A little yell-fest.

Sometimes, people annoy me to no end and no matter what I do, I just can't deal with them. So, I end up ranting and this happens:

Here's a list of things that I just really want to yell at the world right now:

a) Stop telling me about how your uncle has type 2 or how you friend's cousin's aunt's best friend died of complications. I don't really care. You telling me about how other people have died from the chronic illness I deal with every day of the year does not help me; It makes me feel like crap. I already worry if I'm even gong to wake up the next morning sometimes because of a sneaky low, so telling me about the unfortunate events your family members have gone through does not motivate me to be a better diabetic. It also doesn't help me 'connect' with you. It makes me want to escape from your presence as soon as possible.

b) DO NOT MAKE DIABETES JOKES IN FRONT OF ME. I do not care if you thought it was funny; joking about eating candy giving you diabetes does not lighten the mood. It just perpetuates stereotypes about diabetes and makes more people look at me oddly when I mention being diabetic.

c) Do not hesitate to give me candy because your friend would, "Eat whatever she wanted and then dial in more insulin since she was a bad diabetic, as you look at my insulin pump." I'm not your friend and eating then giving insulin through an insulin pump is not being unhealthy/uncontrolled: THAT IS WHAT A PUMP IS SUPPOSED TO DO.*

d) Don't tell me about how your friend had "brittle diabetes" and make jokes about it around me. There is no such thing as brittle diabetes and making diabetic jokes is insensitive and cruel. (See b.)*

e) Think before you say something rude and insensitive.

Moral of the Story: Rant = Over (For now, at least.)

*My current Spanish teacher did both of those things and I dislike her immensely for it.

(Also, I'm counting this as my kind of sort of post for the DSMA blog carnival for November; this rant applies to the topic. Here's the required text: This post is my November entry for the DSMA Blog Carnival. If you would like to participate too, you can get all of the needed information from here.)

The Irony of It All

This month is national diabetes awareness month and I haven't posted a single blog post for two months, I haven't participated in a #dsma chat in who knows how long, and I've barely read any of my favorite diabetes blogs this month. You're probably wondering about why on earth would ever do any of this, especially in November. It's mainly because of tons of schoolwork (and I know I've said that for months, but  only say it because it is 1000% true) and burnout.

I have at least three hours of homework nightly and don't get home until around 6 because of extracurricular, so that equals at least staying up until ten if I am feeling super-productive, but it's more like me staying up until 12 because of many distractions, most of them from the internet. I'm taking a pretty heavy course load this year, so that obviously contributes to my immense amounts of homework I have to do. If I don't have physical homework to do, I have a book to read, notes to study, or some project that needs to be done which gives me little to no free time. (In case you're wondering, I'm typing this at 12:07 AM while I should really be doing a plasmid map for my biotech lab due today.)

Gerard has been under my pillow, pitifully with a dead battery for two months. This makes me sad.

And I've been in a lovely state of continuous diabetes burnout mainly because I haven't had my dexcom sensors in two months. They were supposed to be on auto-refill and I should have gotten them in the beginning of October; I obviously didn't get them. After calling Neighborhood Diabetes the company that distributes my sensors)/ dexcom/ our insurance company multiple times, my mom finally got them to ship my sensors on Thursday. They are hopefully going to be here today or tomorrow. We're looking into finding different companies that supply sensors because this is the third time that Neighborhood Diabetes has screwed up my sensors and I don't want this to happen again. I'm hoping that we can just buy from the dexcom store because I'm sure they actually care about me using their product enough to ship our sensors at the right time.

I am annoyed to the nth degree right now because of Neighborhood Diabetes' general lack of care about my health since they obviously can't send my sensors to me on time. WHAT IS THE POINT OF HAVING A CGM THAT I CAN'T USE BECAUSE OF THE IDIOTS THAT SUPPOSEDLY 'CARE' ABOUT MY DIABETES WON'T SEND THEM TO ME ON TIME? (Sorry, I had to get that out of my system.) There are curse words that I don't use for these kind of people.

Needless to say, my life has been stressful due to factors outside of my control, so I've had to limit the amount of time I've been spending on my blog. And that genuinely sucks.

Moral of the Story: I might as well just order my sensors in bulk, so I don't have to deal with this again.

