Hey y'all!
A lot has happened since I last posted. I turned 17 (wow!) and spent a weekend at potentially the greatest leadership seminar ever to exist--more about that later. I also got the results from my ultrasound: 1 cm of growth, which means there's no need for a biopsy!!! I'm so relieved, and so grateful to all of y'all who sent supportive messages after my last post.
Most of this blog is dedicated to talking about the "big things" that T1D can do to a person's life. The ways in which it can shape you, change you, and yeah, hurt you. But lately I've also been reflecting on the little things--the ones that outsiders would never notice, and the ones that even PWD sometimes overlook. See, when you live with a condition like this for as long as I have, it's easy to fall into a sort of pattern. You expect certain things to happen, and when they do, you just ignore them because it's easier than getting upset. But sometimes something happens to break that routine.
When I first arrived at the Illinois Leadership Seminar, I was a little anxious--and not just because I was in a group of complete strangers. PWD know that when we're in a new situation, there's a lot to consider. Meals without carb counts, random bursts of exercise, and oh yeah, the whole "no cell phones" thing. Not to mention the fact that I was wearing Dex on my leg, where everyone could see it. Nice.
I made it through the first day without really discussing my T1D with anyone (except my group leader, who gave me permission to use my phone without any sort of pushback--a miracle in itself). But that night, we had a dance, and y'all know what that means: low bg. By the time I stepped into the hallway to catch my breath, Dex was saying 58 and dropping fast. Normally that wouldn't be a big deal, but my purse--and my emergency fruit snacks--were on the other side of the noisy, crowded room where the dance was being held.
Somehow, a girl in my group noticed that I was starting to panic, and asked what was going on. I don't remember what I said (probably something along the lines of "blood sugar--low--food"), but next thing I knew she was grabbing my hand and pulling me through the crowd. And then, get this--when we got to the corner and I grabbed a bag of fruit snacks, she stayed with me. Didn't walk away, didn't turn to chat with someone else. She stayed with me until I was done eating, and then asked if I was feeling ok.
T1D is exhausting on even the best of days, and a lot of that comes from the tiny details that see insignificant until they build up and overwhelm you. But every now and then, someone does something that lifts a little bit of that burden off your shoulders. They might not even realize they're doing it. But to a PWD, those little gestures make a world of difference.
It's the friends who wordlessly offer you some of their food when they hear Dex beeping an urgent low. It's those rare times when you pull out an insulin syringe and realize that for once, no one is staring at you. It's the people who ask questions before making assumptions, the ones who care more about helping you than judging you. It's meeting a fellow PWD in the wild and sharing that brief connection that runs deeper than anything else you've ever known. It's the way my friends check on me after an endo appointment, the way my tennis teammates ask "what are you at?" before a match, the way random classmates will stand up to defend me when a teacher tries to give me a detention for checking Dex in school.
To everyone who's reading this, everyone who's made my fight against T1D easier in their own little ways--thanks. Y'all mean more to me than you know.
Next time I post, I'll be getting ready to leave for Congress! In the meantime, don't forget to comment, subscribe, and stay fabulous. Love y'all!
Wednesday, June 26, 2019
Monday, June 10, 2019
Waiting Game
Hey y'all! How's everyone doing? Hope you're all having a great week.
Today's post isn't super positive, sorry about that. Y'all know I usually try to keep things happy but like... I also want to be honest about life with T1D, and that means I'm not gonna keep this stuff from you.
But before we get started I wanna say happy Diabetes Awareness Week!!! If you know a PWD, give them a hug this week!
Ok, here goes.
One thing that plenty of people know about T1D is that it comes with a whole host of complications. Like, so hecking many. Heart disease, blindness, loss of circulation, nerve pain, and generally shortened lifespan are the most common ones. But that's not all, folks! It also increases our risk of getting other autoimmune conditions. (yay.)
One fairly common condition that often goes hand-in-hand with T1D is thyroiditis. Basically, there's this gland in your throat called the thyroid, and in people like me, it doesn't work. That causes lack of appetite, lack of energy... lack of lots of important things. I take medication to help with that, so it's really not a big deal.
But here's the killer: it also suuuuper increases my risk for thyroid cancer. Like, I don't know the exact statistics because my doctor wouldn't tell me (if that's any indication), but I know my chances are pretty high. In fact, I already have a tumor--they call it a "nodule" because it sounds more friendly--on the left side of my thyroid.
Two years ago, I had a biopsy done on the nodule, which wasprobably definitely the most painful procedure I've ever had. Thankfully, it was benign (which means Not Cancerous). But it still has the potential to become cancerous, which is pretty hecking scary.
So every year, I get an ultrasound to see whether the nodule has grown. Last Friday, I went back to the hospital for my annual appointment with the grumpy folks in Ultrasound Room 1 (lemme tell you, there is nothing more awkward than being a teenage girl in an ultrasound clinic). Here's how it works: if the nodule has gotten smaller or stayed the same size, it means I'm probably safe, so we'll wait another year and see what happens. If it's grown--which, so far, has happened every year--we'll rebiopsy and see what's going on.
