Happy New Year!

Oh My Gosh! I really don't want to see another mince pie for a looooonnnnnng time!

It's a new year! Some feel that it's a new beginning, a reset button, or a fresh start. For me, the day my children go back to school is the I stop using the phrase "because it's Christmas!" It's when I get back into my everyday routine and stop with the extra sugary treats and back to tighening up those wobbly bits by getting outside for my walk.

The New Year also brings the bombardment of new ways to adapt a healthier lifestyle, new "fad" diets, anyone see the Lidl and Aldi circulars with all the exercise gear?

Almost every website, social media page, newspaper or magazine has an ad for a new, fast way to lose those Christmas pounds. Really,

My favourite of these terrible ads was the Sunday Independent's claim that some people are genetically designed not to benefit from exercise!!! Who doesn't get any benefit from exercise???

Even if all you gain is the "happy" from the endorphins released through exercise, isn't that beneficial? Yes, a lot of people will not loose weight if the exercise, because they need to cut back on calories too but losing weight is not the only reason to exercise.

I exercise because it pulls all the wobbly bits in a bit, I can clear my head and shake off the cobwebs from my ever creaking joints. I also find it social as I was a bit with a friend. It's makes me feel like I've earned the right to sit for 30 minutes with a cup of coffee afterwards while I recover:-)

Exercise makes me feel good and, well, really, I don't care about any of the other benefits. That's good enough reason for me to get outside.

Christmas and Type 1 Diabetes.

Christmas is almost upon us and people with diabetes tend to approach holidays like this one with dread. We do tend to go a little bit insane with all the chocolate, boxes sweets, tins of biscuits, and mince pies.

Anyway, people have asked for a number of years at my support group about tips for dealing with Christmas and we've shared some valuable tips. Lots of them can be found on other blogs (sorry).

For me, Christmas is about one day. I don't have any office parties to go too, being a stay-at-home mum. I have a couple of coffee mornings with other Mums and I do have a birthday 9 days before christmas but I don't go nuts. It's more about the company than the food. I have dinner and cake and deal;-)

Christmas day is a "limited" day off from diabetes. I do my blood glucose tests, I guestimate the carbs as much as possible, I bolus and bolus conservatively and probably bolus some more. If I fancy the food I eat it. I stop when I'm full. We have potatoes A LOT in Ireland for dinner and on Christmas day I usually skip them altogether in favour of stuffing. It usually works out - call it a christmas miracle :-)

When we visit my husband's family in the US for Christmas there is usually so many activities going on that the food is an after-thought. Plus, there are so many of us that the goodies "disappear" extremely quickly.

I don't tend to sit around a lot on Christmas day either; we travel to my mothers down the country for dinner and once the dishes are done, we move ourselves to my brothers house for the present giving.

For others, Christmas Day usually isn't the problem though, it's the numerous parties, and giving into the grocery department's tempting treats in the 6-8 weeks that run up to Christmas. (When did we all start making this holiday about food?)

My approach is; for Christmas day, I let my hair down and don't worry about that one day. But for the rest of December all the rules apply and as soon as the children go back to school it's back to the old routine.

I hope you all find ways to cope with your Christmas and enjoy it.

I will be taking a break from blogging until the New Year, so....

Happy Christmas, Happy Holidays!!!

Elephants never forget... just get distracted

21 years with type 1 diabetes and this very seldom happens but it does happen. I did say to myself "how is it possible that I forgot to bolus for a meal?"

Then I reminded myself that it usually happens when a young person starts a sentence with "Mom ...".

Anyway, I very rarely forget to take my bolus insulin but this morning I did. It was breakfast. I usually catch the error when I'm expecting my insulin pump to notify me that it's been two hours since I bolused and that I should be my post-meal blood glucose test. This morning I had the added incentive of my weekly coffee morning and wanting to test before I left the house. 

I tested and I was 17.8 mmol/ls (323 mg/dl)!!! I knew I had started the day with reasonable (i.e. single digit) number, so I went into my pump history to see if I actually bolused. Surprise!!! No bolus, thank goodness for insulin pump histories.

I took my correction bolus of 2+ units and wondered how taking my insulin before breakfast can make such a HUGE difference? I have a medium sized bowl of porridge (I know, boring but reliable) and take 0.60 units which usually brings me in a little under the target for the two hours post-meal test. However, two cups of coffee later I'm on target for lunch.

