Peace Out D!

That's it, we're putting in our 2 week notice! I've had it with D's antics. We are officially saying sayonara in 2 weeks to D!...... If only it were that simple..

We've battled the lows before, we've battled the highs. But what get's me is the 'unknown'. I tend not to dwell on it because we'll that would just drive me crazy. But now after battling lows during the night, and catching a low this morning pre-wake up time for Clifford. My brain gears are starting to turn trying to figure out what is causing this.

2 weeks ago we battled lows 4 out of 7 nights during the week. I made a decision to start giving him lower carb snacks (under 20 grams) uncovered, meaning no fast acting (bolus) insulin given to cover those carbs. I decreased his Lantus to 5 units. (Lantus is the insulin that he gets at night time which is supposed to work for up to 24 hours, or long lasting insulin.) This worked good for us except a few morning highs of 200+. Well throw school starting last week into the picture and you get ridiculously high numbers 300+ daily for lunch/snack. To me that is just unacceptable! School is stressful enough, but with numbers that high it can't be fun at all.

So point being here, his Lantus was increased by to 5.5 units (what his endo wanted) to see if we can get those early morning 200 numbers, and TA DA! We have a low of 62 at 11pm! Now as my brain is working I question is it the increased Lantus. Or is it something else. He was complaining yesterday morning of his throat hurting when he coughed, but showed no other symptoms of being sick, and the cough wasn't a bad cough more of a clear your throat kinda cough. But after getting a sore throat myself last night and having it still stick around this morning, I'm wondering if this is the start of a Fall cold brought to you by school????? Being sick would cause wacky numbers both high and low......

The problem here is there is no black or white with D. He could very well be getting sick, but it could also very well be the increased Lantus that caused the drop. Just like the tootsie roll pop.... We'll never know... The best I can do is guess and hope it all works out in the end.we'

A poem for dealing with D...

It was asked today at Sunday school how you can show your faith or worship to God in writing. I used to write poems all the time from the age of 15 on. At 15 I lost my cousin, more like my brother and it helped to write out my feelings. However with as busy life has gotten I haven't had much time to write. Tonight I sat down and tried to accomplish this task. The only thing that came to my mind in showing my faith in God is in dealing with D. It is a very difficult journey to deal with an illness that at anytime can take my son away from us. It has been a long hard road to follow in getting to the point I'm at now. So with my words here is how I show my faith to God on our D journey.

The unknown scares me to my core.

I don't know how I can take much more.

During times of many questions.

I open my heart and mind to your suggestions.

My strength I pull from you.

For you are there to lead me through.

The difficult times both near and far.

You are my ultimate northern star.

School is back in session as of Tuesday, Sept 6th, and it has done nothing but wreak havoc on Clifford's blood sugar numbers. It's just that time of year again that he made need more insulin. However the debate with myself that I'm having is that I feel he should be more active in sports or extra curricular activities first to see if that helps before we increase his insulin. All summer long when he was home and the weather was nice the first thing he did after breakfast was go outside and play, and so it continued all day long after lunch, and after dinner. His numbers reflected this, they were Great!.

But now he's back in school, and it's been doing nothing but raining all day and everyday, he's stuck inside with no recess, and only gym once a week. My thought is why just increase his insulin if he can get into activities and become more active. I know that there is a good chance in the winter time he'll need more insulin even if he is active but right now I'm leaning on activity to see if that helps. I'm just not enjoying the numbers of 300s and 400s at school when I know he has not been that high in a long time when he was at home. It's frustrating to say the least. He has been known in the past (last year) to sneak food he wasn't supposed to, so that is an option too. That is why at our 504 meeting I am recommending we have an Aide with him during the day and on the bus. #1 to help if he's low, etc. #2. They can watch over and make sure he's only eating his lunch that he packs.

Normally kids trade foods etc, and it's no big deal. Not in this case, each carb is counted and he must eat only his, because if he traded and got something with more carbs, well highs will happen for sure. I just know there is NO reason he should be this high during the day at school. When he get's home it's a fight to get him back within range, only for him to wake up then go back to school. That is one roller coaster his body should not be riding.

Stages of Grief and a Chronic Illness...

With a chronic illness it's like you are losing part of you or part of your loved one that you cannot get back. In Clifford's case I cannot get back the carefree days without D. The time that I sent him off to Preschool without any worries, or even a second thought to him eating or drinking.

When looking at a chronic illness to begin to even accept it you must go through the grief of losing that piece of someone or yourself.

The first stage is Denial, The I can't believe this stage. I kept thinking in our experience that maybe they got it wrong, maybe it wasn't Type 1 diabetes, maybe it was something else that he can just take a pill for or nothing at all. Denial is a hard stage, because with Diabetes you need to accept your new normal and handle and care for your or your loved ones Diabetes diligently.

After you have passed Denial you will hit the stage known as Depression. I may have stayed in this stage a little longer then I would have liked. I was very unhappy that Clifford had to go through what he had to go through and couldn't be a normal kid anymore. I could cry at the drop of a hat just thinking what he must endure now and the rest of his life until there is a cure. Heck I probably could still cry at the drop of the hat, but I'm emotional like that. I however got through the depression and moved onto the next stage which is Anger.

In the anger stage, which once in awhile I frequently revisit, I was so angry with Diabetes for coming into his life. I wanted it to see where the front door was and see it's way out. I wanted Diabetes to know it was NOT welcome in Our life and most importantly my son's life! It's hard to live day to day when you are so very angry at someone or something. It's not healthy for anyone around you and certainly not healthy for yourself. It is also hard not to be angry at something such as Diabetes for robbing them of a normal life. But eventually you move past your anger and learn to enter the last stage Acceptance.

