Diabetes Shots

SILVERWARE & SMARTIES
I have quick sugar-up items stashed in various places around my house. At work, at the beginning of each month, my work building passes out candy to each office. A couple months ago, they gave us Smarties, which are basically pure sugar compressed into tiny circles of fun. I kept grabbing handfuls of them from the receptionist’s desk, and began stashing them throughout my office, then my work bag, and eventually at home. These wound up in the silverware drawer in the kitchen. Forks, can-openers and Smarties. The house of a diabetic.

Diabetes Shots

PLUGGED IN
My computer. A diabetes essential. I’m a MAC girl all the way and my laptop was a gift to myself shortly after diagnosis. I mostly use it for the internet (to post my blog, Facebook, stalk celebrities on Twitter, e-mail friends), but I also keep a file for my medical records, checklists for grocery shopping and packing and random notes, projects, pictures and thoughts. On my screen? A really pretty flower garden in London. I like the pink pom-pom blooms. They make me happy.

Operator Error

I’ve been keeping a log of what I eat, how much insulin I’m giving myself, what my numbers are and when, in preparation for my endo appointment next week.

And because I’m that kind of person, I’ve color-coded the numbers that are too low and the ones that are, for me, too high, so they jump out immediately at me.

And you know what I’ve noticed? Yes, there are a couple of wacky instances where the numbers did what they wanted despite my best efforts, but more often than not, I’m the one who caused the numbers, especially the high ones.

I can see the trends, and I go high when two things happen:
1. I underestimate the carb count of something.
2. I don’t give myself any insulin for what I’ve eaten.

Let’s review.

1. I underestimate the carb count of something. I know how to read a label. I have a scale. Sometimes, though, if I’m tired and I just want to sit in my chair with a bag of bbq potato chips and watch television, I don’t weigh. I guess I’ll eat about 2 carb units worth, shoot up, then just shovel the chips in until I’m bbq’d out. Did I eat 2 carb units? Did I eat 3 carb units? Did I eat 1? Who knows. What I really need to do is just take a bowl from the cabinet, put it on the scale directly below said cabinet and weigh. Seriously. Not that hard.

Next big thing: I like to bake. While I try to stick with recipes that list some sort of carb count, I don’t always. So I wind up guessing. And it usually takes me until the last brownie to find the right carb count. You’d think I’d write this down, to remember for next time, but I don’t. And you’d think I’d realize that if a container of harmless yogurt has 1 carb unit, the brownie most certainly has more than two, or three.

2. I don’t give myself any insulin for what I’ve eaten. If I’m really low, I’ll drink a juice or eat an applesauce, about 1 carb unit, and not shoot for it. This is fine. It brings my number up to a yes-I-think-I-can-think-now number, without pushing it too far over the limit.

But when my numbers are not low, when they are normal and I want to eat, I must shoot. This is 101, right? But it’s so easy just to grab that handful of Tootsie Rolls, or eat a tapioca pudding cup without even thinking. I don’t know why or how my mind/body justifies this, but it does. And I consciously do not shoot. And when I’m done eating, I think somehow, magically, the carbs won’t count. And then I test, and I’m high, and I know if I had simply done the shooting to cover the food, I would have been normal.

I’m not beating myself up, but I am giving myself a slap on the wrist or a flick on the side of the head. I’m responsible. It’s my body, they’re my numbers and it’s just a little stupid of me, I think, to be this slack with something that only takes an extra minute or two to control. Seeing those numbers on the page makes me realize how much I really am being lax, and I’m going to make a conscious effort to do better; I know I won’t always, but I think I should at least try.

As always, more to come…

*P.S. Never write a blog when you’re zoned out from sinuses, or sinus meds or slightly low blood sugar—or especially all three. I had to look up how to spell “conscious” three times, even though I’ve known how to spell it since the third grade, possibly the second… Cheese and crackers, one carb unit, one unit of insulin…

Diabetes Shots

I NEED A NEW ONE
I’m using my old Lantus OptiClick pen case for my Novolog pens. The case is bulky (because that nasty OptiClick pen was bulky) and too big for what I need it for, but I just don’t seem to ever remember to look for a better version. There are two pens in there because I left my kit at work one night, and had to bust out a new pen at home. I’m hoping I can use up the insulin in both of them and not have to throw one away because it’s gone wonky.