Life Lately

I went to the endocrinologist on Wednesday and found out my A1C was 7.3 %; it went down .6 % from March and I think it went down .5 % from June, if I remember correctly. I was truthfully expecting my A1C to go up because I had been going high a lot in the afternoons, so that was a pleasant surprise. Kerri, my amazing dietitian, was who I saw on Wednesday. (I usually see my actual endo once or twice per year.) She told me I was doing a good job with measuring food and covering it, but I need to cover lunch 15 minutes before I eat at school so I avoid spiking after lunch. She also told me that I need to start exercising because, well, it is healthy to do. She said that if I have time to text my friends or go on the internet, then I have time to exercise. So now, I am being a good little diabetic and walking on the wondrous treadmill for 45 minutes every day. I'm multitasking by reading my blogs for 30 minutes than looking over notes for 15 minutes. Multitasking also distracts from the fact that I am being very gross and sweating, so it's all good. We also adjusted my basal so I wouldn't go high at night because that had been happening a lot lately. My basal adjustments lead to the fin experience I had last night. (1000 % sarcasm when dealing with the word fun, at the moment.)

It's not just a CGM picture today!

Last night, at around 10, my blood sugar was 63. I had a juice and Larabar and covered about 2/3 of the Larabar. I went up to 76, so I had some apple cider and covered it. I tested again and I was 70. I ate a another Larabar and covered some of it. Then I went down to 56. I stayed under 80 for another hour and I ate 112 carbs with no insulin (including disconnecting from my pump for an hour) before I went up to 110. I waited a little longer and then was 146. I was later awoken at 6 in the morning to my CGM beeping because my blood sugar was 372, so that was fun. I was pretty much expecting that because I ate 198 carbs total before my blood sugar stayed in range. I brought my basal down .025 from 9 -12 PM because of this lovely incident.

Moral of the Story: That was 1 glass of apple cider, 2 juices, 3 Larabars, and 8 glucose tabs. I was very full after that.

Wordless Wednesday: Diabetes Lately

Yep, I've been MIA. Again. School has been busy, what else can I say?

#therewaspotentialforanohitter & CGM pictures must be getting really old.

Well, hello there.

Hi. I know I haven't been on in over a month and that really stinks. School started last Thursday and before that I was on vacation. I am extremely busy now-I am in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) program at my school, so that means a lot of extra homework. I’m taking AP Biology, Honors Chemistry, Accelerated Math III, Introduction to Healthcare and Biotechnology, AP World History, Spanish III, and 10th Grade Honors Literature. In addition to those classes, I also participate in robotics (FIRST, mainly), academic team, and math team. So basically, I have very little free time now. I promise I'm taking all of these classes because I love school and learning, so don't think I have been forced into this situation.

Because I have so little free time, I don't have a lot of time to blog. *sad face* I really want to try to post at least once a week; I know this doesn't sound like a lot, but I have an average of at least 2 hours of homework nightly, including weeknights and I also have to go to my extracurriculars and I don't get home until 6 PM on Mondays through Thursdays and I have robotics on Saturday from 9 AM to 4 PM. So, I'm sure you would agree that once a week is plenty for me.

Gerome in his home, AKA the Jack Daniel's glass. (No, I don't drink Jack Daniel's; I am only 15.)

Now that I have given you excuses and have already typed something, I might as well update you on my joyous diabetes.

Lately, I've been feeling like I'm dropping whenever I am 150-200. I have no clue why and it makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. I have also been getting headaches at around 250 rather than the 300s, lately. This is extremely annoying and I do not like it at all. We are sending charts to the endocrinologist on Monday and we shall ask them about this then. I am also wondering if it could be from me getting a lack of some vitamin or mineral because of being a vegan. I want to ask them about that as well in the e-mail. I really hope we find an explanation to this strange phenomenon.

Moral of the Story: School has brought me another fun phenomenon!

A Scary Low

I woke up today feeling really high; I tested and my blood tester said I was 72. I tested again to make sure it was working and I was 70. A few minutes later, I went to get some juice. I drank some and then my mom asked me to unload part of the dishes. I already felt bad, but once I started unloading, I had to lay down. I told my mom I was low and lied down. I tested again and was 70.

I felt like I was in the 20's by the time I had gotten in the car. I could barely sit up, so I was lying down in the seats. I had a second juice and could barely eat the quarter of a cliff bar and cereal that I did eat. I literally had to force myself to speak and eat anything. I turned my basal off for 30 minutes then completely disconnected my pump for about an hour. I even asked my mom if we could give me a mini-gluc. (Basically, you use a regular syringe to draw up the amount of units of glucagon needed, which is one unit per years of age. For example, I'm 15, so I would get 15 units. This is only for kids 2-15 years of age.) She told me to wait 30 minutes and not eat anything, since I was 79.

