While I was away...

So we left for Dothan, AL last Wednesday night after I got off work. We drove to my aunt’s house in Hendersonville, TN, just north of Nashville. We stayed there for the night then got up early the next morning to make our way to Dothan. We got to Dothan about midday on Thursday. Thursday was the family viewing of my Papa. It was so hard. Everyone was crying, no make that bawling. It was really hard. Not to mention, I am almost 6 months pregnant with crazy hormones and there’s also this stupid disease that’s constantly craving attention, the big “D”. I had a pretty bad low on the way to the viewing which surprised me because I thought with all the stress, I’d be running higher. I got down to the 40s and was constantly eating the candy stuffed in purse to try to recover. We got back to the house and oh my goodness the food. People were bringing food in like crazy. And this is really good southern food too, no salads or low carb options here. The many choices included items like macaroni and cheese (heavy on the cheese), casseroles of potatoes and squash, chicken and dumplings, congealed salads with fruit, and various breads. The huge dinning room table had nothing on it but desserts including chocolate cakes, pound cake, cookies, pies, banana pudding, you name it, we had it.



Carb counting was pretty much a nightmare. I definitely guesstimated. I mean how can you even possibly guess how many carbs are in something when you aren’t even sure what ingredients are in it. Overall, I did OK. I’m not saying I deserve a gold star or anything because I could have done better, but I’m cutting myself a break.


The funeral was on Friday. It began with a lunch at the church. The lunch included items like fried chicken tenders, potatoes, and green beans. And, hey there was even salad (of which I had none). :)  I did have a piece of something resembling a coconut chess pie…it was amazing. After the lunch, we had the public viewing, then the funeral service. During this time, I was so upset (not to mention the food I had) my blood sugar rocketed to the 200-250 range and was hard to get down. I swear, diabetes just doesn’t cooperate no matter how down you get, it just doesn’t care.


We stayed at my grandparents’ house while visiting from Thursday through Monday. We slept on a blow up mattress, which was pretty hard on my hip bones considering I can only sleep on my sides now. I thought I was really starting to have problems sleeping, but once we got back home in our bed, I was fine. Must have just been the blow up mattress.


So, we are home now and I am back at work. I have an A&P test on Tuesday and I have been doing nothing but studying since returning home. This test may just kick my butt. We’ll see. Hopefully not. If I do well, I could be exempt from the cumulative final, but we’ll see. I’m trying not to put too much pressure on myself.


It was nice to see all my family while in Alabama. My mother and my Mema (grandmother) even got to feel the baby kick. I do, however, miss my Papa. I’m so sad he’s no longer with us. I know I will always have wonderful memories of him. I love you Papa.

Papa

Tomorrow I will be 23 weeks pregnant, but there won't be an update. My grandfather passed away last night. I am leaving tonight to go to Dothan, Alabama for my grandfathers funeral. I will be gone through early next week. This is the first grandparent I've lost, and it is really, really hard. My Papa had Alzheimer's and was progressively getting worse, so it wasn't completely unexpected but nevertheless, it doesn't make it any easier. Please keep me and my family in your thoughts and prayers.

D-blog Day: Top 6

November is Diabetes Awareness month. Since I have diabetes, I am making you aware. :) Today is D-blog day, a day started on November 9th 2005 to help unite diabetes bloggers and create awareness about diabetes. This year the online diabetes community is blogging about the six things they wish people knew about Diabetes. So, here are my top six:



1. Living with Diabetes is really hard. No matter how easy I or other people may make it look with our pumps, continuous glucose monitors, and other technology, living with diabetes is hard. You can do all the “right” things and still have terrible consequences. I just can’t imagine being hungry and going to get something to eat. No, a diabetic’s life is more like this: I’m hungry, check my blood sugar, count carbs for what I plan to eat, take insulin for said carbs, wait for insulin to take effect, then eat, check blood sugar 1-2 hours later to see if all that carb and insulin measuring turned out right. No matter how well you eat and how much exercise you get, EVERYTHING affects your blood sugars….stress, illness, hormones….everything!


2. There isn’t a “look” associated with diabetes. I hate it when people say, “You don’t look like you have diabetes.” What is that supposed to mean? People with diabetes all look very different. How does someone with diabetes typically look? Am I supposed to be fat?


3. There isn’t an age associated with diabetes. Just because all you ever see on TV about diabetes includes old people in Medicare advertisements, doesn’t mean that includes all diabetics. Diabetics can be infants, teenagers, adults, and even the elderly.