Diabetes Shots

HERE ARE THE INSTRUCTIONS
Massively worded, tiny-sized type, origami-folded instructions and disclaimers that come inside my Lantus and Novolog boxes. I’ve read each one once, the first time I took each form of insulin. Now I just think of them as padding, so my Lantus glass vials and my Novolog pens don’t roll around inside the box.

I Don’t Feel 98

And, no, I’m not talking about my age (because sometimes I do feel like I’m almost a 100 years old…I digress).

I’m incredibly irritated right now—by the last e-mail someone sent me, by the magazines that are too close to my arm right now, by the marker that’s in front of the keyboard, by the fact that I keep having to delete typos and start over, by my palm, which stings from where I just tested it, convinced it was going to show me I’m dive-bombing into the 70s and below.

But I’m 98. And 15 minutes ago, I was 101, and an hour before that I was 120. So I’m not rapidly descending as far as I know.

But my head has that fuzzy halo. And I’m as cranky as Mr. Wilson. So my logical conclusion is that my meter is wrong, wrong, wrong. That my body is wrong, wrong, wrong. That the numbers aren’t computing to what’s actually happening.

And I have no choice but to break out the Wee Brie and crackers and have at it.

You have to play diabetes by the numbers, but sometimes you have to play by the instinct, too. Or the crankiness factor.

As always, more to come…

Diabetes Shots

OFFICE SUPPLIES
Colored paperclips: check. Large paperclips: check. Smarties: check. Standard office supply, no?

Molly Says Hi

Diabetes Shots

I COULDA HAD
A V8, and I do, almost every single morning. I figure it gives me a little more nutrition than I might normally get and, for some very odd reason, regular drinking of said product keeps my acid reflux at bay. Go figure. Also, point to make: I hate tomatoes of any kind and it took me over a month to be able to drink V8 without holding my nose. Now I swill it like I’m a frat boy at a kegger with a warm beer—I swallow as fast as I can and don’t dwell on the taste.

Ooops…

I kinda forgot I have an endo appointment in three weeks. I’d really like to bring in some good information, since this will be my first visit after being on the Novolog since Easter. (I had one quickie appointment about three weeks after going on it, just to make sure it wasn’t causing an allergic reaction/too much/too little/killing me—usual stuff.)

Unfortunately, I suck at the logging thing. My meter will keep my readings as long as I test often enough. HOWEVER, the diabetic world doesn’t seem to like to be compatible with MAC, and I’m not giving up my MAC, so I have to manually flip through the meter with a pencil and notebook to log them.

I also want to log how many carbs I’m eating and how many units I’m giving myself, and mesh them with my meter readings. Which means keeping track of the times I’m eating and shooting, so I can sync with my meter readings. Ack. It all sounds so horribly complicated and so time consuming and mind numbing. (Whine, whine, whine, bitch, bitch, bitch.)

So, as of tomorrow (because doing it today seems awfully daunting, and I haven’t picked out a pretty notebook yet), I’ll be in log mode, trying to write down all the tiny little details. And I’ll also wait to start until tomorrow, because I just realized my meter gained about 20 minutes of time somewhere along the way (scary; what else did it gain?) and the whole timing thing will be off if I don’t fix it before I start logging.

I’m off to change the meter time and find my notebook. I saw some really cool handmade ones somewhere. Life is always better with pretty paper.

As always, more to come…

Diabetes Shots

BOXED UP
I have many different boxes for my diabetes stuff, including a set of wooden boxes from Ikea. Some of the boxes hold office supplies, since the boxes are in my home office, but this one contains my Accu-Chek Multiclix lancets, my Freestyle test strips, extra batteries for my meter and my dog’s Percorten, which she gets injected with once a month for her Addison’s. My disease, her disease—it’s all good.

Attention, Please

I can be easily distracted. I admit this freely, and I think I may have even demonstrated this once or twice (okay, maybe three times) in my writing on this blog (my love of parentheses feeding this habit).

One would think, though, that in certain situations, my distractions would be limited and my focus would be 100 percent—say, upon jabbing a needle into my stomach. One would be wrong.

I’m standing in my kitchen, shooting up for the pizza that just arrived. I dial my Novolog pen for a large dose and insert the needle into my gut. Flish-flash and something on the television in my living room catches my eye. I look up and in some sort of instinctual linear movement, I lift my hand slightly as well. I look back down a split second later to see the needle hovering just above my body, insulin dripping from the tip. I check my stomach and see a slightly raised circle of skin—insulin that has pooled just beneath the surface instead of being fully injected into the fat region.

