They say it's his birthday

While I would love to write a post waxing poetic about my love for Fred, I have in-laws landing at the airport in less than 2 hours and my house looks like a landfill threw up. Sooooo, let me just say Happy Birthday to THE best husband and father in the world. Elise and I are blessed.

Love you Freddie!

Miscellaneous Stuff

First off, thank you for all the wonderful comments on my last post. I am so glad to finally know the gender so my planning can begin in earnest... and let's not forget the arguing over names!

The doc said everything is looking great, he is growing and measuring right on target. The only two things of concern were my thyroid gland is still not in range (TSH should be between 1 - 5, and mine came back at 22.32), and my placenta is really low. She's not overly concerned about the second thing right now, but says she'll need to keep her eye on it.

Poor Elise got her MMR shot today, and I think it finally caught up with her tonight. We had some moderately high (mid 200s) numbers right after, but then she went low-ish (71) while in bed tonight. She's been crying in her sleep off and on too, so it looks like we're in for a long night.

I'm glad we were able to get her the shot (had to delay because of the strep throat) because my Mom says there's a measles outbreak in some Vancouver schools right now... YIKES! We're only about a month away from our trip up there, so I'm hoping it's all cleared up by then.

As for the World Diabetes Day shirts, we have enough people saying they're in to do an order (printer has a 12 shirt minimum), so I should have some more info on that soon. I am so excited to be able to do this again, I can't even tell you! I loved getting all those pictures of people wearing the shirts in my email last year, and I'm looking forward to seeing more!

And that's all I have to report from my corner of the world... time for bed! Good night, and good numbers!

It's a...

We loved having a baby so much the first time

We thought we'd give it another whirl
So we're overjoyed to announce
That in September, we're having a baby...

BOY!!!

World Diabetes Day Shirts

I know this might be a little early to throw this out there, but Fred and I are thinking of offering to do the World Diabetes Day shirts again. If you didn't read my blog back then, here are some pics of people wearing the shirts:


Because I will be birthing a child a few months before World Diabetes Day, which is November 14, I thought I would post about it super early so I can gauge the interest level.

Last year the shirts went for $15, including shipping. I'm hoping to knock the price down a bit this year. By getting it done so early, we wouldn't have to use priority shipping. I'll have to do some figuring on how much shipping will cost for 1 shirt vs. 6 shirts, etc., so I can't give a concrete price yet. But after I get some responses on the interest level, and talk to our printer, I will have a better idea. I'm hoping to get everything done and shipped out by August at the latest.

So who's in? Leave me a comment!

P.S. For all my Canadian friends, Nicole handled the shirts for the peeps north of the border last year. I emailed her to ask if she's up for doing it again, but I haven't heard back. Nicole, If you're reading this, let me know!

Normal in my world

Sometimes I forget what it must be like to have a child that doesn't have diabetes. Things happen in our life that would make other people stop and say, "huh?", but I don't even blink an eye.

In my world...

It's normal for my daughter to go around testing her dog's "blad shure". And her baby doll's. And the mini pumpkin she got at Hallowe'en. And anyone else who is willing.

My 2 1/2 year old knows how to do all the prep for her insulin shot, including; getting the syringe, cotton balls and rubbing alcohol, taking the stopper off the syringe, rolling the insulin, and putting alcohol onto the cotton ball and cleaning the tops of the insulin vials. She does all this by herself. The only thing I do is put air into the vial, and pull the insulin out.

When we forget to give Elise her shot, she will remind us. Before bed the other night, we told her it was time to go upstairs and brush her teeth; the first step in the many steps to bedtime. Her response? "But you didn't give me my shot yet!" Indeed, we hadn't.

I find test strips inside my socks, in Elise's hair after a nap, or inside my bra.

Before eating anything, Elise will ask me, "do we need to test my blad shure?" It breaks my heart every time.

It is normal for any of Elise's stuffed toys or baby dolls to have diabetes. In fact, one of her dolls has "six diabetes", according to Elise.

My daughter will ask for a shot, just so she can have an M&M (our current bribe, er award, for "good shot behavior").

This is what passes for normal in our life. Do you have any "strange normals"?

By Jove, I think we got it!

And by it, I'm talking about the correct dosing for the Amoxicillin Elise is currently taking for her strep throat.

I knew it was the antibiotic making her run high, and not the infection, because she was constantly running high (in the almost 400 range) about 2 hours after getting her dose (breakfast and dinner). We usually see numbers in the mid-100s or lower at these times. Her numbers at other times during the day were fine.

The incredible Meri suggested adding a correction dosage to the shots Elise was getting at breakfast and dinner to see if that would help. Elise gets 1 unit of diluted Humalog for 301-400, and 2 units for 400+. I decided to start with 2 units, which didn't make much of a difference, so I got bold and upped it to 4 units. We're now seeing numbers in the high 100s. Not perfect, but I'm reluctant to up the dosage any more than I already have.

THIS is why I love my D-community!

Disclaimer: This correction dosage for Amoxicillin, of course, pertains to Elise only. Every child is different, and will respond differently to medications and/or insulin. Please follow your doctors advice, and use caution when giving your child a buttload of insulin.

