Catching up

I wanted to answer the Juvenation Blog Carnival Questions each day in November but I got distracted really fast and forgot.  So, I'll start catching up right now. 

Q1. What does your T1 diabetes mean to you, in 3 words?  Consuming. Tedious. Defining.

Q2. How has the Diabetes Online Community (DOC) helped you?  Finding other people who go thru the same things I do, day in and day out, has been a bigger relief and source of support than I could have imagined.  I read about how people who had out of control numbers buckled down and took charge of their diabetes and I was motivated to do the same thing.  I began to understand that many other people experience the pre endo dread, and fear the magic A1C result.  I realized that there are thousands of you that struggle with, why am I low, why am I high, I corrected the way I'm suppose to, the way I usually can and nothing happened, I did nothing and now I'm higher...I can't seem to get my number back above 60...everyone struggles with that, and reading others frustrations and successes make me feel like I can do it...

Q3. What is a normal day for you like?  Be as descriptive as you want.  Okay.  I'll do tomorrow since most days are different depending on what I work.  I open in the morning so I'll get up at about 5:20, make a cup of coffee,  test, shot, and eat breakfast, get dressed and go to work.  Cole and I will finish counting inventory, we'll put the truck away and put up the prep list, set up dish, then I'll get numbers ready to send off, and get the packet ready.  tomorrow I'll finish with dish machine quotes, write the manager meeting notes and meet with a guy about the dish washer at 8.  Then I'll help with prep until its time to get the FOH set up, be on the floor until 2.  Then we'll have a manager meeting and after that I'll be in the kitchen for a little bit, probably take the Anderson Trucking catering then I'll be done with work.  I'll test a few times, and eat lunch hopefully at some point.  Tomorrow I'll make dinner when I get home (I'm making a beef pot pie thing), and probably clean for a while while my dinner is cooking, test, shot etc...eat dinner, watch tv for a while, then pack my lunch for work on Tuesday.  The diabetes related parts of my day, test, shot, are monotonous and not worth repeating in here but I want to include it.  At the end of the night I'll take a few minutes, replace my needles, make sure I'm stocked up for the next day (tomorrow night I know I'll need to take another Humalog out of the fridge cause I'll run out sometime on Tuesday) and write down my blood sugars from the day.  I'll double check to make sure I've got juice next to my bed, and glucose tabs and nuts or some other protein in my purse. 

Q4. If you opened up your fridge what is the first thing you would eat?  Why did you choose that food and how many carbs does it have? black olives and diet Snapple.  I'd choose that because I'm pretty high right now and don't want to deal with the shot, test, process anymore today.  There is 1 carb in 4 olives and none in the diet Snapple.

Q5. What is your blood sugar right now? 213. ouch.  I ate a cookie earlier and obviously didn't dose enough for it. I tried to make up for it when I realized but it was too late.

Q6. How often do you test?  Do you skip a lot?  which meter do you have?  Do you use monitoring software?  which finger do you use the most? Take a photo of your finger and lets see if we can connect the dots!  I test somewhere between 10 and 12 times a day, I skip when I forget, but lately that isn't very often...I usually remember to test but sometimes forget to give myself a shot afterward.  I have an AccuChek. and I generally use the index finger on my right hand if I'm not thinking, or my pointer finger.  and I tried to take a picture but none of my dots showed up on the camera...the dots on my stomach on the other hand are another story...

Yeah, caught up!!  Today I went to the cities to see my dad then I had dinner with a friend tonight.  I'm finding that the most frustrating things are going out to eat...Its hard to know exactly how many carbs are in things ESPECIALLY when I know I'm not going to eat everything on my plate.  So I try to order things I know.  But even that is hard and most of the time if I know it its something I can make at home and thats not what I WANT to order at a restaurant!  My dad and I had Outback for lunch.  I had a salad, so I could pretty accurately guess the dressing and croutons, a serloin - no carbs.  and a sweet potato with only butter.  I have a pretty good idea on that too, depending on the size.  Seems simple enough, but I was still high when I tested a few hours after lunch.  So frustrating because that should have been the easy meal.  So Kara and I went to Flame (? I think) for dinner and I had a chicken sandwich and mashed potatoes.  I know better than to eat those, but I did it anyway.  So again, fairly simple.  Chicken, nothing.  So I've got a bun and potatoes.  I WAY over figured it plus 2 extra units because I was at 212 still.  and still, its 11 and I'm over 200.  My dad made cookies and I ate one on the way home...that was dumb.  I might have been fine otherwise.  So...anyway.  I was looking forward to getting to bed early so I'm not tired all day tomorrow, but it looks like I'm setting an alarm to test in a few hours anyway and I always have trouble falling asleep after that.