It has been far too long since my last post. We have had so many changes over the past few months. Our oldest daughter Macy graduated from high school and is currently attending the NYS University of Albany... She is majoring in political science and is loving every minute of the college experience! Kalee,16, is now beginning her Junior year of high school. She is starting to show signs of, "school itus"... You know that chronic need to be finished with the drama of high school. Unfortunately, this usually does not hit until closer to Senior year so.... She has quite some time left to go. :(. As for , Michael, age 13 now... He is plugging away at his last year of Middle School. He reminds me every day that he would much rather stay home and play.. (play referring to his iPod and electronic gadgets) than attend school.... Academics do not seem to be the top of his priority list these days. Kalee and Michael had a pretty uneventful summer when it came to their blood sugars right up until our first full day of vacation in Florida... Typical right? We took our annual 22 hour drive to sunny Florida in August to visit with some family and spend a week in Disney with our adorable friend Mickey Mouse! Our first evening after a lovely dinner we headed back to our resort to get some sleep before heading to the Magic Kingdom the next morning. At about 9 p.m Kalee mentioned that her stomach was not feeling well. Her blood sugar read in the lower 60's so I gave her some crackers and juice.... Yikes! Big mistake... It took all of two minutes for the juice and crackers to come right back up thus beginning the viscous cycle of every half an hour vomiting throughout the night. Now a stomach virus to the non diabetics of the world is bad enough but having type 1 with this virus puts a whole new spin on it. We struggled to keep Kalee's blood sugars up because she could not keep anything down. Finally having to give her a micro dosage of glucagon to raise her glucose level to a safe number. Then, as many of you know.... Here come the ketones. As much as Kalee tried to drink water to flush those nasty ketones out of her system, it was close to impossible to keep the water down for more than five minutes. By 8 a.m the next morning my concern turned to worry. I contacted Kalee's physician here in NY who felt that if we could not get the vomiting to stop and fluids into her we would need to take her to Arnold Palmer Hospital in Orlando. My heart sank. Just what this poor girl wanted right... to spend her vacation visiting Arnold instead of Mickey :(. Not to mention the thought of bringing my daughter to an out of state hospital with doctors that we did not know terrified me. I began trying small drops of water on Kalee's tongue.... She finally started dozing off after a full night of vomiting and I would wake her each hour to give her sips of water through a straw. Thankfully by late afternoon.... Kalee's fever had broken, she was keeping fluids down and her ketones had decreased to a trace. By the next day we were in the parks doing what families are supposed to be doing in Walt Disney World.... Having a Magical Time! Our vacation which started out on not such a magical note turned into one of our very best Disney experiences! Type 1 sure does trip us up from time to time but we try our very best to not let it knock us down!
Friday, September 19, 2014
Monday, January 20, 2014
A New Year.... Bring it on 2014!
Happy 2014! Is it really a New year? Where did the time go? Well the holidays came
and went. I would love to say that they came and went without a hitch but... life is not as uneventful as we wish for here in the Waddingham household. Just before Thanksgiving our Kalee had a day of seriously unexplained low blood sugars. By midnight we turned Kalee's insulin pump right off after hours of doing just about anything that we could think of to get her blood sugar to rise above 60.... Unlimited glasses of orange juice... sugar tablets... peanut butter and crackers... These attempts were doing nothing more than contributing to the nausea that poor Kalee was feeling. I went into a "Diabetic Mom" panic... U moms know what I am referring to...the half smile, no worries, consoling words and silly jokes all for the sake of keeping your sweet diabetic (no pun intended) calm.. Holding back the flood of tears that are on the brink of overflowing. After a returned telephone call from the endocrinologist... it was determined that we would have to administer glucagon in hopes of breaking this hypoglycemic cycle. My hands trembling uncontrollably as I pulled the glass vial with powder substance and barbaric needle out of the dreaded red glucagon case. As I mixed the elements together, I said a silent prayer, hoping desperately that this would work. While sticking that ridiculously thick, extremely long, inhumane needle into Kalee's leg, my heart felt as if it would beat right out of my chest. I quickly pulled it out of her thigh and waited... We waited and waited in hopes that Kalees blood sugar would rise quickly. After about ten minutes Kalee's glucose meter read 90... She was rising but it was not exactly the number that I had hoped for.. I was looking for a 150 to 170 and