I hate when this happens. It looks creepy and it feels creepy. The first time I did it, I panicked for hours, thinking I had created some horrific medical disaster that could only end in severe trauma. I learned that the insulin eventually sinks in; it just takes a little bit longer.

I don’t panic anymore, but I do think it’s a little dumb on my part, possibly a lot dumb. It takes, what, five seconds to shoot insulin from the pen into my body? And I can’t stay with the task on hand for the full five? I can only handle two, maybe three seconds at best?

The only explanation I can offer is that it’s become so routine to shoot, I don’t think about the physical act of doing it as much as I used to. This is a good thing, in that shots have never been fun for me (are they for anyone?), so the fact that I don’t have to screw up courage to jab myself is a plus. This is a bad thing, in that it’s a waste of insulin, and the insulin that does make it to its destination isn’t absorbed as well as it should be.

What’s a girl to do? Well, other than turn the television off before I dial? Focus. (Folk us. Wee folk. Folk lore. Lore. Lora. Hey, that’s me.)

As always, more to come…

Diabetes Shots

GIMME BLOOD
This is my trusty blood kit that goes everywhere with me. My main meter is a Freestyle Flash, but my lancing device is an Accu-Chek Multiclix, thanks to the Diabetes Online Community. I HATED the Freestyle lancing device, which gave me huge, gaping wounds and I mentioned it in a blog. The Accu-Chek came highly recommended and I’ve never looked back.

Strip Show

It’s time to play the diabetes strip game. That’s where you surf the Internet to find the most reputable place selling your brand of meter test strips for the lowest price.

For one, brief, shining moment, I had an insurance Camelot and I could get 100 test strips a month for a co-pay of $10. All good things must come to an end, though, and my new insurance has a different policy on “non-formulary” items. It now costs me $50 for 100 strips at the pharmacy. Still not a bad price, but I hate the pharmacy and I hate that I have one more prescription. I’d much rather just order all my “non-formulary” items online, where I can get them in bulk and get them for about the same price. If I look.

I’ve been using Hocks.com for a while; they seem to have everything I need and at good prices. Shipping is free when you order above a certain dollar amount (not hard to do when buying test strips), and you can earn “dollars” that you can apply to future orders, which means I almost always get four or five bucks off my total. They’re really reliable, too, and they’ve only messed up one order one time and immediately fixed it.

Every now and then, though, you gotta do the comparison-shopping thing. Who knows? Maybe someone got a good price on a huge box of test strips and they’re selling them off cheap, or someone has a good heart and is selling them for what they’re worth, not what the mark-up is.

Here are this week’s findings. Each price is based on 50 strips. Stunning, really, when you see the varying prices…

Health Warehouse: $28
Drugstore.com: $59.99
WalMart: $103.04
American Diabetes Wholesale: $28.78
Allegro Medical: $32.95
Walgreens: $114.99
Overstock Drugstore: $29.98
OTC Wholesale: $31.99
Hocks: $27.99

Hocks is still my winner, although there are a couple of other places that come close—but they don’t let me earn dollars and some have a shipping charge as well. I’ll also order my pen needles and my syringes at the same time—they have a really good inventory. And, I can get 200 alcohol swabs for $2.39. AND, they have Sugar-Free Tums!

I’m not being paid by Hocks to write this. It’s just that I’ve been all over the Internet for the last six years (except for my time in Camelot), always looking for the best prices and decent service, and I was hoping to save someone else a little time and trouble. Hocks doesn’t always come up in searches for Freestyle test strips, so someone might miss them.

And, of course, I’m always open to hearing if someone else has found a gem of a place to order diabetic supplies in bulk, online, for cheap.

We gotta stick together. These strip shows don’t come cheap—a dollar here, a dollar there…

As always, more to come…

DIabetes Shots

BUTTER AND INSULIN
Like a lot of diabetics, I keep my insulin in one of the shelves in my fridge door. While I try to keep the butter separate, it does often end up mixed in. In case you're trying to read labels, there's a box of Lantus SoloStar pens, vials of Lantus, and boxes of NovoLog pens. I keep the insulin in my fridge until I'm ready to use it, then try to take it out the night before so it has a chance to warm up a bit. I hate injecting cold insulin.

Calorie Shmalorie

I’ve given up my calorie-counting ways, or at least the documentation of them. For about two months I noted everything I ate, what I drank, how much I exercised. It was a good lesson in portion control and learning to look at a nutrition label for something other than carbohydrates.

