This Is My Brain: This Is My Brain On Diabetes - And Sometimes It's Exhausting

Diabetes is so damn different every day and at every turn - it's a goddamn crapshoot!

For example, 3 days ago I filled up a new omnipod with 150 units of insulin (180 unit is normally too much,/as in too wasteful for me,) and placed it on my side boob.

95% of the time, boob sites work really well for me. 

This boob site is working exceptionally well. 

We’re talking almost a solid flatline on my Dexcom for the past 72 hours, except for normal post-meal spikes and 3 actual low blood sugars. 

All of the above had me seriously thinking: Oh my God, did somebody kickstart my pancreas and neglect to tell me?

Anyway, pod expires in two hours, at 6:11 pm tonight. 

I currently have 36 units in my pod. Even if I keep it in for an additional 3 hours (half the 6 hour grace period after the time on your pod officially runs out,) and bolus for my dinner, I’ll still have more than 31 units left. 

Do I really want to start a new pod at almost 10 pm at night and post-meal? 

I DO NOT. 

WHY? Because then I’ll have to stay up and make sure everything is copasetic with my new site/pod. If it isn’t  - I have to start the process all over again. I have to work tomorrow - I don't want to be up super late!

Not to mention the fact that if I change out this pod late night tonight, that means in all probability, I'll have to change out the next pod late at night- unless I can sync my morning alarm with the 6 hour grace period and make sure I have enough insulin in said pod during that grace period. Or I run out of insulin before the pod times out. Or an occlusion alarm goes off. 
Or 390 other different diabetes wrenches getting thrown into the equation.
This isn't projecting, this is what is required for those of us wearing diabetes robotical parts. 
SIGH. 

If I put less insulin in my new pod, there’s a 50% chance that diabetes will switch it’s bitch-switch and I’ll go through my normal 150 units in less than 72 hours and will have to change out my site early - unless of course, that doesn’t happen. 

Again - who the hell knows what will be required from a new infusion site and no matter what brand of robot pancreas you’re using. YES, the same happens with tubed pumps.

Or like... do I put less insulin in the new pod and do correction injections from the remaining insulin in my previous pod? 

For fuck sake, insulin is the 5th most expensive insulin on the planet and I don’t want to waste it!

Yeah, this is only a small portion of the mostly necessary and seriously annoying diabetes minutia that runs through people living with diabetes minds and on a daily basis. 

This is also why when a healthcare professional asks me how much insulin I take a day I look at them with daggers in my eyes. OK, maybe not daggers - especially if they're nice. But I definitely channel my inner 13-year-old self and roll my eyes at them and I'm all like, WHATEVER.

Every day with diabetes is different - and requires a different amount of insulin - and for dozens of different reasons. And there are dozens if not hundreds, maybe thousands, (but for real it feels like MILLIONS,) of different diabetes scenarios having nothing to do with site changes or insulin or carbs.  

AND SOMETIMES IT'S GODDAMN EXHAUSTING. 

This my brain. This is my brain on diabetes.  

This spot-on cartoon was created by the amazing Haidee Merritt.
To see more of her work, laugh your butt off and maybe buy her books,  click HERE. 

#DTM2018: The Diabetes EcoSystem

A few weeks ago I attended the Diabetes Technology Society's 18th annual Diabetes Technology Meeting  (#DTM2018 on the twitter,) in Bethesda, Maryland on November, 8th, 9th, and 10th. 

It was an excellent opportunity to listen to lectures from diabetes tech-heads, FDA, researchers, scientists, healthcare professionals, and to learn more about the latest diabetes and dtech advances for people with diabetes. 

A tremendous amount of information was discussed at a rapid fire pace - as in it made my head spin - but in a great way. 

I’m glad I was able to experience it. 

Full Disclosure: I was able to attend thanks to Ascensia Diabetes Care, who sent me there to cover the event as their Guest Reporter. Ascensia covered all my expenses, (travel, lodging, meals,) and provided me with an honorarium for my time and my talent. 

As always - All thoughts are mine and mine alone. 

My first of two #DTM2018 articles is up on Ascensia's website, mapping out the topography of the Diabetes Ecosystem, its parts and booming expansion - and how “people with diabetes are more than the twin of their diabetes data. We represent what the data cannot articulate - the living, breathing, real life component of diabetes. Our voices need to be included on panels and discussions when it comes to diabetes tech.”

Click HERE and give it a read! 

Diabetes Friends, Pod Changes, And A Lost Bottle Of Insulin

Last Friday night I spent time with local diabetes friends - a family who lived in the next town over. The timing was right and my Omnipod was about to run out. 

