- I am really trying not to be paranoid, but with all these stories about the bad flu season we are in, and cases where normal, healthy kids are dying, it's hard not to. I still have to live my life, though, but I'm cautious. I don't make unnecessary trips out; I don't browse around stores for the heck of it, like I might during the summer, things like that. I have Jarrod make small trips to Schnucks when I can, instead of me going. And I still attribute the two habits I have mentioned on here to my [so far] success in avoiding colds and the flu this season. I also try, as much as possible, to keep my distance from people no matter what. That's about all I can do without being confined to my house for 4 months. And that sounds like zero fun and no way to live your life.
- Jarrod and I officially joined the Jaycees at the end of last year. We've jumped in with both feet, Jarrod being the new webmaster and I am... planning a trivia night! I've been busy writing questions and organizing everything for it. It will be April 7th, starting at 7pm at the VFW Hall in town. If you're interested, let me know and I can send you the flyer. Or contact me to reserve a table!
- I've started crossing something off my bucket list: I'm learning how to sew! Since Toni in town retired at the end of the year, I gave in to the fact that it was time for me to learn how to hem pants. Both Jarrod and I always need to have our pants hemmed. Mom's good friend Gwen is teaching me! I had my first lesson in November, and actually hand-stitched a pair of Jarrod's dress pants at Christmas! I was so proud of myself. I'm glad I finally decided to give this a try, because it's really not as hard as I thought it would be.
- We are looking forward to the Olympics. Jarrod likes the winter games more than summer games. We actually signed up for Sling TV for one month, then we'll cancel it, so we can watch more than the highlights they run on channel 5 in the evenings.
- Josie is getting pretty scruffy these days. Her face is in the "slightly shaggy but adorable" phase that I really like, but the rest of her hair is getting long. Problem is, it's still pretty cold out and I'm hesitant to groom her anytime soon. She just might be a shaggy dog for another month or so.
Friday, February 9, 2018
Friday Fast 5
Tuesday, February 6, 2018
Josie and the Beeps
Years ago, there was a terrible thunderstorm in the middle of the night. Lightning struck a house on the street right next to ours, causing a huge boom. It freaked Josie out, who was laying on the bed. When it happened, it also made my oxygen concentrator beep due to the surge. All of it, combined, made her want to run for it. To where, I have no idea, but we tried to keep her on the bed with us. Knowing what I know now, that was probably not the best thing for us to do, but we had no idea.
Ever since then, she has been scared of thunderstorms, especially ones at night. I've worked with her a lot to try to calm her fear and redirect it. If possible, we play or go in the basement. And if she tries to hide under our bed, as I now think she was wanting to do that initial time, we usually don't block her. If that's where she feels safe, then we shouldn't try to stop that. That being said, my biggest fear with that (and still is) is that a storm might progress and get so bad that we actually NEED to go to the basement, and it will be hard or impossible to coax her out.
Anyways, lately I've noticed a new thing she's scared of: beeps.
I'm not quite sure where this came from except I can say the first time I ever noticed it was about 4-6 months ago when we had a beeping smoke detector in the basement. I actually asked my dad to come over and fix it around 11am, instead of waiting for Jarrod to come home, because it was bothering Josie so much.
So in this case, she shakes. You'd think she is shivering, but she's nervously shaking. Even up to an hour later, sometimes I still catch her having tiny little shakes.
This is on my mind again because last night, as I was demonstrating my new glucose meter to Jarrod, we later noticed she was sitting in a corner of the kitchen, shaking. It took me a second, but then I realized that it must have been the tiny beep that my meter makes when I turn it on. Wonderful... this thing I'm now supposed to use 4+ times a day is going to make her nervous.
I love Josie so dearly, but I gotta say this is the last thing I feel like tackling right now. I'm going to have to do some good research on training her out of this, because this is not going to be good if we let it go. Fortunately, it doesn't seem like our alarm system bothers her, and maybe because that's predictable. She knows this thing in the house beeps when we leave, and it beeps again after we open the door and are back home, which is almost always followed by the sound of the garage door. But even the other night I was watching Star Wars, and I noticed her ears move every time R2-D2 made his beeps and boops. Luckily she didn't start shaking, but she was definitely noticing it.
Le sigh... I can turn off the beep on my glucose meter, which I might do, but still. We really need to fix this problem before it gets any worse.