However, I realized at some point it started to become a royal pain in the arse to keep dragging out my computer every time I wanted a snack. I also realized that I was focusing so much on numbers of fat grams, calories ate and calories burned, that I was starting to lose my grip on the other numbers, the ones on the meter.

I’m not good with numbers to begin with, so having two sets of numbers rule my life seemed like the beginning of a very bad idea.

I lost a few pounds, I can fit into a couple pairs of jeans that used to cut off my circulation from the waist down and I’ve gotten myself into a very nice exercise pattern. So now I’m just going to wing it. This little calorie song-and-dance number is over. Exit, stage left.

As always, more to come…

Diabetes Shots

ROLLING ALONG
This is my exercise “bike” I have under my desk at work (those cords are for my computer). When I’m doing something online that doesn’t require full-on concentration, I try to ride my bike. I have to lower my chair a bit, so I doubt my fingers on the keyboard are ergonomically correct, but I can still type, so it’s all good. It came with a timer, and most days I try to do about two hours, randomly spaced throughout the workday. It’s not a full-on exercise bike, but it’s better than just sitting there!

The Old Switcheroo

Used to be, I had trouble with my numbers at night; I couldn't keep them down where I wanted them. During the day? Perfectly fine. Nary a rumble of disgruntlement.

But now. My diabetes is exercising its right to vary.

Nighttime numbers aren't the issue anymore. It's the 4pm high that's killing me. It's like my body all of a sudden has decided lunch, well, we don't really need that, do we? Or perhaps we should only eat one carb unit at a time, wait until the numbers level off, then move on to the next one?

Pfft. I'm hungry. I want to eat my sandwich, my applesauce and my animal crackers, all at the same time. And give myself one shot to cover all of it. One. Shot.

I'm asking a lot. I know I am. I guess I'm just going to have to keep testing and playing with the Novolog until I can get it right.

Pfft. Stupid diabetes.

As always, more to come...

Diabetes Shots

PITCHER PERFECT
My kitchen is ground zero for most of my diabetes activities. I dump my bag on the counter at the end of the day, pull out my blood kit and my Novolog kit, and they stay there until I reload the bag in the morning. I test on the counter and I shoot on the counter. As a result, there's often a lot of diabetes debris on the countertop. I finally, after much urging from the husband, grabbed a small container to store the flotsam in. This pewter pitcher is about four inches tall, and despite the fact that my actual garbage can is less than ten feet away, I find it easier to stash used test strips, swab wrappers and needle caps in here. I wind up emptying it about twice a week, depending on how stealthily I've crammed.

K2 + L1, Part Deux

((Note: If you’re travelling here from Diabetesaliciousness and want to get straight to it, go ahead and skip to START HERE. If not, read on…)

If you’ve been hanging around the DOC for any length of time, you undoubtedly know who K2 is—Kelly K. at Diabetesaliciousness. Kelly is wise beyond her years and a rockin’ good chick who makes a mean mojito (or so I’m promised). The L1, that’s just me—Lora, with one L. I don’t have a cool nickname (although Kelly did refer to me as Lorabetes, which I thought was wicked fun).

Kelly has had diabetes for a really long time, and was diagnosed as a kid. I’ve had diabetes for a relatively short time, and was diagnosed as an adult. The two of us got together and decided to have a conversation about how different and how much the same our experiences have been with the Big D.

The conversation actually starts on Kelly’s blog, Diabetesaliciousness, and finishes up here (two, two, two blogs in one, errr…one, one, one blog in two!). After you’ve read part one…

START HERE:
Kelly: Your turn to answer: How and when did your diabetes education formally begin?

Lora: Baptism by fire. You know how the doctor said I should go to the hospital if I started throwing up? On Sunday, the day before I was supposed to go back to the doctor and learn everything, I was home alone and started throwing up. Projectile vomiting all over the bathroom, every five seconds. After about 15 minutes of non-stop, I finally caught a temporary break, grabbed my car keys, my bottle of Lantus and drove myself to the hospital.
I ran into the emergency room, threw the bottle of Lantus at the nurse and told her I had just been diagnosed with diabetes. She asked me what my blood sugar was and I told her I didn’t know. She started to lecture me and asked me why I hadn’t checked and I told her I didn’t know what she was talking about. She started to cuss out my doctor for not giving me a meter when I motioned that the vomiting was about to commence again. They immediately threw me in a bed and I spent the next week on an insulin drip in the ICU.
I thank that hospital every single day because as soon as they realized I had no clue what I was doing, they set up appointments with a CDE and a nutritionist and I got a crash course on how to be a diabetic, and some lovely pamphlets to take home for reference.

