Category: Blog

The last few weeks have been hectic:

• I’m doing much better with the lapband.  I am not losing weight right now, but I am also not throwing everything up.
• Clothing is smaller.
• Furniture got installed at school.
• Parent is suing school and me in particular.  I have to meet with someone on March 30th over that.

Today, I’m hanging out on the internet waiting my turn for dog agility.  Got here about 4 hours earlier, but that’s okay.  I’m in “my office” and will go check on progress in a few minutes.

It is spring break, and it feels like spring in Texas, so all is good.

I finally broke down and got a slight unfill on Monday.

It's been a gradual process and as a result, have been miserable, but my lapband has gotten tighter.  I'm guessing from stress.

We have some things going on that I can't share, but my world isn't very stable.  Plus discovered we owe $2800 to the IRS, and I am still not sure how that happened.

So I am a little tightly wound. 

Friday was almost the last straw, just as soon as I started eating lunch, it came back up, it was something I'd eaten several times before and just couldn't believe it came up. 

I called TLC Edge where I got my fill, and the fill tech was out, but suggested if it was really bad to see my surgeon.  I talked with him, talked with his fill tech but decided to tough it out over the weekend, by the end of the day.

The good news, is that I haven't tossed my cookies in days, since the unfill.  The bad news is that I'm on a mostly liquid diet — I try, but, and I was ravenous last night.  Tonight should be better as Macy and I have agility for at least an hour.

Ever press the buttons on your pump and nothing happen?  Well that was happening for me.  I'd have to press three or four times before it woke up and I finally broke down and complained about that last Tuesday.

Animas said they were sending a new pump right now, and then I started stressing out how to get it.  If I have them ship to school, I've had to hang around and wait as long as 5:00 pm and since we don't have a school secretary right now, I probably wouldn't get notify.  If it gets sent to the house, they deliver real early and then I have to pick it up at the UPS depot, usually not a problem, but had agility class that night.

So the Animas person suggested it would be a good time to take a day off and relax.  She was right.

I made sub arrangements and stayed home.  And just messed around.  Came around 11:00 am, took about 2 hours to reprogram it and I made two "mistakes".  Forgot that the reminder has to be done independently and some how in the last few days my pump ended up at am instead of pm and vice versa.  All is good now.

I still need to work out new basal rates.  Some how my insulin sensitivity is high again.  More on that on a seperate post as I still haven't worked all that out.

Really glad I have a pump that wakes up when I push it buttons.

I've been blogging since February 28th, 2003.  There is no doubt that this is the oldest diabetes blog.  I started it because I wanted to get better at writing.  I had been following DB Medical Rants and he said he was blogging in order to improve his writing.

My goal is still the same, write Computer Science textbooks.  Not there yet, but primarily by time.

At first, I was anamouse but was found out by Radio Free America and outed by them by permission.  I have several blogs now, under the same domain, all managed by Typepad.  I'm even outreaching a bit as I would like the blogging sites to at least break even, rather than being money pits.

I've been ignoring most of what I need to keep up with to control my blood sugar properly.  Which means I haven't been testing, having been keeping up with my TDD, and haven't kept up my spreadsheet.  Probably because all those numbers have been sucking.

Well, according to the Rules of 1500 and 1800, I'm taking WAY too small of an insulin dose for every meal and my corrections are WAY too low.

Just fixed all that, put it in the pump, and am resolving to do better in the evenings. 

Might explain the sugar cravings too.

I now weigh over 40 pounds less than I did at my heaviest last year when I started on the lap band journey.

I realized I was obsessing over numbers so took a break from them.  Finally got on the scales this morning to a new low.

I finding out some weird stuff.  One is, when I obsess over the numbers they don't budge, and then I get even more stressed and the numbers go the wrong way.  Food I shouldn't have visits the house, etc.  So I'm learning to take some breaks from them.

Actually that isn't so weird, I've been warned about that from the TLC Edge people.

Also, people have been commenting that I've lost weight again, and I do think that your body has to go through a process:

• Lose some weight.but not look like it
• Rearrange it — so you don't loose weight, but you look like it

I'm also seeing that the same kind of thing happens with my insuilin usage — when I loose weight my usage goes down, but through that rearranging process, it goes back up.

Means I really have to monitor close — I had a period last week where I was hitting the 300s and got as high as 400 this week and part of it was that I was in denial I needed that much insulin.

I'd still really like to have another 5 pounds gone before our next agility trial next weekend but I doubt that's possible with the week ahead.  Very stressful.

Yesterday every time I checked, blood sugar was in the 300’s.  Not sure what is going on, but trying to pull it down.

Had meeting after school on Monday.  Actually figured out how to eat dinner in public and what to eat.  Meat loaded baked potato and turn it into mashed.

Had meeting from 9:00 – 11:00 at a location off campus.  I think that’s what caused the high blood sugar, that and the second mocha, should have turned my pump to workshop setting.

Then had an online workshop after school, which was good, and we’re supposed to have a copy of it to look at.

Faculty meeting this morning and then maybe life will get back to normal, though I have a meeting in the morning I called with students, we’ll see if anyone shows up.

Goal right now is to get blood sugar back to normal and then see if I can get any weight off at all before the next trials.

Yes, the last few days especially I haven't been taking care of myself as well as I should.  Haven't been testing, haven't been bolusing etc.

I do fix it at the end of the day, and try to fix it in the morning, but I've missed a few mornings.

However, it's the first of the month, and the first of the week, and I bet like all diabetics, I'm vowing to do better.  I've just restocked my bag, and getting ready for another week.

Maybe I can do better this week.

I'm also ready to lose some weight again.

I think I'm stuck again.  Looking at my 14 day spreadsheet, I'm staying within the same two pounds, insulin TDD is about the same, etc.

I'm trying to spread my calories out throughout the day better, one theory if that I put my body in starvation mode by not eating all day.

So I've been doing a protein bar in the morning, lunch, something small after school, workout and eat after the workout.

I've only been doing that this week.  And I'd like to switch the protein bar to something a bit more high fiber.  I am going to see about bringing in some microwave oatmeal and see how that works, I can always do that in a paper cup in the microwave.

I can't really add any more exercise, as the cold fronts are bothering my knees. 

I haven't had a lunch period in a while, and I finally do.

In fact, right now, the door is shut and I'm doing none school stuff.  And some school stuff.

Managed to eat about half of my Diet Gourmet lunch which isn't bad — ravioli, both the lunch isn't bad and that I could only eat half isn't bad.  I'm bolusing for just under half, which makes the math easier and gives me a bit of leeway in case I guessed wrong.

There are some DG lunches I can't eat, usually involving sandwiches, so I've decided to get breakfasts those days.