Ever since then, she has been scared of thunderstorms, especially ones at night. I've worked with her a lot to try to calm her fear and redirect it. If possible, we play or go in the basement. And if she tries to hide under our bed, as I now think she was wanting to do that initial time, we usually don't block her. If that's where she feels safe, then we shouldn't try to stop that. That being said, my biggest fear with that (and still is) is that a storm might progress and get so bad that we actually NEED to go to the basement, and it will be hard or impossible to coax her out.
Anyways, lately I've noticed a new thing she's scared of: beeps.
I'm not quite sure where this came from except I can say the first time I ever noticed it was about 4-6 months ago when we had a beeping smoke detector in the basement. I actually asked my dad to come over and fix it around 11am, instead of waiting for Jarrod to come home, because it was bothering Josie so much.
So in this case, she shakes. You'd think she is shivering, but she's nervously shaking. Even up to an hour later, sometimes I still catch her having tiny little shakes.
This is on my mind again because last night, as I was demonstrating my new glucose meter to Jarrod, we later noticed she was sitting in a corner of the kitchen, shaking. It took me a second, but then I realized that it must have been the tiny beep that my meter makes when I turn it on. Wonderful... this thing I'm now supposed to use 4+ times a day is going to make her nervous.
I love Josie so dearly, but I gotta say this is the last thing I feel like tackling right now. I'm going to have to do some good research on training her out of this, because this is not going to be good if we let it go. Fortunately, it doesn't seem like our alarm system bothers her, and maybe because that's predictable. She knows this thing in the house beeps when we leave, and it beeps again after we open the door and are back home, which is almost always followed by the sound of the garage door. But even the other night I was watching Star Wars, and I noticed her ears move every time R2-D2 made his beeps and boops. Luckily she didn't start shaking, but she was definitely noticing it.
Le sigh... I can turn off the beep on my glucose meter, which I might do, but still. We really need to fix this problem before it gets any worse.
Monday, February 5, 2018
The Sugar Results
As I mentioned in a previous blog, we found out my blood sugars were high in December, and I am officially now considered diabetic. Today I had my first appointment with my diabetes doctor, aka endocrinologist.
First off, I think I'm really going to like him. He has his wonky moments, I noticed, but he really knows his stuff. He spent over an hour with me at my appointment. He explained things so well and took his time and never, ever gave me the impression he was just trying to move on to the next patient. It was really nice.
As I said before, CFRD is its own type of diabetes. It has aspects of Type 1 and aspects of Type 2, so it's a bit more complicated to treat.
The biggest question—and anxiety—I had going into this was: will I need insulin or not? Everything on the CF website said the only way to treat this is with insulin. He echoed those same sentiments today, but luckily there is a bit of "phasing in" to this. Right now, he was encouraged to see my fasting level where it was. It's not on the high end, and tells him that most likely a small dose of long-acting insulin should work for me right now. There are two types of insulin: rapid- and long-acting. The rapid/fast stuff is what people use right around the time they eat. It involves counting carbs and math and figuring out how much you need so your blood sugars will land in their target area and not be too low. Long-acting is a once-a-day thing, and it does just that: it lasts a long time in your system at a consistent, smooth level.
Obviously, knowing nothing about what might be used, I was dreading hearing I would need (rapid) insulin at every meal. I'm so glad I don't need to do that right now. At some point in the future, I most likely will. He explained that our pancreas are always producing insulin, but due to the nature of CF, my pancreas will produce less insulin over time. So eventually, yes, I will probably add in the rapid insulin. But for now, and hopefully for many years, the long-acting stuff should do the trick.
So that's what I mean by "phasing in"... in future I will have to count carbs and deal with more insulin, but for now I can start out with less; kind of ease into diabetes care.
There is a chance the insulin will not work, though. He has had a few patients that can't tolerate insulin because it keeps their blood sugar at a constantly too-low level, so that is something I'll have to watch out for. If that happens then we'll try something else. For most people, this works, and I'm hopeful it will.