Like I said, I had my ultrasound done on Friday. Today is Monday. And still no results.
I'm... kinda going crazy with waiting. You would think, by now, I would be used to waiting for results from the doctor's office. But last year, I got the results the day of the ultrasound, so this wait is making me pretty anxious.
That's all I've got for today, folks. Hopefully by tomorrow I'll be able to update y'all with the results--good or bad, anything's better than waiting.
Today's post isn't super positive, sorry about that. Y'all know I usually try to keep things happy but like... I also want to be honest about life with T1D, and that means I'm not gonna keep this stuff from you.
But before we get started I wanna say happy Diabetes Awareness Week!!! If you know a PWD, give them a hug this week!
Ok, here goes.
One thing that plenty of people know about T1D is that it comes with a whole host of complications. Like, so hecking many. Heart disease, blindness, loss of circulation, nerve pain, and generally shortened lifespan are the most common ones. But that's not all, folks! It also increases our risk of getting other autoimmune conditions. (yay.)
One fairly common condition that often goes hand-in-hand with T1D is thyroiditis. Basically, there's this gland in your throat called the thyroid, and in people like me, it doesn't work. That causes lack of appetite, lack of energy... lack of lots of important things. I take medication to help with that, so it's really not a big deal.
But here's the killer: it also suuuuper increases my risk for thyroid cancer. Like, I don't know the exact statistics because my doctor wouldn't tell me (if that's any indication), but I know my chances are pretty high. In fact, I already have a tumor--they call it a "nodule" because it sounds more friendly--on the left side of my thyroid.
Two years ago, I had a biopsy done on the nodule, which was
So every year, I get an ultrasound to see whether the nodule has grown. Last Friday, I went back to the hospital for my annual appointment with the grumpy folks in Ultrasound Room 1 (lemme tell you, there is nothing more awkward than being a teenage girl in an ultrasound clinic). Here's how it works: if the nodule has gotten smaller or stayed the same size, it means I'm probably safe, so we'll wait another year and see what happens. If it's grown--which, so far, has happened every year--we'll rebiopsy and see what's going on.
Like I said, I had my ultrasound done on Friday. Today is Monday. And still no results.
I'm... kinda going crazy with waiting. You would think, by now, I would be used to waiting for results from the doctor's office. But last year, I got the results the day of the ultrasound, so this wait is making me pretty anxious.
That's all I've got for today, folks. Hopefully by tomorrow I'll be able to update y'all with the results--good or bad, anything's better than waiting.
Sunday, June 2, 2019
Wisdom Teeth
Hey y'all!
This post is probably gonna turn into a bit of a rant. Sorry not sorry, it's been a rough couple of days and I'm in a fair bit of pain so I'm not gonna censor my thoughts as much as I usually do. I'll try to keep it friendly because I love y'all, but just a warning that I'm not really gonna sugarcoat this stuff. Here goes.
As some of you may know (because, let's face it, I always complain about this stuff beforehand), I got my wisdom teeth out on Friday. Not a fun experience for anyone, obviously, and extra not-fun for someone who hates going to the dentist for any reason whatsoever. (Sidenote--Don't ask me why I get freaked out about stuff like that--you would think, considering I'm not exactly inexperienced with needles, that I would have no problem going to the dentist. But there ya go.)
So, yeah, wisdom teeth. Like I said--not fun. El (my twin brother) and I got ours out on the same day, which came with its own mess of emotions and nerves. But it also threw into sharp relief just how different our situations are.
Ya see, for El, the procedure--while quite scary--was pretty routine. Sit in a chair, get an IV that knocks you out for an hour or so, wake up, go home and sit on the couch for a few days with a bowl of ice cream. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not that naive--I knew my T1D would make the procedure trickier. I was labeled "high-risk" from the moment I walked into the examining room. But I didn't realize just how messy things were gonna be.
The first big hurdle was the anaesthetic. I had never had general anaesthetic before, and the surgeon had no way of predicting how my body would react to it. It was pretty scary to be told, flat-out, that if he knocked me out completely, he might not be able to wake me up again afterward. Rather than taking that risk, he decided not to put me all the way under, opting instead to pump me full of painkillers as well as a smaller dose of anaesthetic and hope that I wouldn't remember much of the procedure afterward. Sigh.
Sounds pretty scary, right? Yeah, that wasn't the hardest part--not by a long shot. When the surgeon was giving us all the information we needed for the week leading up to the surgery, he mentioned--somewhat casually--that we were absolutely not allowed to eat or drink for 10 hours before the procedure.
Yeah. Not good. My endo had told me that I should go into the surgery with my blood sugar at roughly 180, so that even if it dropped, I wouldn't be in danger. But staying at 180 after 10 hours of no food... pretty much impossible. I tend to drop like crazy overnight even on a normal day--usually I wake up below 80. Not exactly an option here.
