varohaub

For the past few weeks, my diabetes management has really gone by the wayside. I've been so consumed with my job, my new project, school, and catching up on things that I haven't been able to invest the time that I usually do with my diabetes. And it's giving me a guilty conscious.

Typically, I look at my averages every day and analyze for daily trends I see. I upload at least once a month and analyze all of that data. I count carbs fairly accurately, instead of just plugging in a number that sounds "about right." And I make sure to treat accordingly.

  (READ MORE)

Steven van Rij

Last month, I formed a list of the top five bad habits I have in my diabetes management. For the past month, I've been working on breaking these habits to get the most out of my pump and my life. I can't say that breaking habits is ever easy, but I feel this time around was much harder than most. With all that has happened in my life outside of diabetes, I have not focused on my diabetes the way that I like to. So I decided to go back and update the five habits to see if I've curbed any of them. (READ MORE)

Sometimes I joke that my self-worth is wrapped up in my eyebrows; when they're well groomed, I feel great, but when they need to be tamed, I think I'm ugly. These days, my self-worth is wrapped up in my blood sugar readings. And I'm not sure that's a good thing.

Do you ever do that? The day is going along fine, then you get a reading that you don't "deserve" and the day just falls to pot? It's happening to me more and more lately. Some days, even before I lift my head off the pillow, the day is "ruined" by a high fasting number. My mind starts racing to what I did (or didn't do) to "earn" such a high number. Did I eat something I shouldn't have last night? Did I not exercise enough? It's first thing in the morning and already I'm feeling bad, guilty, like I did something wrong. Even if I hadn't. (READ MORE)

Over the weekend, I had a low blood sugar in the middle of the night that left me feeling like I had been beaten soundly and left in a ditch. (Covered in petrol, a la Eddie Izzard.)

It was a strange experience, though, because the "low hangover" feeling was neatly accompanied by a feeling of guilt. This low wasn't one that came out of no where and smacked up upside the head. This low was the result of a miscalculation while I was at dinner. (READ MORE)

When the phone rang, I had just finished yelling and screaming at my computer. It was shaping up to be one of "those" afternoons.

"Hey, what's up," my husband wanted to know.

"If I had any chocolate I'd be eating it right now!" I said between my clenched teeth.

"Oh, really?" he said, knowing what my dependence on chocolate during stressful times amounted to.

From the office next to mine, I could hear my co-worker say "There's chocolate in the fridge!"

"Actually," I said rather proudly to my husband, "I don't have an appetite right now, so even if I did have chocolate I wouldn't be eating it." Starting my second month of Byetta was starting to pay off in the appetite-suppressant area.

"Well that's good," he said. (READ MORE)

The open bag of chocolate-covered raisins stared at me from beside my keyboard. I had a craving that morning for something chocolate and popable, like M&Ms or junior mints. It was a strange craving because most of me didn't want to give in, but the part that drove me to the drug store and walked me to the candy aisle obviously won out.

I gave those raisins the evil eye before I twisted the top of the bag and threw them into my top desk drawer. I should have thrown them away, but I knew I'd want some later. Strange, yes, my thought process.

It was around lunch time when I sat on the couch, unable to move from the nastiness I was feeling in my stomach. Four times in two hours I had been to the bathroom. Getting back to work wasn't any easier as I was barely able to concentrate. (READ MORE)