Sweet and Sour- The Type 1 Diabetes Rollercoaster

This post was supposed to be a rant to end all rants, however, I'm too tired for that and will write it on Sunday. For now, this is what diabetes is like on a bad day. I'm sick, I'm tired, my diabetes educator won't get back to me and my blood sugars are wreaking havoc. For the past few weeks as you can see in one of my last posts  I've had some diabetes drama. High blood sugars all the time kind of drama. Yesterday really was a diabetes rollercoaster, my levels starting moderately high in the morning, crashing down in the afternoon and going all the way up to 21 by night (guess who got up at 3am again). I've talked about how lows feel before, but high blood sugars are terrible. - You're tired - You're thirsty - You feel really sick - Energy? What is energy? - Pins and needles - Dizziness - You blog about how crappy high blood sugars are to distract yourself from the crappy high blood sugars - As shown above, you lose all logical thought I...

I present you the disaster that was last night/early this morning and prompted me to return home and sleep for a solid hour 6pm: Dinner was a bit of disaster, so we had to go and get McDonalds. I calculated approximately 80 grams of carbs for my meal, taking a huge amount of insulin to cover it. 7pm: Blood sugar- 9.5. This was a little low considering the amount of carbs I'd just had. Due to my fear of the dreaded hypo, I decided that I should have a juice box- 30 grams of carbohydrate. However I'm really clever and completely forgot the delayed effect McDonalds has on blood sugar, shooting it sky high a few hours after eating. Now I had anoher 30 grams on board, with no insulin to cover it. 9pm: Feeling pretty sick, but pass it off as being tired from the past few weeks of exams. 10pm: Blood sugar- 24.5 (normal range is 4-7). At this point I was pretty concerned, checking for Ketones (acidic substances that the body produces when there is no source of glucose, meaning...

Dear Diabetes, I think we need to sort out a few things, because you really haven't been behaving yourself lately. I've made you a comprehensive list of my concerns and would like a reply and action to be taken as soon as possible. 1) Stop with the high blood sugar levels in exams. Just stop it. It's not nice, I don't like it. Whoever gave you the idea that blood sugars of 15-17 were ok during exams is an idiot, because it's just not. You've been here for going on four years, you know better. 2) Now onto the fake low blood sugars. No diabetes, I'm not low when my blood sugar is 7, stop over reacting. Not being able to treat symptoms of a low is terrible... because I'm not actually low. Seriously, I'd love to eat stacks of jellybeans and chocolate, really, but you're going to have to deal with having more insulin when I do. 3) Ok, I understand that you and pizza don't get along, really at 25 grams a slice I don't blame you. But PLE...

'Out damned spot!' A pretty iconic line in the Shakespearean play Macbeth, where Lady Macbeth experiences night walking and paranoia, washing her hands of unseen blood in her sleep. Now whilst I may not be as murderous as Lady Macbeth, I can understand her issue with having blood on your hands. I promise, whilst it may look as though I've been moonlighting as a hit-woman with my blood-stained hands, this isn't the case. What happened is some more pump mayhem, well cannula mayhem to be exact.It's gross, it's rare and it's terrible- it's called a 'gusher'. I was treated to one of these Lady Macbeth moments a night ago as I changed my insulin set. Usually, pulling out the cannula isn't an issue, it's like ripping off a band-aid. But this time, it was intense. After taking off the sticky white cannula, I was treated to what a stream of blood that wouldn't stop. Once I got past the whole 'AAH I'M HEMORRHAGING' bit, I was ...

Hypo's are no fun, they're the kid that comes to your birthday party, eats all the cake, teases the other kids and leaves without so much as a how do you do. Which in kid speak translates to hypos are evil and will never be invited to your birthday party again. They feel awful, everything spins, you feel nauseous, extra dizzy and if you're still conscious, panicky. You turn pale, you sweat and your eyes glaze over. Not a lot of fun huh? Well, I haven't had a hypo in a few months, which is very strange for a diabetic. But it's got to the point where I'm afraid of having one, that maybe it will happen when I'm asleep and I won't wake up (yeah my brain is such a drama queen, but it is a possibility). So as a result I've been dialling back my insulin at night, you know, just in case this kid comes to the party during the night and knocks over a few chairs. But that leaves me with high blood sugars all day, ranging from 10 to 20 (so much for between 4 and...

My insulin pump, fondly named Dobby (Yes, from Harry Potter.... don't judge me...) seems to share a goal of spontaneously appearing where it shouldn't and holding the wish to maim and seriously injure (you traitorous pump you!) Don't you see the resemblance? You diabetics know what I'm talking about, Dobby likes to live on the edge. It's a little sport, called pump bungee-jumping and I think my pump's addicted. It happens at any time, any place and usually when it's least wanted, like when standing up on a bus/train to get off at your stop or when you go take off your seat belt in the car. There it is, the pump hanging by its tubing, swaying in the breeze. Not only is this painful, but sometimes it gets caught on things like doorknobs, and pulls out the infusion set, meaning that I have to inject a new one early (boo!). But that isn't all. Me being me, when this happens I usually make some form of comment that would sound really really weir...

Phew, blog week has been pretty demanding so I'm looking forward to getting back to my style of posts! Now I'm meant to link the blogs I've stumbled across thanks to diabetes blog week, and they're pretty amazing! 1) k2 at http://diabetesaliciousness.blogspot.com She's brilliant, there aren't any other words for how amazing her sense of humour is. As always reading her posts has made me smile. 2) Meri at ourdiabeticlife.com is inspirational and gives me a bit of a look into what it must be like to be a mum of a diabetic.  Now that this blog week is over, I thought I'd share todays diabetes drama! RD presents: that time I accidentally OD'd on insulin ... so this happened last night! So it was 10.30 and time for my blood sugar check. I'd been the perfect student, totally prepared for todays exams and heading to bed early. But no, I made one mistake. Typing my blood sugar into my insulin pump, I sat with bleary, glazed eyes attem...

So I just found out about D Blog Week and signed up, though I will be running a little late (just a day :) ) Day 1:  Often our health care team only sees us for about 15 minutes several times a year, and they might not have a sense of what our lives are really like. Today, let’s pretend our medical team is reading our blogs. What do you wish they could see about your and/or your loved one's daily life with diabetes? On the other hand, what do you hope they don't see My health care team? It's pretty amazing. I'm lucky enough to be constantly supported by diabetic educators, dietitians, counsellors and of course my endocrinologist who really is one of the best in his field. They know so much about my diabetes, but sometimes you have to wonder, what do they actually know about me, the person? I wish they could see the support I constantly have around me, and how much their guidance has influenced me. I wish they could see how their lessons have helped me manage day t...