Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Unicorns! Glitter! And a little bit of Ohh..

Wednesday was one of those days when diabetes was all about unicorns and glitter, and I've been smiling ever since.  Except then I remember the news that my awesome nurse is leaving.

I haven't been with her very long, but I was looking forward to many more years.  I realize that through my blog it may not seem as though I'm shy, but I am.  I trip over my words and I get uncomfortable talking to new people.  And I've never felt this way with her.  And I've never had to say "I think there's something wrong with me."  (with any medical professional) (And I almost didn't)  But I didn't feel uncomfortable at any time during this appointment.  I walk in there and I feel comfortable.  And when things are going really wrong, she has been there to support me.  She helped me figure out that my body is much more sensitive to insulin when my blood sugar is extra high, so when I figure out a bolus over 350 mg/dL, I reduce it by 10% before bolusing.  And it works!  I know that there is a lot of talk out there in the DOC that we are awesome and medical teams don't always know what they're talking about, but I never would've figured this out without her.  Before I made my final decision about switching my pump, I called her to hear what she had to say.  I knew I didn't need her approval, but I wanted to know what she thought.  I value her opinion.

I am sad to see her go.  I am sure that wherever she is off to next will be fabulous and wonderful and I hope that wherever that may be, they will appreciate her.  In the excitement that was finding out my A1C, she told me that my hard work made her day.  I know that she "lives" in diabetes world, and diabetes world is awesome.  But from what I can tell, she doesn't have diabetes and is still awesome and still gets it.  (for you non-D, non-medical people, you'd think that this happens all the time, but it doesn't!).  When I told twitter, I got more responses than I even could've imagined.  And it made me feel so good.  And when I told facebook, all my D friends liked it (or parents of D friends), but no one else did.

And once again, my words are coming out of my brain and they aren't making any sense.  That's what happens when people mean more than words can say.
Forgive my lack of words.  But I'm changing the wording:
"An awesome diabetes medical professional is worth a thousand million words."

2 comments:

  1. Ok - can you explain to me how you do the bolus thing over 350. I have really never been taught any of this!

    Thanks!

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  2. OK. And I'm telling you this because I had a TON of struggles going too low then going way high again and back again. (If you clicked on the picture post, you can see that.) My body is extra sensitive to insulin when my blood sugar is high. So when I'm over 350, I figure out my correction dose, and then subtract 10%. My sensitivity factor is 35 and goal is 110 mg/dL. So if my BG is 350 mg/dL, my bolus should be 6.85 units. But before giving myself the insulin, I would decrease it by .685 (.7) so my actual bolus would be 6.15. It doesn't sound like a big difference in insulin, but it makes a huge difference! If you're having trouble, you should definitely talk to your doctor/medical professional before trying something like this.

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