Showing posts with label Dexie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dexie. Show all posts

Friday, February 25, 2011

How we are wired

A few weeks ago as I was working I heard a seemingly familiar beeping behind me.

I instinctively asked The Superhero to come over so I could check Dexie.

I wasn't really paying attention and just assumed that was the beeping I was hearing. Of course, I usually recognize the "beep, beep" for a high, and the "beeeep, beeeep, beeeep" for a low or dropping.

So, this time when The Superhero came over to me to show me Dexie, I expected one of these messages. To my surprise, there was NO message on Dexie and his BG was fine. I thought that I must have just been hearing things and went back to working.

Then I heard it again. This time I checked the pump. No alerts. Weird. Back to working again.

Then I heard it again. What? What is that darn beeping!? Then it hit me. It was The Superhero's Leapster Explorer video game! Whatever game he was playing had beeping in it.

I think it is cRaZy how a little beeping can instantly make me think "diabetes". I also think it is interesting how when I ask The Superhero to let me see Dexie, he just automatically comes over to show me.

I find it interesting how as D Mamas (and dads or PWD) are just wired to think this way.

Our brains are wired to "think" diabetes.

Our ears are wired to "hear" diabetes too.


*Disclaimer: I am a mom of a T1 Diabetic child. I am NOT a doctor. I just play one in real life. Please do not take anything in this post or any other post on this blog as medical advice. If you have questions or concerns of your own, please seek advice from your doctor.*

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Here it is, a NAKED pancreas MEME

Reyna over at Beta Buddies started a NAKED MEME and The Superhero and I are going to strip it all off and share with you! I copied Joanne and Hallie's idea and added one last question.

1. What kind on insulin management mode do you use?
We use Apidra in an Animas Ping insulin pump. We also have a Dexcom CGMS, aka Dexie.

2. How often do you inject/change pump sites?
We change pump sites every 3 days, or 4-5 if I forget/am being lazy. We change Dexie sites every 7 days.

3. What type (s) of insulin do you use?
We use Apidra.


4. What are your basal settings ?
12am: 0.050 units
2am: 0.125 units

6:30am: 0.325 units

10am: 0.300 units

12pm: 0.350 units

2pm: 0.325 units

4pm: 0.300 units

6pm: 0.175 units

And on school days at 8:00am (school starts at 8:15) I do a temp basal decrease of –40% for 1 ½ hours.


5. What are your correction factors ?
1:500 at night

1:300 during the day


6. What are your meal ratios ?
Breakfast - 1:30
All other times – 1:65


7. What do you do for activity and/or PE?
Monitor like a crazy person. The Superhero tends to DROP with lots of activity. LOTS of extra carbs are brought EVERY where we go.


8. How do you manage Pizza, Macaroni and Cheese, or any other "difficult to manage" foods?
This varies based on how much he eats of the item. Typically, we can do a combo bolus where we give part of the insulin up from and spread the rest out over several hours.

Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches get an 80/20 split for 2 hours, and double the entire sandwich in carbs (usually a total then of 112 carbs)

Pizza usually gets somewhere around a 50/50 or so split over at least 6-8 hours. And we watch CLOSELY. (tacos seem to fit this category too)

9. How do you prefer to manage your logs/data?
I used to write everything down in an awesome chart I made. Then we got Dexie and I stopped. Now I just download the pump before endo appts and make changes as needed based on what I see on Dexie.

I will start logging again any time I think I need to make serious changes to evaluate before changing everything.


10. What's your A1c?
7/08 -10.11 (at diagnosis)

9/08 -8.6

12/08 -8.7

3/09 -8.4 (just started pumping)

6/09 -8.1

9/09 -7.8

12/09 -8.2

3/10 -7.8 (2 months after starting with our Dexcom)

6/10 -7.9

9/10 - 7.4 (Our BEST ever, and 2 months after switching to Apidra)

12/10 - ?


Alright, who else is going to strip it all and blog a naked meme?


Thursday, February 11, 2010

"My hand hurts"

Before yesterday, I had not had "one of those days" in a L O N G time!

You know, one of those "Why me?" Why my kid?" "This isn't fair!" kind of days.

Why does MY kid have to have Diabetes?

It is NOT fair that I have to wake my 3-year-old up from his nap to have cake gel!

It is NOT fair that MY 3-year-old has to be a pin cushion 24/7 for the REST OF HIS LIFE!

If is NOT fair that MY kid has to feel like CRAP when he is low/ high/ dropping fast/ rising fast.

It is NOT fair that WE have to think about being a pancreas 24/7! Diabetes NEVER sleeps.

It sucks that no one REALLY gets this all, unless they are going through it themselves!


Yesterday was exactly 1 year and 7 months since The Superhero was diagnosed with T1 Diabetes. He is 3 years old. He has now had diabetes for more than 1/2 his life. Most of his life. This did not even hit me until late in our crappy day.

