Sun, Friend, City & Starbucks

Saturday was beautiful day up here in the Boston area, so I got together with my friend and we went walking through the city.  We walked around the common and down Newbury St. talking and talking and talking and ending up at the far end at Starbucks.  We have walked around the city before, and I quite often end up low.  Before we left, I was 134 mg/dL, but I didn't want to go low, especially since I was flatlining around 70 earlier in the day.  I set my temp basal for 50%.  I don't consider walking through the city exercise, but I won't discredit my diabetes for thinking it.  And I won't say that it's not good for me.  And as we stood in line at Starbucks, I was 65 mg/dL.  So not too low, but I was feeling it.  And as I walk up to the counter deciding what snack to get, I see this small, delicious treats staring me back.  (Now keep in mind that I was low.)  I am trying to figure out what these treats are, since there are no signs.  And I'm not really a "Starbucks" person.  I enjoy their coffee, but I don't broaden what I get because ordering at Starbucks is seriously intimidating to me.  But during Lent I am limiting myself to one cup of coffee per day.  

So I walk up and I ask "Is that a, um, red, um velvet......"
"whoopie pie?"
"Yes, that.  Can I get one of those?"
"Did you know that they're free with any beverage?"
*I got seriously excited* "No"
"Are you getting a beverage?"
"Yes.  Haven't gotten that far yet."
I move on down to the man at the cash register at which time I've decided I'm going to have a white chocolate mocha.  And I went for the whipped cream.  And I got the red velvet whoopie pie.  And my friend scored a table in the busy Starbucks.  So we sat down and talked more and more and more and my whoopie pie was delicious beyond delicious.  I bolused for 30g. of carbs.  And as we got ready to walk back, Not only was I 143 mg/dL I was trying to talk myself out of getting another mocha.  I was not successful.  I decided that I would have that instead of a temp basal for our walk back.  This was inspired by Holly and using diabetes to our advantage.  I mean, I wanted it and I didn't want to go low again.  Win win.  So we stared heading back after I ate my Rocky Road Cake Pop (the Red Velvet Whoopie Pie was so so so so much better; but I'm also not a big chocolate person.)  As we were walking back towards the Common, we passed a CVS, and I was pretty sure I forgot to pack extra test strips, so went in.  And this was what I like to call a double decker CVS, which I had never seen before, so we went downstairs towards the pharmacy.  I stood in line after making sure they had One Touch, and my friend was still standing over near the diabetes supplies because it was pretty cramped.  She comes back over and asks me a question.  Not only did she ask me this, but she pretended to be in a sword fight (yes, we're adults).  Sometimes, you just need a friend with a new perspective to make you laugh at this thing that can suck the life out of you sometimes.   We finished our walk and got back on the T, and I was a joyous 60-something.  I didn't want to get rid of the delicious tastes that were previously occupying my mouth, so I ate 1 glucose tab.  Yes, I realize this is not the recommended amount of low correction and yes, I realize this might sound crazy, but I was sitting and my friend lives right next to the T stop.  So I hung out with my friend for a little while, and then before I got ready to leave, I was around 120.  Perfect driving number :)

Hope

I've been going through strips like a crazy person lately, and I went to re-stock.  I also needed to re-stock on tabs and I decided to get some of the little drinky-glucose things too.  Then I wait to talk to the pharmacist to get my test strips.

"One Touch Ultra please"
"All we have is 100"
"Okay"
"Don't you have insurance?"
"Yea, but it only covers strips for a meter that's much less accurate, and I've been having trouble lately, so I'm not going to risk anything"
"Wow, I'm sorry"

It doesn't make it any easier.  It doesn't make it any better.  Shelling out $140 for strips & tabs is never going to be "easy."  But having someone behind the counter say I'm sorry, well, it gives me hope.  Hope that there are enough people out there hearing it that it could change.  With enough sincerity, the world can be better.

A Diabetes Memory

December 3: Oh Christmas Tree

This song will always make me think of one of my best childhood friends.  Her mother is German, so never knew the words that we knew.  I remember that I knew the words to this song in German at one point as a child, and then again in high school when I was taking German.  

Back to diabetes.  We love it, we hate it, we live it every single day.  But sometimes there are little changes that we miss.  Like grabbing a new bottle of strips for instance.  Today, if I forget to grab a new bottle, I come back to my apartment, or stop at CVS, Walgreens or Target and just buy a new box.  When I was in third grade, I was at my friends house, and it must have been a day we didn't have school because I needed to test, meaning I was eating lunch there.  I went to test (and you should see the bag I used to carry around, it was huge!), but there weren't any more strips.  Her dad piled us into the car and we drove to the pharmacy.  This is a local pharmacy (where if the pharmacist didn't get the prescription from my doctor, he'd at least give me enough to survive the day), and closer to my house than hers, and he buys me a box of test strips.  I show him the one I usually get (the largest one), and that's the one he buys me.  We go back to her house, and I'm starting to realize that this is big.  We finish our day, and her father brings me home and Mom & her dad talk, especially about the trip to the pharmacy.  Mom goes to her purse to pay him back and I remember something to the effect of "If you pay that much all the time, please let us do this."  It was a huge day for our family.  Firstly because I wasn't prepared.  But because someone else just picked up and took care of my diabetes the same way (but with less blaming) my family would.