It started with the rice

Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

I am so very sleep deprived that it's not even funny. In fact, it IS funny, cause I will uncontrollably laugh at anything, precisely because I am sleep deprived!

Grace has had some wacky overnights this past week. Lows after dinner, then treated, only to rebound sky high. Wakes up perfectly in range. The diabetes Goddesses are seriously messing with me.

Here is a rendition of Tuesday night. In all it's glory. Ever have one of these nights?

5 pm - 127 BG - 68 g carbs - 3.10 units (2.00 now, 1.05 over 2.5 hours)
Dinner time. Perfect in range number. We have chicken and white rice. I know white rice is a challenge for her. It's one of her favorite foods, and we eat it about once a month.

5:20 pm - 43 g carbs - 2.40 units - temp basal +20% for 3 hours
She wants more rice. I up the insulin and add in a temp basal for good measure.

7:00 pm - 37 BG - Suspend insulin - 1 15g juice, 2 glucose tabs, 1 15 g snack (all uncovered)
Grace comes out of the shower and says she feels a wee bit low. I test her. Thirty flippin seven. She replies that she feels more like a 65. Which I find funny, that she is in touch with what number BG she may be feeling. I think I dosed too much for the rice.

7:20 pm - 69 BG - Still suspended insulin - 1 15g snack (uncovered)
Still trying to climb out of the foxhole.

8:00 pm - 43 BG - Still suspended insulin - 1 15g juice, 1 17g granola bar (all uncovered)
OK, really, forty flippin three? I thought we were climbing out, not heading back down the foxhole!

8:30 pm - 61 BG - Still suspended insulin - 1 about 17 g banana (uncovered)
Here we go again. I think we heard this tune before, didn't we? Up, down, up, down.
Grace goes to bed. I assure here 'I got this honey, you just go to bed.'

9:00 pm - 106 BG - Still suspended insulin (for good measure)
I see the light at the end of the tunnel. Little did I know that was the freight train headed my way.

9:20 pm - 262 BG - Turn insulin basal rate back on - Bolus .70 units for high BG
OK, didn't see that coming. All of this food and suspended insulin is starting to build up. But I'm too scared to set a large temp basal for fear of plummeting again.
The house starts to go to bed. It's just me. Awake on the iPad in the hallway.

10:00 pm - 259 BG - (.65 IOB) - Temp basal of +20% for .5 hour
Isn't that the same number? This is where I loved Apidra. Man, that insulin attacked highs and sent them down baby. Novolog takes its sweet ole time. Ticks me off. I can take lows, it's the highs that do me in.

10:30 pm - 305 BG - Bolus .35 - Temp basal of +30% for .5 hour
Here's where I cursed, cause I finally catch on how this night is gonna roll. We are climbing. The snacks are digesting, the lack of insulin from suspending it, all coming to bite me in the bottom. I am sleepy and I just wanna cry.

11:00 pm - 342 BG - Bolus .35 - Temp basal of +50% for .5 hour
I believe I cursed a lot here. A whole string of obscenities, but I used no voice, just mouthing filthy word after filthy word. It felt good. I throw caution to the wind and I plug in a +50% temp basal. Who's your Mama now, D, huh?!!

11:30 pm - 309 BG - (.95 IOB) - Temp basal of +20% for 1 hour
A lower number! You know how our thinking is so twisted that I am excited to actually see a 309. That's sick, somehow. But she is coming down. I think I kissed the PDM.

I sat back down in the hall with my iPad. I leaned my head back and fell asleep. This is not like me.
I awoke with a start. It was 1:00 am. Craptacular.

1:00 am - 343 BG - Bolus .65 - Temp basal of +50 % for 1 hour
Mother of God - she's up again! What the heck happened? Now I am REALLY awake.

1:30 am - 294 BG - Bolus .05 - Temp basal is still running
Yeah, lower!!!! Do you feel like you are on the rollercoaster with me? Only this rollercoaster stinks.

2:00 am - 281 BG - Bolus .10 - Temp basal of +20% for 1 hour
Now I'm mad. Now, D, you have totally ticked me off. You will not win.

