WWednesday: The broken ones

What do you do with the broken ones? I generally transfer my glucose tabs to the smaller tube, but it’s hardly worth the dusty mess.

Disrespecting glucagon

Though I took the photo, I didn’t bother reading the expiration dates.

My name is Scott, and it’s been 25 years since my last glucagon shot (spoken in true AA fashion).

I have about six of these things sitting on a shelf somewhere in my bedroom. I’ll bet that at least half of them are expired. I really don’t know. They never leave that spot — even when I go on extended vacation. Every so often, my wife asks me to remind her how to use it, but we never get around to doing so.

Some people, I feel, are more liberal with glucagon use than others. If they test and see a BG below, say, 50, they take a shot. For me, I see it as a method-of-last-resort — i.e. if I’m unconscious. If I can get food or liquid in my mouth, that’s what I’ll use. As I’ve been taught (or, at least I misunderstood the training), I should never have to give myself glucagon — because if I’m capable of doing so, I don’t need it.

(Flashback to the time when I was living alone, wandered to the kitchen in the middle of the night to get some juice from the fridge, and woke up later with an open bottle of apple juice on the floor, a nice bite on my tongue, and a possible concussion from hitting my head on the counter while falling to the ground).

#DBlogWeek ’13 – Day 3 – How I met your mother

(Or, more accurately: How my mother met your mother)

It’s Diabetes Blog Week again! For the next five days, Karen , author of Bitter-Sweet diabetes, will tell me what to write about. (She did this last year, too). Today, she wants me to write about a memorable diabetes day. I don’t know if this one is my MOST memorable, especially since the most significant diabetes-events tend to be the ones where I’m in no capacity to remember things, but here goes…

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This happened over ten years ago. Add old-age to hospital-grade hypoglycemia, and memories get hazy, but I’ll do my best.

Back then, I was living alone in a second floor apartment in the suburbs of Philadelphia, PA. I was dating a girl who lived on the outskirts of Queens, NY. Because of the distance between us, we only saw each other on weekends – and the “dates” usually included an overnight stay.

Don’t judge.

The rocky reality of hypoglycemia

This vlog (video-log) could have just as easily been titled “A Consequence of Hypoglycemia”, but alas, that name was already taken. So I’ll just go with the “Rocky Reality…” name.
(subtitle: “Gonna Cry Now”)

Running time 3 minutes

Another nighttime low? or no?

I’m stumped.

Last night, shortly after 1:00 am, I woke up to the sound of my baby son crying hysterically. (A “Low Predicted” CGM alert at 12:30 and a “Low” alert at 12:45 did not. Have I mentioned my expertise in silencing alerts in my sleep before?)

Lifting him out of his crib and laying him on the changing table were no challenge for me. Removing a wet diaper was no challenge for me.

Then the  feeling set in. I started sweating. Shaking. Becoming disoriented. Nausea was starting to set in. This wasn’t the “Regular-Low”, this was the “Oh-Crap-Really-Bad-Low” feeling.  A quick glance at my pump/CGM and I see a sensor glucose of 65 mg/dl. Oh shit, I thought. If the sensor’s reporting 65, I’m probably more like 35. I know how this thing behaves!