As Usual, I Forget Everything

When one of my friends invited me (and a bunch of of my other friends) to go to a house in, and I quote, "the middle of nowhere," I wasn't the most eager. (I'm not exactly a fan of the middle of nowhere, especially when there is no internet connection.) But after a little convincing from my family and friends, I decided to go. I packed up all of my things for a three day adventure to a house on a river and of course, ended up with an entirely full carry-on bag, Northface backpack, and tote bag. I like being prepared, and a trek into the middle of nowhere definitely required that much stuff. (Obviously.)

As I packed up everything the night before, I realized that I didn't have any extra insulin in the fridge or in my bag. Of course, it was probably 12 in the morning, so I just decided to ignore it and hope I could take my sister's extra insulin, instead of doing anything about it. Fast forward to the next morning. I wake up and tell my dad that I have no insulin and he kind of freaks out, (sorry Dad) and of course, Anna's extra insulin has also gone missing. My dad desperately tried to fill my prescription and then we had yet another great revelation: my dad can no longer fill my insulin prescription because I turned 18 a few weeks ago. (Imagine how much more happy my dad was after that...)

My dad frantically made me an account, so he could fill my prescription and then we had our third realization: CVS doesn't open until 9 and my friends and I had to leave by 8. This story ends with me calling a random CVS in Birmingham on the way to the river house and all of my friends laughing at me as I explained to the random pharmacist why I needed my prescription transferred from where I live to Alabama. Comments included: "Sarah you told that person way too many details!" and, "They probably didn't even care."

We stopped at the CVS and I picked up my insulin; I asked if anyone had a cooler in the car after I grabbed it, and then I found out that my friend's mom's car has a cooler built in to it. Who knew? She, of course, let me use it. (And was also as excited about this new discovery as I was, since she had been waiting to find a practical use for the cooler box.) After that little adventure involving insulin, a few more things seemed to go wrong.

The beautiful view we had at the house. Photo credit goes to Michael, since I apparently forgot to take pictures.

At one point on the river, my pump site came out, so I had to walk up 207 steps to get back to the house. (Those steps were evil and let me tell you, my legs burned after walking up them.) My blood sugar also seemed to always be obscenely high before meals, so I sadly had to wait until 10:30 pm at one point to eat some absolutely delicious ice cream. (I'm sure the billions of bags of doritos/ cookies/ cheez-its I ate were the cause of that, though. #irresponsibleeating)

All of the mishaps didn't cause too much of a dent in the fun I had that weekend. I jumped off of a cliff into the river, (side note: don't cannonball from a two story high cliff) helped rescue a canoe my friends flipped over (my t-rescue skills from camp finally came in handy), swam in the lake for forever, and played a ton of fun board games. (I brought Sorry and it was everyone's favorite.)

Moral of the Story: Bring a site with you on the 207 step trek to the river. Because your current one will fall out. 

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. 
--

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.

--
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.
--
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.

Summer

First of all, can you believe that I haven't in over a month?

In my defense, school always becomes super busy in the last weeks because of EOCTs, (End of Course Tests) AP exams, and finals. I had to study for all three of those things. (I had two EOCTs, one AP exam, and three finals.) My life was hectic, I didn't have much inspiration, and I didn't have the time for blogging. Luckily for you, (and me) summer is here!

I love summer; it is ten weeks of freedom for me to forget about schoolwork, homework, and anything educational. It's is strictly a time for me to do nothing and have fun. There are so many things I am doing this summer, so here's a quick list of things I'm doing, since I love making lists.

• Going to Camp Kudzu (Eight days until camp!)
• Going to Oregon
• Counseling at Girl Scout Day Camp
• Counseling at STEM Day Camp
• Going to South Carolina

I have a lot of stuff going on and I am super-excited for this summer because I know it's going to be fantastic!

Moral of the Story: I'm going be blogging a ton this summer.

P.S. I wrote a similar post on the same Saturday, eight days before camp, last year. It's kind of creepy.

Field Trips

Field trips are hard enough for teachers and parents just because going to a new place with a bunch of kids/ teenagers isn't most people's cup of tea. (Except for the other kids/ teenagers on the trip.) If you throw diabetes into the mix, you have a recipe for disaster.

Elementary school was full of so many restrictions when it came to my diabetes. I couldn't carry around my blood tester or insulin, I had to go to the nurse every time before and after meals, and if I needed to check my blood sugar because I felt low or high. I probably lost at least 24 hours of the school year sitting in the nurse's office. (Needless to say, I was friends with all of the nurses I had in elementary school. They still remember me when they see me out in public...)Whenever we went on field trips, a parent had to go because the nurse couldn't just take time out of her day to go with the one diabetic child on the trip. (Obviously, this makes sense because there were tons of other kids at school.) On the 5th grade field trip, my mom had to go with me because we were going to the Tennessee Aquarium, and elementary school kids with diabetes were NEVER going to go out of state without a parent.

In middle school, I got more freedom. I could carry around my supplies, but I still had to go to the nurse's office for lows, highs, and after lunch to cover it. BUT, for the first two weeks of school, I had to go to the nurse's office for every test, and etc, so she knew I could be trusted. I wasn't in the nurse's office nearly as much anymore, and the nurse and I weren't exactly friends. (I'll save the story behind that for another time.) I still wasn't allowed to go any overnight trips without my parents because I was diabetic. (SURPRISE! I bet you didn't see that one coming.) I went on two field trips during the day without a parent, and that was it.

High school came, and now I have tons of freedom. I met the nurse at the beginning of the year and I only go to the nurse's office when my blood sugar is really low, or if I need to do a site/CGM change in school. This year was also the first year that I went on an overnight field trip without a parent chaperoning, and it made me nervous at night. (It didn't help my worrying when my mom told me to pack a glucagon, for the first time ever, to bring with me on the trip.)  I was rooming with my friend I've had since 6th grade, so she knew I was diabetic, but she didn't know all about my diabetes like my parents do. I packed eight site changes for a three day, two night vacation. I only used one of them. I took a full bottle of glucose tabs and a box of clif bars everywhere I went. When my blood sugar was low, I would have mini panic attacks because of all of the possible things that could have gone wrong. "What if I faint and no one finds me?" "What if I need a glucagon and no one knows how?" Those were thoughts I had during my lows; they were obviously invalid because I was in a room full of people, so someone would see me. I had also told my friend how to use the glucagon, so that was irrational as well. I obviously made it through the trip and came back alive; it ended up being lots of fun. (I went to the FIRST Robotics regional competition in my state. I had tons of fun and cannot wait to go back next year.)

I guess the moral of this story is: I wish the schools gave me more freedom when I was younger, so I didn't freak out as a high schooler on an overnight trip only an hour away from home. I'm not sure how anyone can prepare for this, but I feel like if I had experienced leaving my parents overnight beforehand, I wouldn't have freaked out as much.

The Perils of Travel

Going places is cool, but my diabetes pretty much thinks the opposite.

"Oh, Sarah is traveling again? Let's teach her a lesson..."

On the way to Oregon, in a plane, I had to change my site in a tiny airplane bathroom because you can't really change your site in public...

All of my trash in the car.

Than on the way back, I had to change my whole site in the car because my pump decided to give me the occlusion alert for the first time while in the car. Yay! <insert sarcasm here

I think my diabetes has something against using my arm as a site, because both times this happened, my site was in my arm.

Moral of Story: Do I get an award for this?

Wordless Wednesday (kind of..)

Some of the supplies I am bringing with me on my trip.