I had a huge diabetic halloween party scare this past Saturday, and not scare as in somebody’s mask.  Let me build up to the scary part first.  After debating between the Joker and Indiana Jones I decided to go with Chase Utley (Phillies 2nd baseman for those that don’t know).  So throughout the night I was cheering on my Phillies and it was a very close game.  In about the 7-8 inning, I started to feel my sugar getting extremely low.  I tested, and it was at about 35.  I just started eating a mass amount of food, whatever I could get my hands on.  There was chips, chocolate candy, candy corn, a lot of different things.

The party was a great party, especially since the Phillies won in the bottom of the 9th on a great hit by Carlos Ruiz.  I was even happier because I actually tested my blood sugar out at a Halloween party.  I’ve been testing a lot more because I have a couple meters in different places.  As I am typing right now, I know my numbers are a little high because I have to go home from work in order to change my infusion set.  My insertor at work broke, and I brought the wrong prep pads.  I grabbed a regular antiseptic that I use when I have to use my insulin pen, which I can’t use now because I don’t have another pen needle!  Time to re-up my supplies at my office desk!

Phillies one game away from a World Series Championship!

I think I have tested more in the last 3-4 days, than I ever had in any 3-4 day period before….and I LOVE it.  Even though it is expensive to test, I feel a lot more comfortable in knowing every 60 minutes what my sugar level is.  I am not on a CGMS yet, so this is the best way for me to know constantly what my levels are.  It’s also helping me cure those times that I seem to always have a high, wacky number.  I have increased my basal rate for when I am sleeping and so far it has been doing better.

On another note, I get a phone call from my soon to be 8 year old niece telling me about this person she colored and his name is flat Stanley and she has to send it to me and I have to take pictures with it and keep a journal and it is all being graded for her.  Yes, I was just as lost as  you all were right now.  She was explaining to me that a chalkboard fell on top of him, that is why he is flat.  Well, I guess it is a book that they are reading in their 3rd grade class and this is their class project.  So, Flat Stanley went from cold Pennsylvania winter to going to the beach with me this weekend.

I thought this whole chalkboard thing was my niece’s imagination, and it scared me a little that her imagination was that vivid!  But I come to find out that it was the author’s creation.  So the point of this is – Stanley is getting to go on a trip to Florida, however, he will also learn about Diabetes, and what he needs to do in case of an emergency, and I think this will be a great opportunity to teach the kids in the classroom a little about diabetes also!

For the first time since I have been diabetic, the Phillies are in the NLCS. So, now that I have to be worried about my Eagles, since Westbrook has a few broken ribs, I now have to get nervous over the Phillies too. Plus hockey season is starting up. Sorry Philly fans, I am not a Flyers fan, I have been taken over by the local squad, the Florida Panthers. They have a home opener this weekend, but I can’t go because I have to watch the LSU Tigers romp the Florida Gators. That should be a great game.

Anyway, on to the diabetes. My sugars have been pretty good again today, 1 high but thats it. Also, good news, my certificate of credible coverage came in the mail yesterday, so now I have everything that I would need in order to get coverage again, hopefully. We will see, and I will keep you all updated on that.

Gotta Run!

Over the weekend I had a hard time bringing down a big time high.  I had a sub for lunch and took the correct amount of insulin.  I was drinking light lemonade, which was supposed to have only 2 g of sugar per 8 oz.  I had probably 2 cups of it, so only 16 oz.  After I got home, I tested about 2 hours later, and my blood sugar was 425!!  I have no idea how it went up that high.  The only thing that I can think of is that the lemonade I was drinking, was not light and really spiked the sugar levels.  I corrected, and corrected, and corrected.  It took me almost 6 hours to finally get my sugars back down under 200, then when I woke up in the morning, over 300 again!

It was a rough weekend with the sugars.  This morning it was pretty high too.  They should be good and stable this week, because I made some changes to my basal rates, and eating a lot more healthier.  I will also be hitting the gym full blown this week too.  I slowly worked myself back, and now I am back in a little better shape.  Still can’t run as far as I used to be able to, but I am working on it.

Also, the fact that my Eagles lost this weekend, did not help much either!  Virginia Tech did win, but that doesn’t overpower the birds loss.  And not to mention the OAR concert changed locations the night before, and I didn’t get the e-mail update until it was too late.

What a long weekend I have coming up!  Tomorrow I have to go somewhere all day for work, a nice little seminar.  Then Friday night there is an OAR concert at Mizner Park in Boca, so you know I’ll be there (Crazy Game of Poker!).  Saturday then is football day of course, then Saturday night is the big fight.  Sunday, of course at 1 is the Eagles game, a lot of stuff to do so little time to do it.

The good thing in all of this is that I am now testing my blood sugar between all of this stuff.  I have a case small enough now that can fit my meter, lancing device, and strips in my back pocket like a wallet, so it is not a hassle to carry around anymore.  I even take it fishing with me!  I always get inspired to do stuff like this when I see something on tv, this time it was an ESPN interview with Jay Cutler about his T1 diabetes on Sunday.  This time I am going to follow through and stay consistent with it!

I just purchased my tickets to go back home for Thanksgiving.  I haven’t been home since Christmas, that is the longest I have been away from my family!  But in times like this, you gotta do what you gotta do to keep a steady job right?  Well you all have a great day and have a great weekend also!

Well, what a week it has been.  After coming back from a nice, but short vacation, it was time to get back to reality.  First, I received the keys to my new apartment and started to move in most of my stuff, got all the big stuff out of the way first.  This whole process of moving and getting the keys was very stressful, but didn’t have much affect on my sugar levels, which surprised me.  Then yesterday when I was doing a lot of moving, I was doing it pretty quickly because it looked like it was going to rain, so I was sweating and getting a good race of the heart.  My levels shot up though.  Different types of exercise make my levels do something different everytime, I can’t quite figure it out yet.