Guess what I did today

Spent quality time with my husband and daughter doing something fun? No.

Having a little "me time", and going to the store to buy some cute and starting to be much-needed maternity clothes? Nope.

Getting a massage, plus facial and pedicure? Perhaps in my dreams.

Taking advantage of Fred being home and laying down for a nap? I wish.

Grocery shopping? Good guess, but you would be wrong.

No friends, I spent two hours of my life that I will never get back, organizing all of our D supplies, including stacking them by date so our oldest ones are now at the front of the shelves.

Jealous much?

Did you know that the Multiclix lancets have an expiration date? Nice try Accuchek, I don't give a flying rat's ass if it's not 2009 anymore... I'm STILL going to use them. Hahahahahahahaha!

Methinks I've gone off the deep end. Anyone care to join me?

D-Buddies!

I can't believe I forgot to post my pictures of our play date with Nate and Liam! Granted, I didn't get very many because my memory stick filled up and I didn't feel like going through 600+ pictures to see which ones I could delete.

Anyway, there's nothing like hanging with a couple of girls that are not only fun to be with, but totally, 100% get what you're going through. There was much laughing, chatting, carb-counting, weighing, eating, child-wrangling, and eyebrow-furrowing (when a weird number would pop up on someone's meter).

A lovely time spent with lovely ladies. Oh yeah, the kids are pretty adorable too!

Nate and Liam cooking up some fun. Keep it up boys, a girl loves a guy who knows his way around the kitchen!

Elise and Liam eating lunch. Elise told me the other day, "I just love Liam so much!"

Mini-chefs!

Liam is such a gentleman!

Mr. Strep's Wild Ride

Whoa, this strep is driving me CRAZY! It has been sending Elise's numbers all over the map. Last night (at 9:00), she was almost 400. She'd had her first dose of the antibiotics at dinner earlier. She then came all the way down to 128 at 2:30 am (no correction other than her usual bedtime insulin).

I decided to wait and check her in an hour, but after 30 minutes had gone by, she was moaning and crying in her sleep; a sure sign she's going down fast. So I gave her some banana, and re-checked at 5:00 am. Now she's at 97. I gave her 5g more and she was 233 at wake up, I guess she didn't need that last 5g after all.

Then today, after breakfast and antibiotics, she was 437. Wow! I decided against giving her a snack (she wasn't hungry anyway), and she came down to 138 by lunch.

So it looks like the antibiotics are sky-rocketing her BG. She's on Amoxicillin, and I'm pretty sure it's the stuff with flavouring. Elise's pedi offered to phone it into a special compounding pharmacy, so we could get sugar-free, but I know from experience we don't have one close to us. So for convenience's sake (I wouldn't have been able to pick it up until the next day because Fred is out of town, and had I to deal with nap/dinner/bedtime schedules), I chose not to go that route. Next time, I definitely will.

So what is your experience with antibiotics? Does it cause your kiddo's BG to go high? How do you combat it? How many carbs do you figure is in 5 mL (1 tsp) of flavoured Amoxicillin anyway?

All good things must come to an end

The good things in this case being Elise's numbers. During the past 2+ months, her numbers have been nothing short of phenomenal. Okay, her daytime numbers... I think I've given up on ever figuring out what the heck goes on in her little body at night.

Oh, but her numbers during the day were ever-so-wonderful. I was so in love with those numbers, that if it wasn't for Fred, I would have run off and married those numbers.

But I'm off chasing rabbits again.

Anyway, yesterday I noticed her numbers trending higher. Like high 200s. Very out-of-place for her. Plus, she did not want to eat. And at 11:00 last night she woke up inconsolable with a fever of 101, BG of 269, but no ketones. I tried to calm her down for almost an hour, then gave her some Tylenol because she seemed to be in some pain.

At the 3:30 check, she was 360 (YIKES), and .5 ketones. Hmmm, something definitely was going on. When she woke up this morning, her fever was gone, and she declared herself to be "feeling much better". Yeah, I hear sleeping will do that for ya. Her BG was still high at 269 and ketones were .4, not bad, considering.

But something was eating away at my gut, so I made an appointment for her anyway. Dx... strep throat. UGH, poor little girl! Between the illness and the antibiotics, I've resigned myself to the fact that our run of good numbers are over for now. But mark my words, I will get them back!

I'm too in love to give up that easily!

What would you do?

This post is not meant to start a war over the vaccinate vs. not-vaccinate topic, but I do have a question for all you D-parents on what you would do in a certain situation.

Elise is not up-to-date on her vaccines. We've done a delayed schedule with her from the beginning, and we got behind around her second birthday due to illness and having to get both the flu shot an H1N1 shots. The ones we're missing are the MMR, Hib, and Hep A (which I am not all that worried about the last one).

I am planning on getting the MMR very soon because we're going on a trip up to Canada in the next few months, and the thought of Elise flying on an airplane, plus having to go through customs at the Vancouver airport with a bunch of international arrivals makes me nervous.

My dilemma is this; I have recently met a Mom who wants to get together on a play date. She has three kids, one who I know of for sure has never been vaccinated for anything. She is the one closest to Elise's age. She also has a 6 year old, who I assume comes into contact with a lot of other 6 year olds. Rounding out the list is a 6-month old, who I'm uncertain of if she's received any vaccinations.

