Today is World Diabetes Day
What is World Diabetes Day? A day set aside for all of us living with the big D to spread the word about diabetes awareness. I’ll choose to share a typical day in my life living with the big D.
Thursday, 9:30 p.m. I go to bed battling a cold or the latest crud. As a person living with diabetes, it is easier for me to catch the latest thing my kids bring home from school or the babysitter.
Thursday 11:15 p.m.
I wake up knowing my blood sugar is low. I typically don’t have too many lows anymore since being on the pump, but they happen. I check my blood sugar and it is 61. The kids drank all of my OJ a couple of days ago and there’s no milk (we need to go to the grocery store), so I have two pieces of toast with butter and honey. This gets my blood sugar up but not before I go into total shakes and cold sweats. Fall asleep/pass out in the chair until my blood sugar comes back up.
Friday 7:15 a.m.
Wake up. Test my blood sugar – it is 81. GREAT!!!! Some mornings it is good, some not so good. Disconnect my insulin pump, take a shower, brush my teeth (because of my bad teeth and my diabetes, I have to make sure I take extra care of my teeth – my dental hygienist and I have a love/hate relationship – she loves to scrape all of the crap off my teeth and gums and I hate it!). Take all of my medications – quite a bit of medications for my blood pressure, cholesterol and other aches and pains of being almost 40. Reconnect my insulin pump and then decide on what to wear today. It’s Friday, so I’ll just choose jeans/t-shirt. My pump clips right on to my jeans pocket today. Some people freak out about where to put their pump, but mine goes right on my waist, belt or on the pocket of my jeans. Some days are better than others on dealing with the tubing.
10:30 a.m.
Check my blood sugar at my desk – 130 – pretty good. It seems that teaching raises my blood sugar some days.
12:30 p.m.
LUNCH at Wendy’s drive through with Dana. Southwest Taco Salad and some french fries. I love french fries, but they play a number on my blood sugars. I’ll have to make sure to take a bit more insulin because of those damned carbs in the potatoes that convert directly to sugar in my body!
1:30 p.m.
Go to walgreens.com to refill insulin and blood testing strip rx. Thank God I have decent insurance and will only pay about $40 for the insulin and test strips. Without insulin it would be $200+.
2:22 p.m.
I’m feeling light headed and shaky – check my blood sugar and it is 65. Over compensated for the french fries and also since I’ve been sick lately, my blood sugars are reacting wacky to my insulin. Take a swig of Gabe’s chocolate milk and eat some honey.
Just a little snippet of my day with diabetes. Tomorrow will be different and so will the next day. I’ve been lucky today, as my blood sugars have been normal to low. Tomorrow they might be high – it’s always a guessing game.