I will be going to Daytona Beach, FL for the weekend and I always have a habit of not testing while away.  It gets as bad as not even testing once in a 3 days period.  I told myself that I will test at least 4 times a day still, no excuses, even if it means carrying a little bag around with me every single place that I go, I don’t care!

Lastly, I have another A1C test coming up pretty soon, so stayed tuned for the next round of results.  I have to get the test done before my insurance runs out at the end of the month!  Still haven’t found a conclusion for this yet!

So tonight is final positioning night for the bowling league.  We are in 4th place going into tonight and only 3 points behind first place.  We will be bowling the 3rd place team, so it will be difficult to win first because we will have to rely on the 1st and 2nd place teams on splitting the games, plus we have to win all 3 games tonight.  Also, today starts the new diet, and it started out on the right foot, I was up at 6:45 today and at the gym by 7.  New apartment, new diet, new me!

I weighed myself last night, after a week of eating nothing but fast food because I was moving all week and was just grabbing stuff on the go, I weighed 250 pounds!!!!  5 years ago I weight 200 pounds, just a year ago I was 205, I have gained 45 pounds in one year, not too good.  However, the good news is that it is excessive fat that I will probably be able to shed about 10 pounds in almost a week.

Well the insurance is almost up, September 1 is approaching fast.  I have to get my blood work done before that because I have the whole 9 yards being done this time, more then just A1C.  I am expecting a better A1C then last time, but I still don’t think it is going to be under 7.  With the new diet though, I feel confident that by November, it will be under 7.0 and hopefully under 6.5!

 Have an amazing week everybody!  I promise, I will post more than I did last week.

Alternate Site Testing (AST) has becoming more popular over the past few years.  What exactly is AST do you ask?  Simple.  It is a method of testing your  blood sugar without having to prick your finger.  You are able to use your lancing device on several other areas, such as your forearm, upper arm, thigh, and your thumb.  This gives you a break from using your fingers all the time and potentially bruising them.

 There are some instances that you should still continue to use your finger, for instance, according to the FDA, when you think that your blood sugar is low you should use the blood sample from your finger.

Some lancing devices that allow alternate site testing are the Accu-Chek MultiClix, Advocate, Freestyle, and the Ulti-Lance.

So Friday I ventured off to Orlando with my girlfriend for her birthday (yes we found silver heels!)  First thing of the night was going to Downtown Disney and visiting Cirque Du Soleil.  If you have not witnessed this event live, you MUST!  It was the most incredible, shocking, speechless thing on earth.  I want to go back again already.  At times there is so much going on that you don’t know what to look at.  But overall, it was magical.

After that, we headed over to Pleasure Island because my girlfriend would be 21 in 15 minutes, so we stand in line to get into a club and at 11:54 exactly they say “I’m sorry but you have to wait 6 minutes”  I was furiated because I timed the line wrong and figured it would be midnight by the time we got up there.  So we went back in line and made it right at midnight.  We had a lot of fun in the “Motions” nightclub, and then headed over to the “BET Soundstage” for about 15 minutes.  I was pretty disappointed in the fact it only stayed open until 2 a.m., I would have figured at least 4.

Saturday morning came and we spent all day (10:00 a.m. – 12:30 a.m.) at Magic Kingdom.  We were able to accomplish every single ride and attraction to see.  We watched the fireworks, which are just magical and worth the price of a ticket by themselves.  They give you a little button that says “Today is my birthday” and when I went in March with my aunt, they gave her free water, ice cream, and etc. at every place we went, my girlfriend did not get a single thing free i was mad.  Well, she did get happy birthday sang to her at the Noodle Station (in Tomorrowland) and they gave her a little dessert!

One of the things that made my day had nothing to do with Magic Kingdom.  We asked a gentleman to take our picture and he did and as I was walking away I heard him say, “Hey, are you diabetic?”  And I turned around and proudly said, “Yes, I am for almost 5 years now.”  He pointed to his daughter, about 7-8 years old, and says, “she is too, she’s had it since she was 8, show him her pump honey”  She showed me her pump, same one I had.  Then came the cutest thing I ever heard in my life (I can’t believe I just said cute), she looked at me and said, “My last number was 104, what was yours?”  I responded with, “I haven’t tested for a few hours, but it was 180?, and the best advice I ever had followed, “Well, thats a little high, you should probably test again!”

Like I said, a magical experience!

This is week 6 of the Miller Lite Fun league, and so far it has been no far at all, being whooped every week.  This weekend was a crazy one.  Witnessed two fights on Friday at the bar we were at by the beach waiting for the fireworks.  The fireworks sparked by people on the patio bar were better then real fireworks.  Two different fights right next to us broke out and and security came and had to break things up.  It was great.  Drunk kids, I tell ya, dress ‘em up but ya can’t take them out!

Anyway, my parents will be coming down here in less than a month, along with my brother and his wife.  They will be coming down for my graduation.  I can’t wait to just get that over with, if it was up to me I wouldn’t even walk, I am just doing it for my mom.  I need to make sure I have some skittles or some other candy with me to make sure that I don’t get a really bad low in the middle of the ceremony.  That would not be good.

My morning sugars are still really out of whack and it is really starting to scare me.  I can’t get these down for anything, and it is becoming a bad situation.  I am happy when I wake up with a blood sugar between 200-300!  This is ridiculous, but I have tried so many different things.

Any suggestions, please help!