A few weeks back, I’d offered to fill a new pod/do a site change in front of the Dmama and t1 AlmostTweenT1 daughter so they’d know what to expect when they went for Omnipod training. Friday morning I texted Dmama, and told her I’d be changing my site between 4:30 and 5:30. If it was good for them, I ‘d stop over. If it wasn’t, we could schedule for another day.

People with diabetes do that. We show-off and explain our hardware; share experiences and help one another out when diabetes is being bitchy. 

We share because we “get it.” We speak the language of diabetes and in the same diabetes dialect. And it’s comforting.   

Those are just some of the gifts of our D community — both online and off - and I love and am so incredibly grateful for those gifts. 

Friday morning I packed my diabetes bag with my almost new bottle of insulin — as in I’d used it exactly twice. 

Plus 2 pods, extra skin-tac, and my PDM and test strips , which were already in my diabetes bag. . 

I was good to go. 

7 hours later I knocked on their door and we caught up on life and life with diabetes.

I also learned that American Girl sold Doll manicure kits with “real nail polish for the dolls and that they only cost $10.”  Also: Said manicure kit came with some hideous looking (at least it looked damn hideous on the computer screen), bubblegum pink nail-polish, that would thankfully wash off.

But to each her own. 

45 minutes later, with 3 units left in my old pod and 2 hours until my current pod officially expired, my friends watched as I cancelled out my old pod; filled the new pod with insulin, went through the PDM prompts, and prepped the skin on my left arm with skin-tac. 

Dmama asked questions and my assistant AlmostTweenT1, pressed the PDM button after each prompt and only after I gave her the OK. 

We were done in a snap. 

AlmostTweenT1 smiled and said “COOL,” then went to go play with her brothers.

I checked my blood sugar: 146. Dmama  offered me a juice- box. I did and bolused for it, and we kept talking.

20 minutes later I started packing up and came THIS CLOSE to forgetting my insulin. 

I didn’t - and made sure it was tucked safely in both its box and my diabetes bag before I zipped it up tight in my diabetes bag and tossed it in my handbag.

We said our goodbyes and promised to meet up in a few weeks. 

I went home, put my box of almost new insulin in the fridge immediately and completely forgot about it. 

Cut to Monday morning when I woke up with an itchy site and a 300 blood sugar. 

My arm site had crapped out with 12 hours to go and 13 units left. 

Shit happens and I went to grab my insulin. 

Which I did… except the box was empty, the insulin bottle was missing. 

I checked the fridge shelf where every bottle of insulin I open makes it’s temporary home - NOTHING. 

I checked in the veggie drawer where my unopened bottles of insulin live. 

I looked on every shelf in my fridge, and then under it. SO GROSS. 

Then I looked on my kitchen floor and under my stove. 

I dumped out my diabetes bag, handbag, and work bag. NADA. 

The clock was ticking, my blood sugar was high, and I needed to get in the shower. 

I also needed coffee. So I temporarily shoved the lost bottle of insulin to the back of my mind,  opened a new bottle of insulin and did what I had to do. 

I knew how lucky I was to have extra insulin bottles in my fridge. 

The cost of one bottle of insulin kept running through my head and the thought of losing one bottle made me sick to my stomach. 

 I looked for that damn bottle of insulin for two days. 

I KNEW I hadn’t left it at my friends. 

A. She would have texted me ASAP.

B. I knew that if I texted and asked if they’d found an extra opened bottle of insulin, my Dmama friend would worry. 

I didn't want that. 

Plus, I was worrying enough for the both of us. 

Last night I came home and kept thinking about that damn bottle - I had a feeling I’d find it 6 months later and in a place I never thought to look. 

Maybe it fell out of my bag as I was going up the steps. I checked in my stairwell and up my stairs. NOTHING. I flipped the cushions on the couch and then checked under it. ZILCH.

And if it was in my car — it was cooked. 

I thought about what if I didn't have backup - and what if I'd had to explain losing a bottle of insulin - the very stuff that keeps me alive to my insurance company - and I knew they would tell me that I was SOL. 

I took a hot shower, put on my pajamas and flipped through NetFlix. 

Before I went to bed I decided to check near the fridge one more time. Nothing. 

But something made me look in my pantry — which I’d already looked in multiple times. 

And there in the corner —  on my white and gray patterned floor…. was my white labeled bottle of insulin — blending in so well I could barely see it.

I washed the bottle under cold water, then swabbed it with alcohol. 

When it was dry, I marked it with a purple Sharpie , so I’d know to use that bottle first. 

And I was thankful.
I was so tired, but I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about others who weren't lucky -  because they couldn't afford insulin or were forced to ration insulin and  are no longer here.