Kelly: You did go through baptism by fire! Hey, was “Mr. Hypo Is My Friend” one of the pamphlets??

Lora: No. Because I’m sure I would have remembered that one, and probably hung it on my fridge! Let’s talk about shooting up. Did they teach you how to do injections while you were in the hospital? Were you scared? Did your parents shoot for you?

Kelly: I was terrified of needles and would immediately start to shake and cry. I remember one nurse being afraid to give me a needle and saying something like: “She’s terrified. I’m afraid she’s going to pass out if I give this to her. She’s shaking.” I remember trying not to cry when it came time to shoot up. I’d actually stop crying and start shaking. The whole being- afraid-of-shots thing was why I was in the hospital for three weeks after diagnosis—they didn’t want me to leave until I could inject. Which I just realized now. WOW.
When I came home, my parents and my sister began giving me my injections. About a month later, I started doing it myself. My first shot took forever to inject and it was in my thigh. I remember my sister telling me to just stick it in and get it over with, but I did it my way—slow and steady.
After the first one, no one in my family ever gave me an insulin shot again! I realized that when I did it myself, it hurt less. Plus, and this might sound odd, but being able to inject my own insulin at age eight really gave me confidence and freedom. My friends thought I was brave. I remember my friend Theresa being amazed when I tested my urine sans the tape. I used test tubes and fuzzy pills and my bathroom looked like a lab—COOL. Also, injecting meant I could go on sleepovers without having my mother come in the morning to give me insulin. I knew what to inject and the sliding scale for high glucose levels in urine. I was proud I could do it on my own. Looking back, though, it might have been better if my mom had come over in the morning. But this was preglucose testing and the rules were different—and incredibly archaic.

Lora: Sounds like you were able to take control pretty quickly. Maybe there was an actual bit of Quincy in you…

Kelly: What about you? Were you afraid when you first starting injecting?

Lora: Terrified, just like you, even though I was 26 years older! I was the little kid who had to be held down by my mom and two nurses so the doctor could give me my vaccination shots. My first solo shot, I sat on the edge of my bathtub for over half an hour, reading the Lantus instructions and trying to screw up the courage to jab my thigh. I kept shaving off a couple of minutes each night until I could do it in a timely manner. Still not my favorite thing to do, but you do what you have to, right?
And by the way? I agree that’s it’s much easier to give yourself a shot than to have someone else do it. I’ve never had anyone give me an insulin shot.

Kelly: Seriously—you’re my SHERO! SO, did you ever blame yourself for your diabetes?

Lora: At first. I thought maybe if I had eaten better, kept my weight under better control and exercised more, I could have held the diabetes at bay for longer. After all, I had gone 34 years before it reared its ugly head, couldn’t I have gone even longer if I’d made the planets align just so? I was also in a bit of denial. I kept thinking maybe the test the doctor gave me was wrong. Did I have Gatorade that morning, thinking it didn’t count as fasting? Could that have thrown my blood sugar off and caused a misdiagnosis? Then I’d stop myself and remind my brain that DKA doesn’t happen because someone drinks Gatorade.
I could be wrong, but I think as an adult, you tend to look for reasons why and to place blame. As a kid, I think you just accept that’s the way it is, even if you don’t like it. I think my parents were a little more like the kid in my diabetes diagnosis; they didn’t really know what it meant, and they accepted what I told them. How did your parents handle your diabetes?

Kelly: My parents were very much into making me take ownership for my diabetes. They wanted me to be independent, and they set some wonderful examples. Exercise was paramount, as was diet, yet they still allowed me to have ice cream and be a kid. Honestly, Lora, our house was a diabetes pressure cooker. Looking back, I know my parents were under a tremendous amount of stress, and I truly think they were overwhelmed by diabetes and were just doing their best to survive day to day. I think they felt worse about it then I did. To this day, I have no clue how they did it.

Lora: How did you handle your diabetes as a kid?