These are not innocent numbers anymore. The 70's are not good, at all.

I finally started to feel better after just sitting for a while. I tested and was 110. Before eating a snack 2 hours later, I was 316.

I have no clue what happened and it was one of those really scary lows that I just want to forget and have never happen to me again. I was wondering if I needed to go to the hospital and how they would treat my blood sugar.

Moral of the Story: Weird things always happen when I'm not wearing my CGM, so if I don't get my sensors tomorrow, someones going to get hurt.

The Struggle

I'm having a day that consists of endless wishing for Skin-Tac and Tegaderm.

Why are wishing for these item, Sarah?

Well, my Dexcom sensor is falling off. It's at the point where if I lift the white adhesive part of the sensor, I can see some of the sensor wire and I have to push it back in.

For a while, the wire hurt my arm, but I haven't taken it off yet because I only have one sensor left and I don't want this to happen again.

Are you reminded of this or this?

Now I've resorted to using penguin duct tape to hold my sensor in place until we can order some necessary supplies.

Moral of the Story: Duct tape really does fix anything.

Speaking of the caption, I got a new popcorn popper two days ago and I need another new pump clip. (!)

Middle School

Back story: I actually wrote most of this a while ago; I found it in my drafts a few days ago and decided I should post it.
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I have been thinking about writing about this for a while, and reading this post from D-Mom Blog finally convinced me to do it. I've had plenty of school nurses to deal with, after all, I have been diabetic since I was five years old. There is one, not-so-lovely nurse that I began to grow a disliking for during middle school. (Middle school is pretty bad, anyways, but this nurse was the icing on the cake.) Now, I'm going to share some stories about my wonderful time (sarcasm) in middle school with this nurse. (I'm leaving the nurse unnamed to protect the guilty party.)

During standardized testing in middle school, I had to test my blood and check in with the nurse before I started taking the test. One time I tested my blood before I ate breakfast at school, (I used to buy breakfast from the school. I don't anymore.) and I was in the 500's.  I covered my blood sugar, then the nurse made me walk around the school's gym 15 times. (Or whatever was equivalent to a mile.) That doesn't sound too bad, except for the fact that I had a headache, felt sick, and hadn't eaten since about 7:00 PM the night before. I tried to tell her beforehand that exercising with very high blood sugar can make your blood sugar go up or do nothing, but she didn't listen. She thought that I was trying to get out of exercising because I was lazy. I didn't want to exercise because I felt like crap; after all, I had extremely high blood sugar. After that, I went back to the nurse's office and after a plethora of complaints, I finally convinced her to let me buy some food from the cafeteria. I got one cheese stick. I wanted to eat something more filling, since I hadn't eaten in sixteen hours, but she made me sit in the nurse's office and test my blood every hour. I finally got sick of doing nothing in the nurse's office, so I went to get something to do from my locker. I ended up walking into the counselor's office, crying because I just wanted to eat something more than a cheese stick (My blood sugar was going down.) and go home because I was tired, felt bad because of my blood sugar, and was hungry. The counselors let me call my mom; she took me home, and got me food. Since then, I pretty much hated the lady. All of this was treacherous, but the worst part was that she never contacted either of my parents to tell them what was going on or ask what she should do. It was written on my school health plan that if I had high blood sugar, she needed to call my parents, but she never did.

Another time, I walked into the front office to get to the nurse's office. (It was behind the front office.) I had low blood sugar and the ladies in the front office asked me how I was doing. I incoherently mumbled something, then those ladies proceeded to whisper about me and laugh. Way to make me feel better.

We also had to threaten to implement a 504 plan (which we really should have had anyways), because they didn't believe my mother when she said my late check-ins/ absences were diabetes related. (They didn't believe us because I had over 10 absences, the school's "limit.") Every time I was out because of diabetes, we had to have the doctor e-mail the school an excuse note, even if we didn't go to the doctor.

Recently found out: The worst part of this whole mess is that this lady is becoming a CDE and is apparently using her work as a school nurse as credit for working with diabetics. I pity the people that are going to come in contact with her for medical help with their diabetes.

Moral of the Story: There is too much irony for me to handle right now.

