What a long weekend this was, and short at the same time.  Does that make any sense?  Saturday morning was an early morning because the Panthers had an open practice, so of course I had to go to try and get some autographs.  We did get there a little late, so there wasn’t any autographs that I could get.  We did get to watch a little of the practice and then some of the Bruins practice also.  I then had to run over the site of the ADA’s Pembroke Pines Tour de Cure to drop off some supplies to them.  Then my girlfriend and I had to kill time before the 7 p.m. Panther’s game.  We went to a mall and then over to the Sawgrass Mills.  We had some dinner and then it was time to go to the game.  And what a game it was, 2-0, 41 save shutout for the Panthers.  It was amazing in there, loud, play-off atmosphere!  My sugar was running a little high because my insulin was running low.  I didn’t realize when I left the house in the morning I only had about 60 units of insulin for the next 12 hours.  That may be a lot for some people, but I have a 2.1 basal rate, so that’s about 25 units right there.  Plus lunch and dinner boluses, I had about 2.5 units when I got home after the game.

Yesterday was another early morning in order to be at the Tour de Cure very early.  It was a great event, I wish I could have been riding.  After that I went home and took a nap and prepared for the NASCAR race.  Then my sugar went high.  I tested and it was about 350, so I corrected.  2 hours later I tested and I was 397, doesn’t make any sense.  I feel my infusion set and it is soaked, smell my fingers, and just as I suspected…..the great smell of insulin leaking!  So I used my insulin pen to correct and then inserted a new infusion set.

Now, it is Monday and I am back to work. H ave a great day!

What an experience the Daytona 500 was.  I can’t even describe it other then it was one of the greatest experiences of my life.  My blood sugars were pretty good throughout the whole weekend too.  There was one night and morning that they ran high, but that was expected because of the event we went to that night.  $10 cover, all you can drink and eat as long as you were wearing racing gear.  So, since I was wearing my JR hat (Dale Jr. ampEnergy) I was able to do that.

Feeling those cars fly by you and being about 10 feet away from the cars (we snuck down close to the start finish line right on the fence) was amazing.  I did receive a bunch of ampEnergy drinks and I have never drank an energy drink before, never a red bull, monster, rockstar, amp, NOTHING.  But since it’s racing season, I didn’t think it would be a problem to drink a few for my favorite racer.

Anyway, I didn’t post in a few days, because I have been swamped trying to catch back up after the race, but I just wanted to get some information up about the exciting Daytona

Well, it is off to my first Daytona 500.  No idea what to expect, and also never would have thought that I would be attending a Daytona 500, but here I am.  We are going up tonight and then coming back home Sunday night, which should be a lot of fun not getting home until about 2 in the morning.  My insulin re-order came in just in time.  As I was on the phone with the mail order pharmacy, the insulin was being delivered at the exact time, what a coincidence.

So, I have a full 3 month supply of insulin in the fridge, so I will take 2 full vials with me just as a precaution.  I will also take with my 5 infusion sets, 3 reservoirs, 2 infusion set insertors, 50 test strips, 10 adhesives, the all important skittles, and that’s just my diabetes supplies.  That fills a travel bag almost by itself.

Also, thank you to those of who left your numbers at diagnosis.  Now I’d like to see what your A1C levels or average sugar levels are.

I spoke to somebody the other day who was just diagnosed and we were talking about our numbers when we went to the emergency room or when we found out we were diabetic.  So this blog is going to be very short, but I hope you all respond, because I am very curious to know.

 What was your number?

Just reply back with what your number was, mine was 858.

As promised I am going to tell you the story about my insomnia that occured after I was first diagnosed.  I was watching a show on MTV over the weekend about kids who couldn’t sleep and their school work and work life was slacking because of this.  I was talking to my girlfriend about it for a while and explained the same story as I am going to now.  When I was first diagnosed and made it home from the hosptial my sleeping habits were normal, actually I was falling asleep around 9-10 instead of the normal 11-12.  However, once I became comfortable with managing it, that is when the sleep problems came because I was not as worried to get a full night’s rest (even though I should have been).  So I started to stay up later.

Then when I would finally lay down to go to sleep all sorts of things started running through my head.  Where was I going to transfer to, will I be able to play football where I transfer to, will I be able to play sports at all, why did this happen to me, what am I going to do??!!??  All this stuff would be running through my head so there was no way that I could fall asleep, so I would just stay up and watch tv.  I would also try and read because that would put me to sleep but then I would wake up abotu an hour or 2 later and couldn’t go back to sleep.  I would go to bed around 3-4 and wake up at about 7-8.  This was making my sugar levels go all out of control also.  This went on for several months until I realized it was only going to get fixed by myself.  It was just a mental thing and I had to be mentally strong and get over it.  And I did.

Now, I get to bed at around 12-1 and wake up at 7, which still isn’t as much rest as I should be getting, but I just can’t fall asleep earlier then that.  Sometimes I do if I am extremely exhausted, but that does not happen very often.

Have any of you had some of the same experiences?

Well, I didn’t start my CGMS over the weekend, I have decided to wait.  I can’t wait too long because the sensors don’t have the longest expiration date.  This weekend would have been a good time to be using it because my sugars were crazy.  On saturday night, I tested and I was 405!!  I used my Humalog pen as a correction instead of the Novolog in my pump.  I tested about 45 minutes later and my meter just read “HI”.  I thought, there is no way I just corrected an hour ago it can’t still be that high so I tested again with the same meter 2 seconds later and the reading showed 258.  So I took a deep breath and pulled out a different meter and it read 300.  So I pulled out a 3rd meter and it read 275.  So i was good with the 275 because it was right there in the middle.

Finally when I went to bed it was about 200 and when I woke up it was 75.  Last night they were running pretty high also.  I think it was because I ate hot dogs on both days, that really screws me up.  Plus I had pizza on Friday for lunch, which killed me all night long with hearburn.  My diet was destroyed over the weekend.  So this week it is back to eating salad and working out tough.  I did so well over the past few weeks to drop a little over 10 pounds, and then I slowly put 5-7 of it right back on.  There are no more excuses, except for the Daytona 500 this weekend.  But I will try and eat salads only.  Except for at the track, thats a different story.

Tomorrow I am going to tell a story about my insomnia that occured after my diagnosis.  I don’t want to get into it today, but I will share it tomorrow.

Well, I am receiving my new 722 pump today or tomorrow. I already received the glucose sensors and a new inserter, and some adhesive patches, so ummm….. now what? When I received my first pump 4 1/2 years ago, my educator put me through intense training and online pump school and would not allow me to start using the pump until I passed everything with a 100% and was able to do quick correction calculations in my head and how to use the bolus wizard, etc. I still do not have an educator down here in Florida that I see on a regular basis, I kind of just get advice from several of them. I will spend a lot of time this weekend reading all the instructions. I will probably start trying it out on Monday-Friday. I’m not going to wear it next weekend because I am going to Daytona for the Daytona 500 and I don’t want to screw something up some how.

So, what were some of your ups and downs on the first week or 2 of being on a Medtronic CGMS. What should I expect? Or what should I not expect? Any and all advice is greatly appreciated.

Thank you all in advance.

Friday at work I had used my last testing strip and I made myself a little note to bring in another 2-3 boxes on Monday so I can have some more here.  Well, yesterday I was doing a lot of cleaning and this note was in the way, so I decided to throw it away.  Well, guess what?  I forgot to bring more testing strips to work.  So, I will have to go from 9-6 without testing once.  I hate going this long, especially at work on a Monday when it can be stressful.  I also forgot my lunch at home.  That is a double whammy on a Monday.

I didn’t post much last week because I have been completely swamped with work, and Panther’s games, and cleaning, and other odds and ends.  Last Thursday I was getting ready for work and cleaned my glasses and my lens popped out and I noticed that the bridge of the glasses had broken.  Normally this would be fine, but I didn’t have any contacts left because I haven’t been to the eye doctor in a long time, which I can now schedule an appointment now that I have full insurance again!  So I had these things all taped up, and it was not very easy to see nor safe to drive because there was a piece of tape in my line of vision.  So, when it was all said and done, I was given a free 2 week sample pair of contacts, just long enough for me to buy new glasses.  I went this week, and have to go pick up the new ones later this week.

I used to wear my contacts every single day back in high school, but not so much anymore, guess I’m too lazy.  Well, I didn’t really have any bad diabetic experiences this weekend, so not too much to talk about there.  So you all have a great Monday