4. There isn’t a “bad” kind of diabetes. There are different types of diabetes: Type I, Type II, and gestational. They all suck. Just because you take insulin, doesn’t mean you have it any worse than someone who doesn’t. It’s all about how you take care of yourself and if you don’t take care of yourself, they all have BAD consequences.


5. Just because you have diabetes, doesn’t mean you can’t have sugar. I hate it when people ask me, “Can you have that?” While sugar should probably be limited for better control, it doesn’t mean I can’t have a piece of chocolate. Lots of things have sugar (such as milk and apples) and no one would question me if I ate either one of those, right?!


6. There isn’t a cure for diabetes. I love the show The Biggest Loser but if they tell these people one more time if they lose enough weight they won’t have diabetes anymore, I’m going to throw up. Losing weight doesn’t cure diabetes. Maybe they won’t have to take medication anymore and be able to control it with diet and exercise, but diabetes doesn’t just disappear. There isn’t a cure. And there certainly isn’t a cure for Type I. It doesn’t matter how well I eat or how much I exercise, my diabetes isn’t going away. I didn’t do anything to deserve diabetes, nor did anyone else. We still need a cure. We deserve a cure.

22 weeks

I am 22 weeks today! It’s been a pretty uneventful week, especially compared to last week. ;) I am feeling the baby move a whole lot more but you can’t feel it nearly as much from the outside. But he’s definitely moving around in there. It’s such an amazing feeling! I’m trying to talk to the baby lately, but I just feel stupid talking to myself. It doesn’t seem as crazy when Cary does it since he’s actually talking to my belly, not his own. I’m trying to get used to it, but it’s weird. I read on babycenter.com today that around week 22, stretch marks may start to appear. Luckily, I don’t have any yet (I also don’t have that dark line in the middle of my belly yet), but I know they may still be on their way. I’ve learned in Anatomy that no matter how much lotion you use, it won’t stop them, you have so many layers of skin that it can’t penetrate that deep. It’s pretty much mostly genetics, if your mom had them, then you probably will to. And just so you know, my mom had them. The lotion does however help with the itching from the stretching.

I had my second Anatomy and Physiology lecture and lab tests a couple of weeks ago. I did really well. I got a 92 on my lecture test and I got the highest grade in the class on my lab test: 104! I was shocked. Overall with all the extra credit she offers, I have a 100 in the class! Very, very happy about that. Hopefully, I won’t have to take the cumulative final. If you are in the top 10% of the class, you don’t have to take it. I still have one more lecture test and lab test to take, so we will see. Our professor let us know today that this is by far the hardest test. It covers the spinal cord, brain, nervous systems, etc. Hopefully it won’t be too bad. We dissected a sheep’s brain today in class. It was awesome (but I love gross stuff like that J).

I had someone ask me today if I had everything done for the baby’s nursery. I was like, um no. I haven’t gotten a thing for the nursery. I am trying to find a crib and bedding right now. I have been looking online and when we went and registered at BabysRUs, I looked at some there. It seems like there are so many more choices for girl stuff. Speaking of registering, that was so overwhelming! We spent a few hours in there and then basically just gave up, we had had enough. I know babies need a lot of stuff, but I never knew it was that much stuff!  I can’t wait until my classes are over, then I can focus more on the baby stuff. I just feel like when I am looking at baby stuff online, I should be studying instead. I guess maybe I just have a guilt complex.

As for my diabetes, I haven’t had too much trouble. I increased my basal rates by .5 a couple of weeks ago when my numbers started to climb, and they’ve been pretty stable since then. I also had to increase my carb to insulin ratio for breakfast, but I don’t know that’s it’s helped that much. It seems like I can’t eat anything in the morning without a spike. And when I say spike, I mean spike. I even wait a full 30 minutes between taking my insulin and eating and I still spike, only to come crashing down around lunch time. I’ve tried tweaking my morning basals and bolus’ but nothing seems to get the right combination. Another thing that seems to be spiking me anytime of day is any kind of dairy product. It’s weird, because I’ve heard other people say they have this problem but I never had before. For example, I had half a cup of cottage cheese the other morning with strawberries all carefully measured for a total of 17 carbs. The cottage cheese only has 5 carbs! It’s weird. Anytime I have milk the same thing happens, although it’s not nearly as bad in the afternoon or night.

OK, I’m done rambling….here is my 22 week picture.