During the acceptance stage you realize finally that this is how it is going to be from here on out. How I looked at it was I could either sit around being sad and angry at something that was out of our control, or I could accept it, and be as happy as I possibly could. It helps to look at all the positive around you rather than the negative when dealing with D. The best positive of all is that my son is alive!

Now some stages of grief list bargaining. Which I can see as I have said many times to God, why couldn't he just make Clifford's pancreas work correctly and give me D instead. That I would much rather endure the shots, and everything involved with D rather than Clifford go through it.

In all I've gone through all the stages of grief. That's not to say that from time to time I don't go back and revisit a few. I do, I'm only human, but I've learned to accept that this is Clifford's new life, and we just make sure to do our very best to ensure he grows up to be a happy and healthy adult. And also make sure he is a responsible capable adult in dealing with his diabetes management, that is until a cure is found...........

Diabetes is a cruel joke...

I've come to accept that nothing with D is guaranteed. I've also come to learn how certain things affect Clifford's blood sugar. However, there are times when I'm just baffled and it really irritates me. Wednesday night was 'tiring' to say the least with a random low at 4am, and lack of sleep. With that being said, I was determined to get some sort of sleep last night. I was really hoping for 5 hours straight!

I pulled out all I could in my bag of tricks to make this happen, and it went a little something like this. Feed the twins good right before bed, check. Put them in warmer Pj's so they don't get cold, check. Give Clifford a good amount of a solid protein, and extra carbs to sustain a nice number, DOUBLE CHECK! I thought that would get me some sort of sleep last night. HOWEVER, D had something else in mind. Clifford was 83 at bedtime (lower but still a nice number). Instead of 50 grams of carbs, and 1 unit per insulin ratio, he had 75grams with at least 2 servings of protein (peanut butter). Peanut butter has been known in the past to help sustain a nice solid number for Clifford at night time. I could have placed money on Clifford having a decent number throughout the night. Before my bedtime (around 11pm) I decided to check Clifford and not wait until the 12am check. To my surprise he was 63!! After running and grabbing juice, crackers, and some more peanut butter, I rechecked to make sure it was correct, and he was now 50! The one good thing in this story is that he woke up and was able to drink the juice, and eat without much mess. We joked about how he got to get some good snacks the last two nights. He was asking how low he was, etc. I don't keep it from him, and let him know his #, but made sure to tell him not to worry about it to go back to sleep, and I would be rechecking him, and he'll be safe. After that brief conversation he was back to dreamland.

I waited around 20 minutes to recheck him and he was back up but still only 100! I just didn't like going to bed with him only being 100! So I gave him 2 glucose tablets to ensure he got up over. I figured he'd be a little bit high, and at that point with lows throughout the day and previous night, I could accept a little bit high during sleep. I decided to set my alarm for 1am instead of 3am to recheck to make sure we were sitting good. Well as I've said before I seem to wake right before the alarm goes off. So at 12:56 we were at 237! Again high, but I can accept that number. Like I said, D sometimes baffles me. The only reasoning I can think of the drop is the amount of activity right before bed, and it finally caught up on him.

It seems that last night D was playing a cruel joke on me and I didn't get the punchline to it. I am really hoping we don't have much of these 'Yummy late night snacks' when school starts back up, or that boy is really going to be tired.

Food.. What is it to you?

My lack of sleep is causing my thinking to be somewhat comical. Every time I turn around it's time for more food.. Breakfast, Lunch, snack, dinner, snack, etc, etc, etc...

So I got to thinking how food in our world is a bit different then food in your average world.

Food can be our friend (perfect situation where blood sugars are good, and food provides him with his nutrition and vitamins he needs to be healthy. Food can be our foe, and cause way high blood sugars if not enough insulin is given. And high blood sugars, are just a pain in the tushie. But then like last night, sometimes at 4am food can be a life saving medicine to bring up a low blood sugar.

I'm just at the point today that I'm sooo over food, no matter how yummy it can be. Besides, food is WAY overrated anyways....

3am battle, to treat or not to treat..... OH yeah an a A1c Update!

I've become so accustomed to waking up and doing night checks at 12 am and 3 am lately, that I wake up right before the alarm goes off. I figured for the most part we would be running a bit higher last night, since bedtime snack was banana cake with vanilla icing for Ethan's birthday.. However I did not foresee a battle at 3 am with myself trying to decide whether to treat or leave him ride it out. At midnight he was 173, a bit higher then I would like during the day but a number at night that I find just fine. I figured with his past trends the last few night's by 3 when his Lantus hit it's peaking point he would drop at least 20 more. Boy was I a bit off. At 3am, or 2:53 to be exact, since I woke up without the alarms assistance, he was 123!. Well that is an awesome number, but left me questioning whether I should give him some assistance in keeping up during the night, or let him ride it out. I decided on the latter. Now the question remains, how did my decision pan out??? Well I just tested him and his waking number is 96!!! BEAUTIFUL! I really hope that is the start of a great bs# day! (Yuck picture you really can't tell as it's on the webcam, Bad Bridget for not charging the camera, however there is our pretty 96!!).

Oh yes and an updated A1c, our last endo app 8/16 Clifford's A1c went from 7.3% to *drum roll please* 6.8%!!!! I am beyond estatic, as you can tell by the fact that it's over a week from said app and I'm still gushing about it.