2:30 am - 204 BG - No bolus - Temp basal is still running
I am winning! I am winning! I am winning! I also feel punch drunk.

I try and lay my head down for a few hours.

6:00 am - 110 BG - No IOB
Hee hee hee. I think I might have won :0)

That was my night. Does any of this sound familiar to you? Cause I know there were Mamas sitting in hallways just like me, waiting for lows to rise and highs to come down.

Grace wakes up at 7 am.
'Mom, how was my night?' - Something she always has asked me, meaning 'how were her blood sugars overnight?'

'Oh honey, you were fine all night. I made sure of it.'

Thankful

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Thank YOU, DOC for all the support you give me and Grace throughout the year.

Thankful for the roof over our heads, the warm food on our table and the gift of family.

Thankful for medicine and technology, which keeps my daughter alive every day.

Thankful for doctors, guiding me in the care of my daughter.

Thankful for teachers and staff who care for my gal during the school day.

Thankful for a job to do and the hands to do it with.

Thankful.

It's a Wonderful World folks. Here's a little Louis Armstrong to remind you.

The Book of Better

Addition 11/21/11 - Kim over at the uber-fabulous blog Texting My Pancreas also reviewed The Book of Better. She gives some great thoughts about it. Go over and read her review here.

Wanna read something that will motivate you to make your 'diabetic life' BETTER?!
I found it, in The Book of Better: Life with Diabetes Can't Be Perfect, Make it Better by Chuck Eichten

The publisher of the book, Three Rivers Press, sent me a copy to read and preview. I read it in one sitting, the day after getting it. It's that good. And funny. And insightful. Oh and it's straightforward and honest. Chuck makes you laugh, makes you think, makes you think some more and then makes you question how you can do it all better.

Chuck has been diabetic since age 13. He grew up in the Midwest. Works for Nike, first as an apparel designer, then in Nike Brand Design, and now as the Design Director for the Department of Nike Archives (DNA). You can read his biography here. Fascinating career.

The whole premise of the book is that, as Chuck says, we can't be perfect, but we can always, always, always, be BETTER. Better at everything, including diabetes. We can always make better decisions about what to eat. We can always make better decisions about exercise and insulin intake. We can always do better with our A1Cs. We can always do better in accessing and using technology to take care of ourselves and our diabetes. Always. DO. BETTER.

And isn't that a wonderful way to look at all this care? That we can't be perfect and we should stop trying to be. But if we adopt the mantra of doing BETTER, well, that's DO-ABLE. In my mind, it's perfect sense. Stop the perfect Penny. Stop trying to achieve the perfect diabetic care. Do BETTER Penny. Work with what you have and what you can access and do it BETTER than you have done it before. It won't be perfect, but it sure will be BETTER. Physically, emotionally, mentally. Better.

A couple quotes stood out for me while reading:

'The highest gift a patient with diabetes can ever receive is a way to make diabetes itself the road, to find meaning in living with diabetes.' - Dr. Victor Montori, Div. of Endocrinology, Manyo Clinic (foreward)

In his chapter about 'Talk About Diabetes' Chuck has some profound thinking to share. In a most straightforward way...

 'Diabetes is a scary monster. Diabetes is just about everything you've heard.

Thoughtless, inconsiderate, selfish, sloppy. Shows up early, goes home late. Reckless and bullying. Prone to sneak attacks. And unlike many of our other personal scary monsters, diabetes isn't just made up in our head.

Scary monsters, real and imagined, are part of life. They don't go away when we run from them. They don't go away when we give in to them. They don't go away when we ignore them.

Truly, the most effective scary monster deterrent is understanding.

The second-most effective scary monster weapon comes FREE with understanding: COURAGE.'

                                                                                                     - pp. 36-37, The Book of Better

And something that really struck me, in his chapter about 'Future Better:'

So what do kids with diabetes need from the grown-ups?

Kids needs information - Learn everything and then share with your child what they need to KNOW - not what you hope, or wish or guess - but what they NEED TO KNOW about diabetes and moving and eating and insulin.

Kids need positivity - They don't need pity or sadness. Diabetes is not a cause for sadness. Sadness gets your kid with diabetes EXACTLY NOTHING. Kids will feel bad for you, the parent, because you are so sad. And it's not about you. And it's not about sad.