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Tales of Travel from Yours Truly

Back story: I wrote this on June 14 while sitting on a four hour flight and had lots of time on my hands. 
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As I write this, I am sitting on a Southwest Airlines flight to Portland, Oregon. I've already waited 3 hours for a delayed flight from Atlanta to Chicago, spent two hours on the said flight, waited an hour and a half at Midway Airport, and now I am on a plane to Portland with an hour and 52 minutes left of flight. After this flight, I get to sit in a car for three hours to get to our final destination. Needless to say, I hate travel.

I especially hate it because here is so much uncertainty when it comes to travelling with diabetes.

Here are some of the questions I ask myself every time I travel:

Did I pack enough sites?

(I packed ten site changes for 8 days.)

Did I pack enough insulin?

(I packed my half full vial in use and another vial. I also have my sister's insulin pens for back up.)

Did I pack enough test strips?

(I packed 100.)

Did I pack enough Dexcom sensors?

(That's a joke. I completely forgot an extra. Hopefully it can lest an extra 5 days; it has before.)

Just keep in mind that all of these questions simply pertain to packing, not the actual trip.

My dexcom on a festively themed background.

Once you get to the airport, you have to deal with the TSA, my favorite thing!

More questions mentally asked:

Will my pump accidentally test positive for explosives?

Do I have to get a pat down?

Will the metal detector ruin my Dexcom or pump?

Will the TSA officer be nice to me?

Will the TSA take away our medical supplies?

And that's only during the security checkpoint. Yay! < sarcasm

When I get on the plane, it gets worse.

What if my pump site messes up and I have to change it on the plane?

What if my blood sugar goes too low or too high?

What if my CGM fails on the plane?

Also, add in all other what if questions normal people ask while on planes.

Side Note: I hate turbulence and apparently we're going to have it for the next hundred miles. Whee!

Morals of the Story: (Yes, there are two today!)

1. Travel messes with the homeostasis of my life, and I don't like it.
2. I don't understand how flight attendants do this for a living.

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After Note: Nothing too bad happened with the TSA. The TSA was crappy, as usual. 

In Atlanta, the TSA got mad at me because I left my CGM in my pocket. I left it in there because people have said they don't make the metal detectors go off. They told me that I need to give it to them and tell an officer to hand inspect it. And before she gave it to the officer to inspect it, she tried to put through the x-ray multiple times, even though I told her it couldn't go through the metal detector. She thought it was an iPod. I also walked through the stupid metal detector about 10 times before she decided I would need a pat down. 

In Portland, one officer tried to convince me five times (!) that I should go through the millimeter wave scanner, even though I was sure that Animas said that it couldn't go through it. He told me that other people with pumps and pacemakers have gone through it and said I should go through it. I firmly told him, "No."  every time. Then I had to wait awkwardly to the side of the security line for probably 10 minutes. (It also confused them when I gave them my CGM for hand inspection, even though the TSA officers in Atlanta told me to do that. Way to be consistent, TSA.) The lady that gave me a pat down was actually pretty nice.

And my dexcom totally failed the whole time and was extremely unhelpful, but I never took it off because I didn't want to repeat this. 

Air Travel

Back Story: I'm going on two airplanes tomorrow to get to Oregon.
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Going through airport security always makes me cringe a little beforehand.

I've only had problems with the TSA once (which I'll talk about later), but so many other people have had horrible experiences with the TSA and it makes me worry every time I have to go through airport security.

Let's count the occasions that people have had bad experiences with the TSA!

1. Kelly at the Philadelphia International Airport
2. Kerri at Green Airport
3. Kelly actually has a tag with eight (!) posts about the wonders of airport security.
4. Google it and you will finds tons of other "lovely" stories about air travel.

I've also had a bad run-in with the TSA before. At the Atlanta Airport, I took off my pump and my dad gave it to the security officer (SO for short) and told him that it couldn't go through the x-ray machine or the metal detector. (It actually can, but I didn't know it at the time.) 

Guess what the SO did right after my dad told him not to put it through the metal detector.

If you guessed: put it through the metal detector, you are correct!

Nothing happened to my pump, but that made me extremely angry. (They could have permanently ruined my pump or voided the warranty, I thought.) Usually I ask for a pat-down, but I just didn't want one that time because they take up a lot of time and I would appreciate feeling somewhat normal in an airport full of other people that are awkwardly standing in line behind me. 

Do you see why I often get nervous when I go through airport security?

Moral of the Story: The TSA should get their act together, so 15 year old diabetic girls aren't nervous when flying.