So last winter, I decided that since I was committed to MDI, I may as well be on the pump. I knew it would offer me superior management.

I called my insurance company to find out what kind of coverage we had so that I could decide which pump company to call. I understood nothing the rep told me, so I emailed HR to get a translation. Turns out we were changing insurance companies in January 2008 and unless it was urgent, I was encouraged to wait until January.

I started to obsess about going on the pump. Couldn't get the darn thing off my mind and I didn't even have it yet. I would look nearly every day at various pump web sites, compare products online and think about how much easier things would be if I just had the pump already!

Finally Jan. 1 rolled around and I was officially on the pump campaign. I thought I had made up my mind about which pump I wanted; that pink one from Animas seemed to be calling my name. On Jan. 2 HR emailed us a link to get temporary cards, and I was beside myself with excitement. I promptly called Animas, where I was told I'd need some blood work prior to the insurance company giving me the OK.

So I had Dr. C set up the tests at my local hospital since his office is nearly an hour away. The only test the insurance company required was a c-peptide, which is a test that measures how much insulin your pancreas makes. I didn't know that at the time; all I knew was that I had to have the test and I was willing to do almost anything the insurance company asked.

Several days later when Dr. C emailed the results to me, I was too focused on a much improved A1C and having the blood work out of the way than what the c-peptide result meant. After reading over the results several times, I got pretty curious about what the c-peptide test was and what it meant.

So I asked. I asked everyone I could find, actually, since Dr. C didn't respond immediately. The consensus was that my result of <0.1 meant I have type 1 diabetes, not type 2 as had been thought for the three years prior.

I was devastated, but I really didn't understand why since there wasn't that much that changed. I got over the initial shock, ordered my purple MiniMed 722 (it's another story how I switched from Animas to MiniMed) and am now happily pumping along with Toohey.

So there you have it. My diagnosis story in a (four-part) nutshell. Read part one here, part two here, and part three here.