In less than two weeks my baby brother is getting married. He's eight years younger than I am, and I remember mothering him as a baby. At eight years old, I was in second grade when he was born -- prime time for baby dolls, so when a real baby came into my life I was all over that!

I'm excited to travel from Phoenix to the Midwest, especially since I've been stalking the weather forecast and it's guesstimated to be in the 70s there, while it's still in the 100s here (set a record high yesterday of 107 and a a record for the warmest overnight low a few nights ago at 89).

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I use an insulin pump to manage my diabetes. The pump I use is from Minimed. I have always felt like they have taken good care of me and speak very highly of them.

Don’t get me wrong, I still think they are a good company but I was a little annoyed by a couple of things that happened.

First, I am signed up for the automatic refill program. Every three months a new box of my pump supplies shows up at my door and usually a little earlier then I need to I feel safe and secure. For whatever reason, my quarterly shipment was not sent. (READ MORE)

It's 10 p.m.; three hours post a high-fat, high-carb meal. At three hours I'm 122. That's an almost perfect place to be at three hours post-meal and right before bed.

But the problem is that I'm headed to bed and I know I'll wake up wicked high. Why not use a square-wave bolus, you ask. I just may, but the real problem for me is that I'd like to be able to use a dual- or square-wave bolus up front so I can sort of fix and forget. But I can go almost low around two hours post a high-fat, high-carb meal. Even at three hours I'm in a decent place, but by four hours I've skipped right over the high 100s and am square in the upper 200s.

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Multifamily Utility

It took me nearly two months to finally get a solid range of good blood sugar numbers. Many checks would have me hovering in the 200's, only to be followed by a bottomed out low caused by a flagrant over-correction. The devil is in the details when it comes to pumping and I started out with the wrong details! (READ MORE)

godesia

Christmas means joy. Christmas means tales of sugar plums dancing in children's heads. Christmas means Christmas dresses.

This past holiday was my first pumping Christmas, which meant learning how to "graze" and square bolus at all the parties, how to watch for trends from "holiday stress" and how to buy a Christmas dress fit for a pump.

Typically, finding a dress is hard enough. I'll try on one hundred to find one. Some are too fancy, some are the wrong color, some are just ugh! But never has one been unfit for a pump. Until this Christmas.
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Tidbit number one: I almost deleted the message because it sounded like a salesman. We get those calls sometimes--you know, people who leave messages for products or services. I really wonder if they really think they'll get calls back. Anyway, so it actually was a salesman and I still almost deleted it, but then I heard the keywords: Dr. C asked me to give you a call. Then I realized he said he was from Medtronic. So the three "I really hope you're having a good day" comments were part of his sales pitch. Ugh. This is how it starts. I hate being sold to. I mean, if you mask it well, then I guess I'm OK with it, but if you're going to sell me something and you're going to kiss my ass the whole time then I, frankly, don't want to hear it. I'm seriously thinking about telling him upfront, "Dude, don't talk to me like a customer. Talk to me like you're trying to convince your brother to buy your brand of pump. (READ MORE)