said that!' - that all kinds of numbers were going to happen. They did and here I sit amongst them all - the 245, the 309, the 41, the 273, the rare 110.

I feel like I have lost control. Did I ever have control to begin with??? Maybe that's all a myth, that we have some control over the D in our kids lives. I mean, we try our best with this basal, and that bolus, and this and that carb ratio, but frankly, doesn't the D do what it wants most of the time? Like a bad houseguest that overstays it's welcome. You want to tell it to pick the clothes up off the floor and get a job. But it just lays on the couch.

While I was on the beach I thought about where I was in it all. What did I need to learn to do to get out of this hole? And frankly, I thought of one thing - that I needed to learn. I needed to learn how to be as close to a really great CDE that I could get. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't want to become a CDE and have no intention of returning to any kind of class to become one. But I need the knowledge that the good ones have.

I need to know how to truly do good basal tests.
I need to know how to change basal rates and then know they are stable.
I need to know when to go back and do basal testing when things go awry.
I need to know how to do the basal rates first, then tackle the boluses and carb ratios.
I need to know how to begin a carb ratio amount and recognize when it needs a fixin'.
I need to know how to look at the data and see what needs changing.
I need to know when I have enough data to makes those changes.
I need to know how to look at patterns and see solutions.

Seems like a long list of needs to me. Doesn't make me feel real good. To be needy, or even recognize that I need so much. But there it is. That's what I need to do this job. It's sort of like, for me, taking stock of getting a new position in a company and then looking around and realizing I might not know how to do it. What do I need to do in order to do it well? That's how I feel about parenting a child with the D. It's a new position and I need to take stock, 18 months in, of what I need now, to do it well. I want to do it well. I don't care if I am the best, but wouldn't it just be a shock to the system if I acquired the skills to do it well, and that, in turn, would lessen the stress I feel when everything is out of control? That would be heavenly to me - less stress, more knowledge and a feeling of semi-control.

So, tonight, I am emailing Grace's D-care team and asking them to help me gain the knowledge. I am beginning a night time basal test.  I am asking her team to teach me to do all of the abiove. Not just faxing them numbers and asking for them to solve it. Not just calling in the information and waiting for a call back. I want them to teach me. I need to know.