There's nothing scarier than looking at the clock and realizing you've reached a point where you're not allowed to treat a low. Seriously. That.... that just really sucked. I worked super hard to figure out how much to cut my dinner insulin, my long-acting dose, etc, but the nerves and adrenaline meant that I had to eat 2 packs of fruit snacks just before the 10-hour mark. My blood sugar shot up to 350, but by the next morning, it was down to 130 and I just had to go into the surgeon's office and pray that it wouldn't drop any more.
Fortunately (fortunately?), we were able to go ahead with the procedure. The surgeon conveniently forgot to mention that the IV with the anaesthetic also contained 5% glucose, so by the time they moved me to the recovery room, I was up to 350 again, and rising fast. Since then, it's been a battle to get below 200, since my body is essentially in a "crisis response" and my liver is pumping out a whole lot of glucose because it seems to think that'll help the situation. And did I mention high blood sugar makes the risk of infection go wayyyy up? Ugh.
I'm grateful that the surgery is done, and I'm grateful that the pain meds are helping at least a little bit. But it was a bit of an eye-opener for me to see just how much T1D can complicate things. Obviously I knew that my condition makes my life a bit trickier, but it's normal for me because for much of my life, I haven't known anything else. So it was interesting to see just how much stress it can add, and how my family and I were sorta on our own to figure it all out. There's probably a valuable lesson in here somewhere, but I'm not sure what it is, so for now I'm just gonna say: to all my T1D warriors out there, y'all are awesome. It's not easy to do what we do every day.
This post is probably gonna turn into a bit of a rant. Sorry not sorry, it's been a rough couple of days and I'm in a fair bit of pain so I'm not gonna censor my thoughts as much as I usually do. I'll try to keep it friendly because I love y'all, but just a warning that I'm not really gonna sugarcoat this stuff. Here goes.
As some of you may know (because, let's face it, I always complain about this stuff beforehand), I got my wisdom teeth out on Friday. Not a fun experience for anyone, obviously, and extra not-fun for someone who hates going to the dentist for any reason whatsoever. (Sidenote--Don't ask me why I get freaked out about stuff like that--you would think, considering I'm not exactly inexperienced with needles, that I would have no problem going to the dentist. But there ya go.)
So, yeah, wisdom teeth. Like I said--not fun. El (my twin brother) and I got ours out on the same day, which came with its own mess of emotions and nerves. But it also threw into sharp relief just how different our situations are.
Ya see, for El, the procedure--while quite scary--was pretty routine. Sit in a chair, get an IV that knocks you out for an hour or so, wake up, go home and sit on the couch for a few days with a bowl of ice cream. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not that naive--I knew my T1D would make the procedure trickier. I was labeled "high-risk" from the moment I walked into the examining room. But I didn't realize just how messy things were gonna be.
The first big hurdle was the anaesthetic. I had never had general anaesthetic before, and the surgeon had no way of predicting how my body would react to it. It was pretty scary to be told, flat-out, that if he knocked me out completely, he might not be able to wake me up again afterward. Rather than taking that risk, he decided not to put me all the way under, opting instead to pump me full of painkillers as well as a smaller dose of anaesthetic and hope that I wouldn't remember much of the procedure afterward. Sigh.
Sounds pretty scary, right? Yeah, that wasn't the hardest part--not by a long shot. When the surgeon was giving us all the information we needed for the week leading up to the surgery, he mentioned--somewhat casually--that we were absolutely not allowed to eat or drink for 10 hours before the procedure.
Yeah. Not good. My endo had told me that I should go into the surgery with my blood sugar at roughly 180, so that even if it dropped, I wouldn't be in danger. But staying at 180 after 10 hours of no food... pretty much impossible. I tend to drop like crazy overnight even on a normal day--usually I wake up below 80. Not exactly an option here.
There's nothing scarier than looking at the clock and realizing you've reached a point where you're not allowed to treat a low. Seriously. That.... that just really sucked. I worked super hard to figure out how much to cut my dinner insulin, my long-acting dose, etc, but the nerves and adrenaline meant that I had to eat 2 packs of fruit snacks just before the 10-hour mark. My blood sugar shot up to 350, but by the next morning, it was down to 130 and I just had to go into the surgeon's office and pray that it wouldn't drop any more.
Fortunately (fortunately?), we were able to go ahead with the procedure. The surgeon conveniently forgot to mention that the IV with the anaesthetic also contained 5% glucose, so by the time they moved me to the recovery room, I was up to 350 again, and rising fast. Since then, it's been a battle to get below 200, since my body is essentially in a "crisis response" and my liver is pumping out a whole lot of glucose because it seems to think that'll help the situation. And did I mention high blood sugar makes the risk of infection go wayyyy up? Ugh.
I'm grateful that the surgery is done, and I'm grateful that the pain meds are helping at least a little bit. But it was a bit of an eye-opener for me to see just how much T1D can complicate things. Obviously I knew that my condition makes my life a bit trickier, but it's normal for me because for much of my life, I haven't known anything else. So it was interesting to see just how much stress it can add, and how my family and I were sorta on our own to figure it all out. There's probably a valuable lesson in here somewhere, but I'm not sure what it is, so for now I'm just gonna say: to all my T1D warriors out there, y'all are awesome. It's not easy to do what we do every day.
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