Do You Remember?
Monday, February 18, 2013 at 12:50PM It’s been a long time since I have seen a “HI” on my glucometer. Yesterday killed the streak, twice.
After church I just felt like going for a drive. None of the family had anything going on so I figured this was a good opportunity to have lunch somewhere different.
75 degree weather with blue skies worked as a tractor beam pulling us towards the beach. We ended up at a little Irish Pub and had some of the best fish and chips I have ever had. I even, for the very first time in my life, tried the whole vinegar thing and WOW I was missing out! So yummy!
After lunch we walked around the pier and checked out some of the shops. It was a lot of fun. Of course walking around seeing people snacking on Ice cream and churros made me want a treat too. We headed over to a little shop making funnel cakes and I ordered one. I know I shouldn’t have indulged but it was a special outing and I thought what the heck.
A few minutes after deciding I was done with the funnel cake I realized I felt really awful. Like sugar drunk awful. I pulled my insulin pump out of my pocket and realized I never bolused for lunch. Or the funnel cake!
WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH ME?!
I checked my bg and it said HI on the meter which as you probably know means my bg is over 600!
I bolused enough insulin to fill a shot glass and drank a gallon of water. After a short while I started to feel better.
Fast forward to that evening.
We were finished with dinner and getting ready to watch the season finale of Downton Abbey.
My daughter made Scones and served Tea to enjoy during the show. We are huge fans.
After enjoying my share of scones and a cup of Earl Grey I started to feel funky again. Pulled out the pump and sure enough, I forgot to bolus for dinner and the scones! AGAIN!
DANG IT!
"HI," said the meter to the ninja.
Ugh, I am not sure what is going on with this whole, forgetting to bolus thing but I need to figure out a way to remember. I know my pump has a reminder alarm but I get so immune to that stuff that I forget and just shut the darn thing off.
Does this ever happen to you? I know we have a lot to remember but bolusing is not something I ever used to forget.
Any ideas?
Reader Comments (3)
Does it ever happen to me? Yeah, there are times I do the math and wait until the meal is served before actually delivering the bolus (and I'm so glad that I can get a bolus history, something I couldn't do with pens!). But most of the time, I set it to deliver the bolus but forget that -- the previous time -- I had done a Square or Dual-Wave bolus, which means it defaults to those same choices, but I've already put the pump away while it's prompting me for a Now/Later ratio or an Extended-Bolus time, so it eventually times out and gives me nothing.
Not sure if it'll help or not as I use pens, but I found myself forgetting to take my meds while I worked. I had different schedules daily/weekly and I never took a lunch or break.... I'd have a yogurt or my kashi frozen meal while working (only time I could get stuff done while my team was at lunch). So I had to set reminders. And reminders for the reminders, etc. I setup reminders in my Outlook on my work computer, on my cell phone, and on my Google calendar (which I synced with my cell phone). I made them remind me every 5 min until I did it. Now, granted, I didn't have my phone on ringer, but I had it sitting out and it vibrated rather loudly. It helped a great deal in getting me to take them in a timely manner. I did the same with insulin.... at lunch, breaks, etc - I'd set reminders to take it.
I can't offer anything that will work--my 18 year old forgets to bolus sometimes too, and when he does it will happen two or three times and then he won't forget again for a month or so. We still haven't come up with a good reminder, since he doesn't want his pump vibrating at school and he certainly can't set alarms on his phone at school.
But I'm really writing this comment to thank you for writing about this. When my son was younger, I used to get frustrated that he forgot to bolus. My husband and I didn't want to be punitive about anything involving diabetes, and we weren't sure what we should do. But, when I learned from adults bloggers that they sometimes forget to bolus, it made me realize that my son's forgetting didn't mean he wasn't trying and that forgetting to bolus upset him too. The resulting highs in themselves were punishing. Blogs like yours help those of us parents without type 1 understand our kids who live with it.