Kids need you to believe - Diabetes is CHALLENGING, not DEVASTATING. 

Kids need you to show them - If we want our kids to believe what we say, WE HAVE TO DO WHAT WE SAY.

                                                                                                  pp. 262-263, The Book of Better

And there are tons more. His chapters include: 

'The Bottom 10 Bad Things About Diabetes'

'The Top 3 Good Things About Diabetes. I An Not Kidding.'

'People with Diabetes and the People Who Love Them

'Insulin; A Wish Come True'

'The Best Available is Better'

'Ups and Downs of Highs and Lows'

and that's not even all of them!

I cannot recommend this book enough, whether you are a parent of a Type 1 child or a Type 1 adult. I found it refreshingly honest, cut-to-the-chase about diabetes book, that lifted me up and gave me a feeling that I can DO better with diabetes. That I indeed, cannot be perfect, but I can always DO better by Grace. 

And isn't that something, to hear that? It is for me.

Buy the book. DO BETTER.

Disclosure: Three Rivers Press sent me the book for free. They did not ask me to write a review. All opinions are truly and totally my own. But you really should buy this book. Get it on Amazon for $10.20. That, my friends, is a well spent $10.20 so that you too, can do and feel better. 

This should make you chuckle

When I schedule Grace's follow up endo appointments now, I can log onto our hospital's new portal and see the appointment, along with test results.

So, I logged on to see our next appointment.

Ummm, they may want to think about how they abbreviate their Follow Up  'Visit Type.'

Diabetes FU indeed.

Endo Visit & Diabetes Candy Exchange

We just had our 3 month endo visit on Tuesday. Grace's A1C remained at 7.1. Yes, I am fully and well aware that that is a 'good' A1C, but I am used to 6.6, 6.8 and even 6.4's. And I so wanted to 'do better' this time around, as her A1C 6 months ago was also 7.1. Then again, I know that I should be thrilled with 7.1. Her growth hormones are beginning, we are starting early puberty and had some uber-highs, from the hormones and from our knock-down-drag-out battle with Apidra. That's chronicled here.

I chalked it up to 'It's good, but we can do better.' And just to put it out there, that is HARD for me. Usually when I do and try my best, I get my best. And maybe this IS our best. Frankly, maybe this is rock-your-socks-off-no-one-else-could-that best, but it doesn't FEEL like MY best, if that makes any sense at all from my twisted mind.

A1C does freakin things to your mind. It's not a grade, yet it IS a grade.
Hell with it.
We will do our best and see how we fare in 3 months.
That's all I can do.

We attempted the Bayer A1C test. What a bust that was. Apparently, we did not have enough blood to do the test. We filled the 'blood filling device' to its brim, but the A1C device gave out a code after 5 minutes that there was not enough blood. Big disappointment. I am saving the other test in the kit for our 3 month endo appt in February.

Look - here's us following the darn directions!
And waiting 5 minutes for the test to end.

The code that says 'not enough blood.'

It was a completely diabetic day on Tuesday, as we had our annual Diabetic Candy Exchange at our local hospital. You can read about last year's 2010 Candy Exchange. Once again, it was fabulous!

Grace brought her bag of candy that she did not like to the exchange. She kept 'the good stuff' as she puts it. She forked over the rest. They carted away tons and tons and tons of candy that the kids brought in. Literally, wagons of candy. I, of course, scooped out the fun size little bags of Skittles - what diabetic throws them away? They bring you up from a low baby! I put my hand right in that giant bag and scooped them out. Grace was embarassed. I wasn't. Any one of you D-Mamas would have done the same thing!

They had pizza, of course. Grace and I chose the hospital cafeteria food instead. They had booths, a pumpkin carving man, raffles for the kids to enter, and of course, face painting.

Grace needed the swirls on her face.

And they rocked my gal's favorite thing - CRAFTS!!!!

And girl, did she ever go to town on the letter bracelets and necklaces.

They totally cracked me up.

Here is Grace's:

Here is the one she made me:

Here is the one she made our OmniPod rep, who had a table there: