guest blogger: stephanie b.

stephanie is one of my best friends. we've known each other since freshman year of high school, and i remember sitting in her kitchen at her birthday party while her friend who was type 1 diabetic checked her blood sugar before we had cake ... and i was fascinated. ahh, irony. steph's sister is also T1, so i know that she always 'gets' it and i've never really had to explain anything to her - just freshened her memory about some things when she asks, she is a teacher and this year has a student with T1 (who i want to go hug because i hate that he has to go through this as a kid, as you all know, i didn't.) oh yeah, she hates ketchup. i feel this is important information to share. because i find it amusing. :)


My first experience with the stupid D word was when I was 9, and my sister diagnosed with type 1.  I won’t go into her diagnosis story, but it DID involve a routine trip to the pediatrician, that turned into missing a family day trip to Mammoth Cave. Bummer. Family- we never made that trip up, ya know.  Maybe it’s time? This turned into a weeklong stay at the children’s hospital, where I’d roam the halls for countless hours (I thought I was hot stuff with that much freedom, and I’ll never forget where room 521 is located!), watch my sister practice shooting up oranges from her hospital bed, and in general, think of how cool it must be to have everyone fawn over you for a week.  I mean, we are talking a LOT of flowers and balloons, people!  I knew that diabetes was serious, but it was never presented to me as a life changing issue, but more as a fact of life.  She had this now, and this was how to keep her healthy.  It meant that meatimes were at set times now, and carbs and sugar grams were counted always.  I knew which were "free" foods, and I knew when it was better to take my candy or other sweet treat into my room or outside to eat it, because she couldn't have it right at the moment.  I knew where glucose tablets were (and how they tasted- YUM!), and what insulin was, and what to do if she went low and Mom and Dad weren’t home.  I never got to squeeze the icing into her cheek, but boy I would have been able to squeeze like a pro if needed!  I also learned very quickly what to do if her blood sugar was high - STAY THE HECK AWAY!!!!  (Love you, sis!) 

Flash forward and now it’s the summer of 2000.  I’m at home and the doorbell rings, and Meredith is standing on my front porch.  “So … I have diabetes,” she says calmly.  I don’t really remember what happened next.  (Did you come inside? Did our moms chat? Why don’t I remember this?) meredith's note: i have no idea. i remember standing on the porch for a while, and then going inside, your mom was showing my mom the binder of nutritional labels, i think we were in your room doing teenager-y things. but I do remember thinking that it all made sense.  Of COURSE she was diabetic- DUH!!  Why didn’t I realize that before?  I also remember thinking “WHY ARE YOU JUST WALKING AROUND??  WHY AREN’T YOU IN ROOM 521??”  ok maybe I didn’t really think that last part.  I was shocked that she was just, like, walking around free though.  Oh, how times had changed already!  

in st. louis, about a year before i was diagnosed

 So fast forward again.  Now it’s my fifth year of teaching, and I have a third grader with diabetes in my classroom.  At the beginning of the year, I was talking to his mom and I mentioned my sister, and how I had grown up learning about type 1.  She basically stopped giving me the “diabetes speech” and told me how relieved she was that he’d be in my room.  I kindly reminded her that I still needed the speech. I certainly didn’t know everything about the devil diabetes and I wanted/needed to hear how it affected her child specifically. 

I tell you all of this to tell you that Meredith has been a great sounding board this year with any questions or problems I have with this sweet boy’s not so sweet D.  It’s such a crappy disease but I am grateful to have so many people in my life who handle it beautifully and make it look effortless!  Kudos to you all.

 december 2010, my annual tacky sweater party (i already took mine off)!

that time i hurt my ankle. and leg.

i've mentioned my leg injury before, but never really gotten into it. when i started to write a post about exercise, i realized i need to explain what happened first, because if i post it all together, no one will ever want to read that novel.

last summer, i decided i wanted to run the susan g. komen 5k with my mom and my man the day after my birthday in october. my mom is an avid runner. she runs in almost all the races in town, she has been running over half her life and she can outrun many people my age. i mean, she won a bronze medal in the senior olympics a few years ago. she's not playing.

so i started training (not straight up running, i had a plan that i was following) about two months before the 5k. my struggle was the same as it had been any time i ever tried to start running routinely. shin splints. people told me they would go away, my legs weren't used to running. stretch, ice, etc. so i kept on.

they seemed to get a little better, but my right leg always hurt more than my left after runs. i'd have to walk around for a long cool down because my right leg always felt like it was tight as a rock and on fire. pleasant. but i was determined to run that race, no matter how slow, so i never gave up.

in september i decided maybe i should try out new shoes. like, the more expensive kind where you go and have them look at your feet and how you walk/run and recommend shoes you should buy. so i got a recommendation (and found them cheaper online because i live on a budget), and they were here and ready to go the week before the race. well, i got to train in them twice. because the second time, bam. injury.

the tuesday before the race i was going out for my usual run, but decided to take a different route to mix it up (around the same area, just a different direction - i was getting bored with my runs). my cousin was living with me at the time, and as i was leaving, i jinxed myself jokingly said if i wasn't back in an hour to come look for me. HAHA right? wrong.

on my way home, i was loving my music and feeling really good about my run, i had gone farther than before and had only stopped to walk once! i remember the exact song that was on. 'eff you' by ceelo. (yeah, yeah. censored, the one on my ipod was not.) 

my left earbud fell down and out of my ear. i slowed my pace as i pulled the cord back up to pop it back in my ear, and noticed the squishy end piece wasn't there. i stopped, turned to look for it on the ground, and as i turned my ankle rolled and i felt and heard the loudest POP i had ever heard from my own body. oooohhhhh the pain. typing this is giving me shivers because i remember how awful it felt. i had never had an ankle sprain, injury, anything like that to my legs (fractured left wrist and broke right arm in 7th grade, story for another day). i was scared to look at my ankle, but i did. i was afraid it was going to be just hanging there. it wasn't, but my ankle was HUGE.

sitting there, i looked up because i remembered seeing a young guy walking toward me, and he was coming over to me to see if i was okay. i told him i wasn't and asked if he had a cell phone. he said he didn't (i remember thinking, what teenager doesn't have a cell phone?) and i asked if he could help me wave down a car or find someone with a phone. - oh yeah, i was running past the YMCA, so that was a little helpful - he asked if he could help me walk, i said there was no way i could stand on it. he said his friend was close and had one and he'd go get him. and then he said, 'don't go anywhere.' right, cuz i'm going to get up and run off. this is all a fun joke.

he came back with his friend and i called my cousin - who just happened to answer my phone because on this day, we were waiting for the gas company to come turn our gas on after they worked on the lines that day, and they had my number to let us know when, ... so she had my phone just in case while i ran.

i told her i fell and hurt my ankle really bad and i needed her to take me to the ER and told her where i was. she came and got me, and off to the hospital we went. my mom met us there, ya know, for moral support.

ewww

  so happy

i got my xray and some pain meds, and was told it was just a sprain. i remember thinking it certainly felt worse than a sprain, even though i had no injury to compare it to. they fitted me with crutches and a brace and i was on my way. the crutches themselves were a workout. ugh. (surprisingly, my blood sugars stayed in range during this whole ordeal, i thought for sure they would be out of whack from the injury and stress)

stupid splint that did nothing

the er doc told me to take it easy for a few days then start putting pressure on it as i felt comfortable. so i did. crutches for my birthday, and the following morning i hobbled on the crutches while mom ran the race. after the race i went to a picnic with my man's family, and kept my leg up most of the day.

taking it easy at a picnic with my man's family ... i sat in that swing almost all day

 by sunday i was hobbling with one crutch. it still hurt a bit but i was so over the crutches that i was toughing it out. monday i used one crutch, and tuesday i went without, but kept them in the car.

that night i was really concerned because my ankle still seemed really swollen, and i had been following the RICE rules. i showed some friends in the medical field a picture and they all thought i should follow up with someone.

yeah, it looked like this a week later. cankle alert. and green/blue foot.

i called my orthopedic surgeon (yes i have one, don't you? okay, he's a friend of the family but we also go to him for these kinds of injuries) and asked if i could come in. i had gone to the hospital and gotten the xrays in hopes of not having to pay for more. i'm glad i did that, because when he looked at the xray, he immediately said that he could clearly see multiple small fractures at the end of my tibia. WHAT? why didn't the doc in the ER see this??

i was irritated but glad at the same time. i got an awesome boot that i had to wear for three weeks, followed by a horrible brace for two weeks that didn't work with any of my shoes (i mean tennis shoes, not fancy shoes).

the week before thanksgiving i was boot and brace free. my wallet was also money free, thanks to all these unexpected medical costs. as if i need more of those, thanks diabetes.

after talking to some friends in the medical field, and one who was a trainer for a college football team, i found out that the fractures in my leg could have come from the shin splints that never got better, the pressure just made it worse and then the bone split (gross). this would explain why my right leg always hurt worse than my left. makes sense. i still have some pain sometimes, and some days i notice swelling, i can tell that i walk down the stairs differently and i wish i didn't, but all in all i am doing a lot better.

just goes to show that clearly i should not run because my body breaks when i do. oh well :D

that one time i was in the hospital

as janet wrote about yesterday (read it if you don't know why i went to the ER), i was in the hospital last year over superbowl weekend (can you imagine if it was this year?? good thing i didn't have a team preference in superbowl last year). here's the story, morning glory:


when we got to the ER at about 11, i got sick when i was checking in, and then i remember getting hooked up to an IV because i was dehydrated and i fell asleep. mom and my man were with me, and dad was in the waiting room with my friends. eventually my dad came in the room and my friends went home. at about 2 am, my blood sugars were normal, but the doc said he wanted to keep me overnight because my heart rate was elevated. GRAND. i had never - literally, NEVER in my life stayed in the hospital except when i was born.

the next morning, EARLY, (you know you never really sleep at the hospital) i had a variety of heart related tests ... a scan i can't remember the name of where they put dye in my arm first, a stress test and an ultrasound of my heart. i was never asked if i wanted them done, never told by a doctor why they were being done, and never even saw the doctor who ordered them. actually, i saw no doctor before these tests except the one in the ER. i was told was that they were checking to make sure everything was ok ... since this was my first hospital experience and i felt like crud, i didn’t question the testing. i did, however, cry and want to know why i was having a stress test done when i was 27 and have no heart problems and the reason i came to the hospital was my blood sugar was low and my stomach was upset. (hello run-on sentence) and the nurses assured me the test would come back normal and i was probably more anxious about having the test done ... um, then why do it? just saying.

a doctor finally came in and saw me after the tests. he had on khakis and a button up, no name tag, did not identify himself, asked about my symptoms and why i had come to the ER, did not examine me in any way and said they would be looking at the results of my tests. after that, i called my dad (who had gone home to get stuff done, mom hung out half the day til my man got there), and he called our family physician. my family doctor was surprised but suggested the hospital was just being cautious, and said he did not see any reason that i’d be kept in the hospital.

later i saw a different doctor who said they thought everything was ok, but said they would keep me another night for observation. after my stress test, i was attached to a second heart monitor ... and since i was on the cardiac floor, i was already wearing one. yes, cardiac floor. for an upset stomach and low blood sugar. so now i had two heart monitors on. (remember that stomach bug? want to talk about how much fun it is to go to the bathroom wearing two heart monitors that you can't take off? while pulling an iv pole?)

i didn't get to go home that day. that night, they restricted what i could eat because a stomach ultrasound was scheduled for the next morning. yet again, i didn't see a doctor before this to explain why they were doing it. no one told me who ordered the test. i was told by a nurse that they (WHO IS THEY?) wanted to make sure everything was normal because my stomach had been upset. how many people with an upset stomach ever have an ultrasound for that reason alone? that confused me. as with the heart tests, nothing extraordinary was revealed.

i talked to my dad again after the ultrasound, it became clear that i needed to take control, start questioning exactly what was going on, and have a say in what happened next. when i got breakfast, i actually felt hungry, and felt much better after i ate. i waited for a doctor or someone to come tell me something, and finally a third doctor came in when i was eating lunch.

the doctor i met with next expressed some surprise at what had happened over the past two days… he asked ME why all these tests had been done. he said that from the tests i had been given he was expecting to see an 80 year old, not a 27 year old with no previous heart issues. he was confused about who the doctor who did not identify himself had been. he basically said that he would not go so far as to document that anything wrong had been done, he would not have ordered all the tests I’d been given. he was also the first of three cardiologists to tell me that the stomach virus and dehydration would have affected my blood sugar (of course, i knew that and i'm not a doctor), and that he would have treated me for dehydration and monitored my blood sugar if he had been there when i arrived. the major thing he said was that it’s common knowledge to basically everyone in the medical field that a persons heart rate elevates when they are dehydrated. so glad the ER doctor thought of that...

basically, the next ten minutes flew by in comparison to the two and a half days i had stayed in the hospital. within five minutes, the first heart monitor was removed and within a few more minutes the second was
removed. i was told i could get dressed to leave and the discharge paperwork was done. about 20 minutes after meeting that doctor, mom and i were waiting at the door for dad to pick us up.

when i saw my endocrinologist two days after my got out of the hospital (because go figure, my scheduled appointment was the monday i left the hospital) and told him what had happened, his reaction was disbelief. he was basically speechless as i told him what happened, and he said, “they did what?”

i guess the worst damage done in all of this a distrust of that hospital. i went because my friends made me i knew something was wrong. i will of course go back to the hospital if i ever have to because of diabetes, but i might think about which ER i choose before i do that.