eventually after about an hour she made it to 154. When the Dr.'s office opened I took Kalee right in to be evaluated. The endocrinologist had no explanation as to why this happened. They have seen unexplained lows before but it is quite rare not to be able to get the blood sugar to rise. The theory was delayed reaction to insulin and exercise... The only other explanation would be an adrenal condition and I am not ready to deal with one more diagnosis right now so.... we will go with the delayed reaction theory. After working closely with the endocrinologist for weeks we have made a number of adjustments which seem to be working for now. So we got through Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years with lots and lots of carb. counting and measuring serving sizes. Kalee turned "Sweet Sixteen"... a few days after her return to school from the holiday break. We are now, embarking on an entirely new experience of driving.....! She passed her drivers permit test the day of her birthday and is anxious to get out there behind the wheel. I am certain that there will be lots to blog about when Kalee is actually stepping on the gas, but for now we will take that issue nice and slowly.... So, Happy New Year to all of you wonderful families out there. If life with diabetes has been going smoothly for your family, then you are truly blessed, and I wish for all of you that things continue to work out that way. If life, however, is a bit more topsy turvey and up and down like what we are experiencing in our house, please know that you are not alone and I am walking through it with you. My wish for 2014 is a Healthy Year for all of us, with hopes and prayers for embarking on one year closer to a cure.. xoxoxo!
and went. I would love to say that they came and went without a hitch but... life is not as uneventful as we wish for here in the Waddingham household. Just before Thanksgiving our Kalee had a day of seriously unexplained low blood sugars. By midnight we turned Kalee's insulin pump right off after hours of doing just about anything that we could think of to get her blood sugar to rise above 60.... Unlimited glasses of orange juice... sugar tablets... peanut butter and crackers... These attempts were doing nothing more than contributing to the nausea that poor Kalee was feeling. I went into a "Diabetic Mom" panic... U moms know what I am referring to...the half smile, no worries, consoling words and silly jokes all for the sake of keeping your sweet diabetic (no pun intended) calm.. Holding back the flood of tears that are on the brink of overflowing. After a returned telephone call from the endocrinologist... it was determined that we would have to administer glucagon in hopes of breaking this hypoglycemic cycle. My hands trembling uncontrollably as I pulled the glass vial with powder substance and barbaric needle out of the dreaded red glucagon case. As I mixed the elements together, I said a silent prayer, hoping desperately that this would work. While sticking that ridiculously thick, extremely long, inhumane needle into Kalee's leg, my heart felt as if it would beat right out of my chest. I quickly pulled it out of her thigh and waited... We waited and waited in hopes that Kalees blood sugar would rise quickly. After about ten minutes Kalee's glucose meter read 90... She was rising but it was not exactly the number that I had hoped for.. I was looking for a 150 to 170 and eventually after about an hour she made it to 154. When the Dr.'s office opened I took Kalee right in to be evaluated. The endocrinologist had no explanation as to why this happened. They have seen unexplained lows before but it is quite rare not to be able to get the blood sugar to rise. The theory was delayed reaction to insulin and exercise... The only other explanation would be an adrenal condition and I am not ready to deal with one more diagnosis right now so.... we will go with the delayed reaction theory. After working closely with the endocrinologist for weeks we have made a number of adjustments which seem to be working for now. So we got through Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years with lots and lots of carb. counting and measuring serving sizes. Kalee turned "Sweet Sixteen"... a few days after her return to school from the holiday break. We are now, embarking on an entirely new experience of driving.....! She passed her drivers permit test the day of her birthday and is anxious to get out there behind the wheel. I am certain that there will be lots to blog about when Kalee is actually stepping on the gas, but for now we will take that issue nice and slowly.... So, Happy New Year to all of you wonderful families out there. If life with diabetes has been going smoothly for your family, then you are truly blessed, and I wish for all of you that things continue to work out that way. If life, however, is a bit more topsy turvey and up and down like what we are experiencing in our house, please know that you are not alone and I am walking through it with you. My wish for 2014 is a Healthy Year for all of us, with hopes and prayers for embarking on one year closer to a cure.. xoxoxo!
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