Uncomfortable

I am almost 28 weeks pregnant and I am starting to get uncomfortable. This kid is kicking, moving and grooving all the time now…not that I should be surprised, he is related to my husband. :) My skin is itchy because of the stretching skin and he is constantly elbowing me, head butting me or maybe just “butting” me. He is turning summersaults in there! It’s so crazy to be feeling all of it.

 

I am having trouble getting comfortable at all. Sitting at my desk at work, my belly is in the way as I try to get closer to my desk. When I’m lying down to sleep at night, I am incredibly uncomfortable. I hate lying on my sides. I am a back sleeper and I am still constantly waking up on my back. When I do lie on my sides, I wake up because my hip hurts and roll to my other side. My stomach is so much bigger now that it needs support of its own. I can’t seem to find the right support for it; each pillow either seems too soft or too big. Between being uncomfortable and waking up to my CGM vibrating (false alarms, bad sensor that I just can’t seem to pull out and give up on) and peeing, I doubt I sleep more than 1 hour at a time without waking. I don’t feel like I’m getting a good rest.

 On the blood sugar front, I was beginning to wonder if something was wrong because it seems like it’s been a while since I had to increase my basal rates and bolus ratios…until now. It started Saturday night and then Sunday was also a sucky day. I was constantly correcting high sugars, trying to be aggressive but also worrying about “rage bolusing” and going way too low. Well on Monday morning I finally gave in and increased my basal rates by .05 each and up-ed my bolus ratios by 1 each. It seems to be working and I am much more stable now.


It’s so hard to know when your pregnancy is actually causing your insulin needs to increase (as is the normal process for diabetics) or if it was something you ate, or a bad pump site, or a bad pump, or stress, or something you ate that you didn’t carb count correctly. Just too many factors to make changes too quickly. I’m glad to get those sugars down because seeing constantly high numbers can really take a toll on an emotional pregnant woman. It is so easy to get discouraged when you just can’t seem to figure it out quick enough.

 Oh, and since I haven’t been posting very frequently, I did make “A”s in both my classes! YAY! I also had my appointment with the pediatric cardiologist (a standard appointment for women with diabetes since the main birth defect for diabetics is a heart defect) and everything was PERFECT! While we were peaking at him, I asked to see his little boy parts again and the cardiologist complied. He is definitely still a boy! :) I have my next OB appointment on Friday!

Traveling Bolus

Over the Thanksgiving holiday we traveled from Louisville, KY to Gulf Breeze, FL. It’s about a 9 ½ hour trip. It actually took us only a little over 8 hours since we couldn’t leave until I got off work on Wednesday at 7pm. We traveled through the night and arrived about 4:15am! I was so tired when we got there because I couldn’t get comfortable enough (with my big belly in the way) to sleep.


Traveling and eating with diabetes is a pain in the butt. If you pack snacks that you know the carb count for (which I do) then you can time your bolus and have no problems, but bolusing for meals along the way is difficult, especially when all I want is Whataburger (a burger chain that only starts to appear once we get to Alabama). I love Whataburger. It is one of my favorite things and my heart has only grown fonder of it since we don’t have them in Kentucky.

It’s hard enough to figure out a bolus for fast food because all the extra fat can spike your blood sugar hours later. It’s so crazy to think you have it all figured out with a flat, constant sugar showing on your CGM, only to look down 4 hours later and see an upward arrow. So frustrating! Add to this the unknowns of traveling…When will I be hungry? When will we need gas? Do I need to pee, AGAIN!?

I worry when we plan to stop for food because I need to take my insulin 30 minutes before divulging into the bad, yummy food. What if I take my insulin and we have a flat tire before we get food? What if we were to get into an accident? How horrible would that be to take insulin for an 80 carb meal and break down on the side of the road with no food!? Nightmare! I sometimes wait until we have the food in the car and then take my insulin but then I have to wait and my food gets cold and cold fast food is just gross.

I guess the correct answer to all this is to pack the perfect diabetes food with us and not stop for the bad stuff, but get real. I need some self-indulgence every once in a while and I’m not going to let stupid diabetes keep me from enjoying a good Whataburger and fries.

Tis the season for cards...

Christmas cards are one of my favorite parts of the Christmas season. Photocards have always been my favorite kind of Christmas card to send and receive. I love seeing everyone in the pictures, especially the little ones as they get bigger, and the cards themselves just seem to be so much prettier than store-bought cards. There are so many relatives and friends who live far away and who we never get to see and photocards are a great way to make the standard Christmas card seem more special and fun. I have been wanting to do one this year, but with the new baby coming, I was thinking we really need to save money where we can, so I thought about not doing them at all.

Then I got a very pleasant surprise!!! I read in another blog about a promotion that Shutterfly is running. If you blog about your Shutterfly Christmas cards, then you get 50 Christmas cards for free! YAY!!! I am so excited about this! I’ve used Shutterfly in the past, and it has always been super easy to use and the products are always beautiful and professional.

Designing stuff on Shutterfly is so easy to do. You don’t have to be creative or good at graphic design because they handle everything for you. They make it look like you are creative and all “artsy fartsy” but really you are just following the simple steps to design the card. I’ve created Shutterfly calendars and holiday cards in the past, and they always come out looking great.

And the best part is it's super cheap and they always have a bunch of deals going! For instance, right now you get free shipping for spending over $30 (which is easily 2-3 Christmas present worth of stuff) and 20-30% off of almost all of their products. You can find 200 personalized, printed Christmas cards with photos for less than $1 per card and another 600 designer cards that are around $1.50 per card!! Meanwhile you can also spend $3-4 per card (or more) in Hallmark for the mass-produced Christmas cards. That is just ridiculous!

These are my favorites: 

Can’t wait to get started on my cards, I’m running a little behind, but hopefully I will get them out soon! J

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.