We have been having crazy numbers lately. It all began with a tummy bug (again!) on Saturday night. We seemed to get past it with only one vomiting spell and then we drugged him up with anti-nausea meds for a couple of days. He seemed to get back to "normal" except that his insulin needs decreased, DRAMATICALLY.

We were doing -50% - -70% of his basal needs for DAYS and he has barely been hovering at 100 during the day and 150 at night.

Yesterday brought MANY lows.

He was being really whiny and crying A LOT in the morning. I finally checked him (via his Dexie) and he was 78, and dropping! I got him to drink some juice. He spilled some juice on his shirt and FREAKED out. We changed his shirt. Then he kept FREAKING out that he DID NOT want that shirt! And "Mommy, you need to take it off!" I finally just had to grab him and hold him tight until he calmed down. I have not seen him like that in a LONG time.

He hovered around 78 all morning, did not want to eat, basals were already decreased by 70%. He then refused to eat lunch. Went down for a nap and ended up going as low as 57 at one point. I woke him up to give him cake gel and he went back to sleep. He slowly came back up to around 100 an hour or so later.

He slept for about 3 hours. I had to wake him up or he might have never gone to bed last night. I got him to have some marshmallows for a snack (healthy, I know). This got his BG up to a more comfortable 180.

I had a marketing event for work and he was going to my mom's house for the evening. I did not want her to battle lows like I did, hence the marshmallow snack.

Off I go to my marketing session, about 30 minutes away (in traffic). I call as I am getting close to the location to check on the kids and see how they are doing. They were doing great, then we started to end the call and my mom had to go QUICK because The Superhero was throwing up!

So, I did my meeting quickly, got my Starbucks to go and went back to my mom's house.

The whole way there I was thinking about how much I HATE this disease. I was thinking about Meri's post about being Strong, but human and her post about Feeling Edgy and I just broke down and started crying.

Yes, I am strong. Yes, I handle Diabetes because I have to. I know The Superhero was given to me for a reason. BUT I am still human and this is A LOT to handle sometimes.

I live life on the edge EVERYDAY. I guess I got pushed off the cliff when he threw up again. I just don't know how much more I can take. I seriously feel like I am on an edge about to be blown off, EACH AND EVERY DAY.

I know my friends and family try to understand, but until you live this life, you never can truly "get it". I appreciate the effort all of them put in trying to understand and to show compassion.

Anyway, I was on the way to my mom's house when all of this hit me and I just could not stop crying and asking the Why me? Why The Superhero? questions. (listed above)

Then I get to my mom's house and The Superhero was happy as can be and running around like crazy. He kept wanting to eat and he snacked a little. He seemed to feel better.

Then we headed home. Since this was a Wednesday night, Rod was in school so I was on my own. I put The Princess to bed as soon as we got home and then was hanging out with The Superhero. He kept complaining that his hand hurt. I pushed all over it and he did not complain. So, I figured no broken bones, he must be fine. Maybe a pinched nerve or it fell asleep or something.

Then it was time for him to go to bed. We went in his room (around 9pm, very late for him) and he just would not settle down. He kept complaining that his hand was hurting. I held him and rocked him. I asked what would make it feel better. He kept wanting me to rub/massage it. I did so. He kept fussing and would not sit still. My mom came over to try to hold him too, so I could get a break. He DID NOT want NaNa last night.

She and I just kept watching him. He was SO uncomfortable and just kept saying his hand was hurting. Then it finally hit us! His Dexie site was on his right arm, the one with the hurt hand.

The ONLY thing we could think was that it must have gotten bumped and was hitting a nerve, causing the hand to feel weird (or pain in his mind). So we changed his dexie site and he went to lay on the couch and was OUT!

Asleep INSTANTLY.

It was 10pm and he just CRASHED. I have NEVER seen him fall asleep SO fast!

Here are pictures of him sleeping on the couch last night. I guess the dexie site did the trick!










I am feeling a little better this morning. I still hate diabetes, as anyone would. But I am moving on. I had not had "one of those" days in SO long and I am sure it will be a while before another one hits me.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

So far, AMAZING!

Just a quick update.

We LOVE the Dexcom, aka Dexie. The Superhero thinks it is SUPER cool and LOVES to show it off to everyone.

We LOVE the trends. LOVE the graphs. LOVE arrows telling us which direction the BG is going. LOVE. LOVE. LOVE.

The Superhero has started "interpreting" the information too. He will feel it vibrate and look at it and say, "oh, I'm coming down." (like he really knows what it is telling him)

So far, the readings have been VERY close to the actual blood readings. We are doing WAY fewer finger pokes than before. We used to check his BG at least 3 times at night and we are now only doing 1. We may even cut that out at some point. We LOVE being able to just walk in his room, take a quick look at Dexie, and make a decision.

Along with the pump, this is DEFINITELY one of the BEST things we could do for managing his Diabetes.
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