I'm surprised that 0.60 units make such a difference, compared to the 2 units I needed to cover my breakfast two hours later.

I pause for thought!

Do you ever feel like all you see are the Highs and the Lows?

When you look at your record book, do you ever feel like all you see are the high blood glucose readings or the lows. Do you ever notice that you have a number of decent readings but that they don't count?

I test approximately 8 times a day and last night I realised that most of those readings were fairly decent, as in fairly close to my targets.

But when I went to bed last night all I was think about was the 12mmols before bedtime and how it was going to be high again in the morning. I then realised that the other 7 readings I took that day were decent (I'm not going to jinx it by saying they were good).

I seem to focus on the ones that are high and the few that are low. I know that I have to think about those readings more so that I can try to eliminate them but shouldn't I think more about the good readings to keep my head in a good space?

I'm being hard on myself. My endo always tells me that and that it's never as bad as I think. I suppose I'm afraid to give myself a pat on the back when I'm doing well because, no. 1 is it really my work that is to be credited, I mean who knows, it could just be all the stars lining up in the universe. Or No.2, I'm afraid to give myself a pat on the back because I might just get complacent and let things start to slide.

Or is it just because tomorrow is another day with diabetes. 

Why does my diabetes not stay the same?

Life with type 1 diabetes is always changing. That's probably THE most frustrating part of diabetes, well for me, for today anyway.

Three weeks ago my blood sugars after my dinner were skyrocketing up into the high teens and twenties. I haven't changed my routine in any way, the food is the same, my stress levels might be a little elevated but not too much.

This trend of high blood sugars after my meal (postprandial) continued for the week and my instructions from my endo are that if something happens for two days in a row then on the third day take action to prevent it. I usually let it continue for a couple more days though just to be sure that it's not something random happening twice (you never know do you?).

I considered all the options that were available to me. I could decrease my insulin to carb ratio for dinner, or I could increase the basal rate on my insulin pump from dinner time until bedtime. Or both but I decided that this was a bad idea. It's better to try one change at a time as too many changes at the same time can leave you guessing which one is to blame if you start having hypos.

I chose to decrease my insulin to carb ratio from 1 unit of insulin to 10 grams of carb (1:10) to 1:7grams. It worked just a little too well on the first night and I ended up with lows for the rest of the evening. So the next night I tried 1:8grams. BINGO! That's the perfect number.... for now anyway.

My next question is why did my insulin to carb ratio have to change for no apparent reason? I mean, I've been at 1:10 for a number of years. AND it was so easy to work out 1:10gms. Now I have to actually use a calculator cos I'm terrible at math.

Ah well, it's nice to solve a diabetes problem. I have so many others that I can't solve.

Type 1 Diabetic Hopes

Inspiration to live well with diabetes can come from the most unexpected sources. The inspiration from this post came from an essay entitled "Type 1 Diabetes - My Many Fears" written by Australian, Alex Williams.

His essay is very well written and even resonates some of my own fears. But as they old saying goes "a life lived in fear.... is a life half lived". So I am packing up those old fears (for today) and putting them in the attic part of my brain for when I might need them and I'm going to think about hopes.

I hope, someday, to be an octogenarian and proudly announce that I have lived 60+ years with type 1 diabetes and that apart from a few aches and pains I have no serious diabetes complications. I do have high hopes.

I hope to be fit enough to run and play with some of my future grandchildren. This is really my biggest dream. I've loved being Mom but being Granny won't have all of the angst.

I hope that in less than five years (that's 2019) the artificial pancreas/closed loop system will be available in Ireland.

I hope that that our health service has all the services in place so that the Artificial Pancreas is easy to access for all people with diabetes.

I hope that in 5 years that 80% or more of people with diabetes in Ireland will have been offered an insulin pump and/or a Continuous Glucose monitor.

I hope that some day in the near future that all people with type 1 diabetes will be able to access structured education where they are receiving their diabetes care. And that all Type 1 diabetes centres have more than 1 (but even 1 would be good) Diabetes nurse specialist, Dietitian and Phycologist.

I hope that, one day, there is a cure.