Not like I'm dying to stick myself, but I actually wanted to get a glucose meter, because I like data and knowing what's going on. Ahead of time, I checked our insurance drug formulary to see which meters were covered and I picked one out I liked. It seems that diabetes testing has greatly improved in the past few years, so thank goodness for that. There are many meters now that require so much less of a sample of blood to test, which means a smaller finger stick, which means less pain in my fingers. I am so thankful for that, because I must admit I was a tad worried what this might do for my crocheting hobby; wondering if it might make it more unpleasant and then I wouldn't want to do it as much. Plus, the meter I chose has an app and will Bluetooth my results to my phone. Considering all of the stuff I have to keep track of and remember these days, this sounds like a good convenience to have.
They happened to have the meter I wanted on hand, so they gave me one (yay freebies from drug reps!) I've already taken two readings so far today, and they are so small and light that maybe my finger aches for 30ish minutes after, but like if I press on my fingertips right now, I don't feel a thing. Hopefully that stays that way.
So for now, he wants me to test my blood sugars 4 times a day, basically. For two of my meals, he wants me to test before and then two hours after. That will give us a good picture of what's going on and we can have data for my follow-up in two months. And I'll start my Tresiba insulin once I pick it up tomorrow from the pharmacy. Tresiba ready!! (Darn that company for having so many commercials on TV with such a dumb, catchy jingle!)
First off, I think I'm really going to like him. He has his wonky moments, I noticed, but he really knows his stuff. He spent over an hour with me at my appointment. He explained things so well and took his time and never, ever gave me the impression he was just trying to move on to the next patient. It was really nice.
As I said before, CFRD is its own type of diabetes. It has aspects of Type 1 and aspects of Type 2, so it's a bit more complicated to treat.
The biggest question—and anxiety—I had going into this was: will I need insulin or not? Everything on the CF website said the only way to treat this is with insulin. He echoed those same sentiments today, but luckily there is a bit of "phasing in" to this. Right now, he was encouraged to see my fasting level where it was. It's not on the high end, and tells him that most likely a small dose of long-acting insulin should work for me right now. There are two types of insulin: rapid- and long-acting. The rapid/fast stuff is what people use right around the time they eat. It involves counting carbs and math and figuring out how much you need so your blood sugars will land in their target area and not be too low. Long-acting is a once-a-day thing, and it does just that: it lasts a long time in your system at a consistent, smooth level.
Obviously, knowing nothing about what might be used, I was dreading hearing I would need (rapid) insulin at every meal. I'm so glad I don't need to do that right now. At some point in the future, I most likely will. He explained that our pancreas are always producing insulin, but due to the nature of CF, my pancreas will produce less insulin over time. So eventually, yes, I will probably add in the rapid insulin. But for now, and hopefully for many years, the long-acting stuff should do the trick.
So that's what I mean by "phasing in"... in future I will have to count carbs and deal with more insulin, but for now I can start out with less; kind of ease into diabetes care.
There is a chance the insulin will not work, though. He has had a few patients that can't tolerate insulin because it keeps their blood sugar at a constantly too-low level, so that is something I'll have to watch out for. If that happens then we'll try something else. For most people, this works, and I'm hopeful it will.
Not like I'm dying to stick myself, but I actually wanted to get a glucose meter, because I like data and knowing what's going on. Ahead of time, I checked our insurance drug formulary to see which meters were covered and I picked one out I liked. It seems that diabetes testing has greatly improved in the past few years, so thank goodness for that. There are many meters now that require so much less of a sample of blood to test, which means a smaller finger stick, which means less pain in my fingers. I am so thankful for that, because I must admit I was a tad worried what this might do for my crocheting hobby; wondering if it might make it more unpleasant and then I wouldn't want to do it as much. Plus, the meter I chose has an app and will Bluetooth my results to my phone. Considering all of the stuff I have to keep track of and remember these days, this sounds like a good convenience to have.
They happened to have the meter I wanted on hand, so they gave me one (yay freebies from drug reps!) I've already taken two readings so far today, and they are so small and light that maybe my finger aches for 30ish minutes after, but like if I press on my fingertips right now, I don't feel a thing. Hopefully that stays that way.
So for now, he wants me to test my blood sugars 4 times a day, basically. For two of my meals, he wants me to test before and then two hours after. That will give us a good picture of what's going on and we can have data for my follow-up in two months. And I'll start my Tresiba insulin once I pick it up tomorrow from the pharmacy. Tresiba ready!! (Darn that company for having so many commercials on TV with such a dumb, catchy jingle!)
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