It makes me nervous to expose Elise to any child who has not been vaccinated due to her having a comprimised immune system, and my gut is telling me to be careful. Am I being totally over-the-top cautious? Or do you think I should wait to have this play date until all Elise's vaccines are caught up? I should also talk to Elise's pedi (and will call her on Monday), but I'd love to hear what you would do.

Things I learned about Diabetes this month... March edition

Holy smokes... it's April? Why didn't anybody tell me? Not only April, but April 9th. So let's talk about some D-learnin' then...

-I'm breaking up with pizza. I truly give up, I cannot make it work for Elise. This is odd for me because it is a rather recent thing. I always give her homemade pizza, using whole wheat pita flat bread as a crust. I even sprinkle the cheese sparingly, but it doesn't seem to make a difference. She will ALWAYS go low about an hour afterwards (which of course we have to give her carbs for), then shoot into the high 300s overnight. Up until about 3 months ago, we never had a problem. It's a shame... she really does love pizza.

-They need to make some more fun, small items to fit into those plastic Easter eggs. When I went shopping for Elise's Easter basket a few weeks ago, the only thing out there for the most part is candy. I did find some fun stickers, chapstick, cars, and some rings... but that was about it. She also got a whole bunch of eggs with coins in them since we just bought her a piggy bank and she has become obsessed with "putting her monies in the pig".

-Sorbet is a great alternative to ice cream for Elise. You don't have the high fat content to deal with, and since it's made with real fruit, in my mind it's healthier. If this is not true, please keep your comments to yourself, I wish to remain living in my fantasy world.

Obsess much?

These days, Elise's daytime numbers are pretty predictable. I can usually guess within about 30 points of where it's going to be at any given time. I guess that's because things have been pretty calm for the last month or two, and I've gotten pretty good at figuring out how many extra carbs to give her when she's active. The fact that we weigh everything and the foods she eats are pretty consistent doesn't hurt either.

But yesterday threw me for a total loop when her pre-nap number rang in at 397. What the CRAP? She's usually anywhere between 90 and 150. She had worked herself into a pretty good tantrum over wanting a pacifier (another "WTC" moment - she's NEVER taken a pacifier in her life, she just happened upon one that was left in our house by a friend), and I had figured she was just tired.

So I went down my checklist...

Ketones? Nope, 0.0 on the blood ketone meter.

Any other signs of illness? A quick swipe of the temporal thermometer showed no fever.

Any foods at lunch she doesn't normally eat? Uh-huh... homemade chicken soup, veggie chips, grapes and some drinkable yogurt.

Rebound from a low? Not very likely... she was 159 at lunch and I checked her about 90 minutes post-lunch. No signs of a low, and she usually gives some indication.

Not an insulin problem... she doesn't get a shot at lunch time, because her morning NPH covers her, and I know that insulin is still good.

So then what the what caused this huge spike? All I can think of is she got into some food (something she's never done), or perhaps I wasn't careful about the weighing (didn't tare the scale, etc.).

When she woke up from her nap 90 minutes later, she was 413 with 0.3 ketones, but in a much better mood.

I don't normally get so crazy over her numbers, but when one comes out of left field like this, it's always a brutal reminder that this disease is anything but predictable. Today, all her numbers have gotten back to "normal", coming in at 113 right before her nap.

That's more like it (but I'm still obsessing over that number from yesterday).

The monster's name

Fred and I are part of a special needs support group at our church that meets once a month. And while we don't meet the traditional definition of having a special needs child, we have found great comfort and encouragement from the people in this group.

We have a lot of the same fears and frustrations. "I can't leave my child with just anybody", or "people just don't get it". We talk about the stress, the anger, and the sadness. But we also rejoice over triumphs too. We may not fit perfectly into this group, but they have made us feel welcome and have even told us they are blown away by what we do.

I feel the same way about them.

Last meeting there was a newcomer. And she didn't meet the traditional definition either. In fact, she didn't even know what was wrong with her child. All she knew was that since birth, her daughter (now 3 - I'll call her G) has been covered in an almost head-to-toe rash. G itches so bad that she bleeds. She cries from the pain and discomfort, and although her Mom has taken G to 18 different doctors, and has a tub full of creams and ointments; there has been no relief for and no diagnosis. Little G only sleeps a few hours a night because of the pain. And of course, the same goes for her Mom.

As this woman spoke, she sounded a lot like I probably did right after Elise was diagnosed. Shaky. On the edge. Angry. About to lose all control and had no idea how to stop it. My heart ached for this woman. She looked so completely beaten down by life. The monster in her life is winning.

We too have a monster in our life. It makes us angry. It makes us sad. And it makes us tired. It interrupts our sleep and disrupts our life. It eats away at our time and energy; even our money. It can make even the simplest illness an emergency. It messes with marriages, strains relationships, and causes friends to drift away. It's ugly and mean and no matter how hard I try, I cannot defeat it, only keep it at bay.

But you know what? I think of this woman and have never been so thankful to know our monster's name.