Category: Blog

I am bored and need a project and I came onto this site on the internet: http://www.gofundme.com/Servicedog4jadzia

Now ordinarily I would work with a diabetic needing a diabetes alert dog, but most of that is covered. Here is a teenager – 17 years old – who has spent most of her life in the hospital. She graduated from high school at 16, through a program in her area for students who are hospitalized. We have a similar program in Dallas.

She is very isolated and has few resources as a result. Let’s face it, our average kid with diabetes goes to school, maybe church and has lots of contacts who can help them fund raise. She doesn’t.

When I first mentioned the project on Facebook a good friend raised some very good questions – she asked why the girl and her family wasn’t getting the dog free from the organization who raises the dogs. That is a really common misconception – that the service dog organization does all the funding. I know that most people have to lay out a substantial part of the funding themselves. Even if the dog and program is completely free, the recipient has to pay for food, dog supplies and vet bills themselves, and as all dog owners know, that can add up quickly.

In addition, most programs require some type of application fee, even Seeing Eye Dog.

The newer programs often have the recipient do some of the fund raising. The organization that Jadzia is considering requires the recipient to raise some of the money to streamline the process. That is very common these days. I know that the organization I used to fine tune Dulce’s training does that – by the way, I paid 100% of the costs associated with Dulce, though I was lucky, I had the skills in place to recognize that she wanted to do that and the skills to do most of the training.

So the $8000 that Jadzia is raising is to help the service dog organization with fund raising – and trust me it’s a drop in the bucket – the typical cost to raise and train a service dog is over $20,000. She is also using some of that money for the initial maintenance of the dog – remember, she’s 17, and is only a high school graduate.

Right now, Jadzia is completely dependent – the purpose of her service dog is to work both as a heart monitor, but also to help her learn how to cope with society. Remember, this is a teenager who hasn’t been to school and hasn’t been able to get out and interact with society. All things her service dog will be trained to help her with.

While the website has some suggestions for donation – it will take any amount – even contributing $25.00 will help, especially if a lot of people chip in. And please, RT this on Twitter and Share it on Facebook. Who knows who it will reach.

Today's alert is exactly why I use her. She was ahead of the Enlight pump and the drop was caught early enough so I just had to delay cardio long enough to process some of the juice.

It would have worked faster if the lap band didn't slow every thing down, sipping not gulping the juice.

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We did things in a different order than usual, had an errand to run.

She got and wanted to leave 9 minutes into cardio after doing a leg workout. Thankfully we are at planet fitness and could take advantage of the black card. We are sharing an orange juice and staying near the front desk.

Hoping that the temp basal rate would do the job but it didn’t.

My first visit was purely intake.  They gave me some tests and discussed the sleep issues.  No treatment at all.

Yesterday was my first visit with the person treating me.  She specializes in both sleep and pain, and acknowledged that the issues are related – FYI: The sleep center is part of the pain center.

She sent me home with a relaxation CD and with a sleep log.  A bit difficult as I have to keep up with paper and pen, and am looking for an electronic way to do the same thing.  Currently it’s downstairs on the dining room table.

She is having me go out of summer mode and suggesting that is a bad idea.  She’s right – it’s always an adjustment to go back to school and isn’t good for me.  It might be okay if I adjusted further in advance, but for now, I’m going back to my school hours.

Today is a little hard because I have endo. labs and can do them until 8:00.  I’m going to come up with a different set of activities for early morning, but right now, I’m blogging and working on household finances. 

We discussed why I have sleep issues – I told her I have always had trouble with that, and we worked out a go to bed routine that I followed last night.

All in all a good visit.

I retweeted the allergy article because one of the issues I’ve come up with as a service dog issue is allergies.  I’ve never heard of a allergic reaction to dogs every make anyone die or become seriously ill. Allergies to dogs is due to an allergy to the dander.  While Dulce is a shedding dog, and sheds quite a bit, I do keep her brushed out and clean.  I would get that a someone coming into my work area would have some issues if they were close to her, touched her, or touched her bedding.  I also would get that someone would have issues in my car or house.

I had someone at a store ask me to stay in one area because someone who worked there was allergic – fine, I just left and went to another branch a mile away.

Problem solved.

However, that’s not always an option.

The good news is that the majority of public places know how to deal with service dogs and it isn’t an issue.

First – I survived wearing my first Enlight sensor for 6 days.  I had some red and irritated skin around the sensor site.  On the whole it was pretty good going except for some low sensor readings that neither the dog or the blood sugar meter agreed with.

To do the second sensor I followed along in the book – not a bad idea.

Had no trouble – though I can’t find my overlay tape and had to open the second box for it.  Good thing they give us extra and finding that is on my last of must does.

Loving it so far.

First, Medtronics is finally selling a rubberized skin for their pumps. I picked up a black one since I am used to black, not purple. The purple still shows.

Second, I have called and asked for a screen protector. I have now badly scarred two pumps. Animas came out with one shortly after I scoured that screen with sand at a dog trial. That was so bad I couldn't read the screen and they had to send me a new pump.

I found the screen protector on Ebay, shipped from Texas. It scared me because you had to spray the pump and protector with soapy water but it is working well.

I tried cutting down a couple of iPhone dry protectors but they came right off.

Wish Medtronics would sell one.

Sent from my Windows Phone

Apparently I passed their tests – I’ve been admitted to the insomnia program and the first appointment in on Tuesday.

Best news – I have met my deductible so there is no out of pocket costs.

I had four options.

Go to training on a Tuesday evening (three different dates, two different locations), or the 4^th option – training virtually.

Guess which I took?

It was great. I had set up the pump in advance and was pumping with it. Morning of, went through the sensor training. When it came time to do the training, I had everything out and ready to go. She had me watch the movie again (and I think I’ll watch it during the next few sensor swaps), and walked me through the sensor insertion.

I love. You don’t see the needle at all.

I was always suspicious of the SofSensor Insertion and wondered if that caused some of the issues.