Kelly: I hated that MY disease hurt my parents so much. I felt so guilty. I tested my urine and yes, sometimes I lied about the results. I’m not proud about that, but I was afraid of my family’s reaction to a high reading. I saw how upset and sad they became when my tests were high. I started lying about my results so I wouldn’t see the pain in their faces. I don’t blame them; they had SO MUCH on their plate. But, I was and am a people pleaser, so lying about my numbers made sense at the time.
I didn’t want my parents worrying about me. I kept a lot in as kid. I’d make them laugh and admitted to nothing. Everything was always fine, even when it wasn’t; I would rather cry in my room at night than worry the people I loved.
I remember getting the flu in the middle of the night and not telling my parents until the morning. I just grabbed the bucket, some ginger-ale and Saltines, and went back to bed. I told them I was sick in the morning. They were so mad—they were afraid of me going into DKA. But I saw how much time my sister being sick took from them, and I just wanted them to get a good night’s sleep.

Lora: Sounds like, as a kid, you felt more accountable about your diabetes to your parents than to yourself… At what age do you think you truly took control of your diabetes, and did it for yourself?

Kelly: There was no real “this-is-all-me” moment. I knew that when I moved out of my parents’ house, and even when I was in it, that my diabetes care was up to me. I didn’t do great with my diabetes in college or immediately after. It wasn’t until I was 25 that I started really owning it. Once I started owning my diabetes, it ceased to own me. I became empowered and I felt great.
I started the pump in my early 30’s, after my endo begged me. Pre-pump, My a1c was very low, around 6.4, because I was working out like crazy at the time. BUT, my stomach looked like a freaking color wheel—various shades of green, yellow, and purple. My endo made me a deal: If I tried the pump for one year, I could get rid of it if I really hated it. I agreed and have never looked back! I love it!

Lora: We’ll definitely have to have the pump discussion down the road. I think I’m as reluctant about it as you sounded. Do you remember life before diabetes? As a seven-year-old… ;)

Kelly: Lora, I’ll answer any pump questions you might have—I know that you’d LOVE it. Life before diabetes barely exists in my memory. Before I was diagnosed, I was surrounded by insulin junkies. I grew up drinking Tab even when I didn’t have to.
Before my diagnosis, I remember Pixie Sticks and Fun Dipp; “The Wonderful World of Disney” on TV every Sunday night; tap-dancing lessons on Saturdays; and gymnastics on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Summer days were spent on the beach and going to the Margate Movie House for free whenever I wanted, drinking ginger-ale from a real glass during “Bambi” because my brother was a theater usher.
Those same things occurred after dx as well....sans the Fun Dipp and Pixie Sticks. That pre/post diabetes line is severely blurred, which is probably a good thing...
Of course there were times when I wanted to be “normal,” but diabetes didn’t make me feel not normal or dorky. I felt different because of my looks and my interests, not necessarily because of my disease. I’ve had my F Diabetes moments of course, just like everyone else.

Lora: Sounds just like my childhood, complete with Donald Duck and minus the gymnastics—I’m so uncoordinated. Definitely not gifted in that area…

Kelly: But gifted in others…because of diabetes! What gifts has diabetes given you?

Lora: A true appreciation for irony. I hated shots as a kid, now I have them daily. I hated math all through school, now I have to count, multiply, divide carbs and insulin units every couple of hours. All the foods I love the most are the ones that mess with my sugars the most.
I also have a little more courage than I used to. I’ve always wanted to travel and had just started about three years before my diagnosis. I was afraid diabetes would stop that and I refused to let it. Four months after dx, I flew to Tokyo for vacation, just to prove to myself I could do it, and everything else I wanted to. Without the dx, Japan might still have been on the back-burner, while I explored safer options. I had to come up with that courage and keep it in the forefront to conquer quite a few things.
I’d also have to say I’ve come out of my shell a little more. I can be shy by nature, but I realized really quickly that if I need information and answers about my diabetes, I have to speak up and ask the questions. I also put myself out there with my blog. I’ve kept a personal diary since I was 10 and have always kept everything pretty close to the vest. With the diabetes, I felt like keeping it too close to me wouldn’t do me any good; I would obsess without anyone stopping me and have pages and pages of worries and admonishments if I left it all in my journal. Externalizing everything I’m thinking and feeling and worrying about with diabetes helps me keep things in the proper perspective.
And, of course, I consider the folks of the DOC a gift. I don’t know anyone personally who has diabetes, so it’s nice to read about what other people are doing. I learn a lot about the technical side, and the emotional side. K2, you are an excellent teacher!

Thank you, thank you, thank you (K2 and L1 take a deep bow). We’re here every day on the DOC—you just gotta look for us….

As always, more to come…