Spring’s Safety Feature

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I have blogged before about using the Spring Universal infusion set and how I didn’t really like it. And, truth be told, I still don’t favor it over the Inset line of infusion sets. However, one feature that this infusion set offers above all the rest is a sort of built-in “kinker” if you will, that, when the set is dislodged, the tape pulls a tab out and causes the spring to move a plastic piece out and also presses against the base of the cannula. Confused you yet? Here’s a video I did last night to show how it works:

Pretty neat, huh?

I still don’t “favor” this set, but I am thinking about ordering some. The tape (on it’s own) is very lacking in the stickiness department, but before I applied this one, I used a q-tip and applied Skin-Tac to the area and I had no problems with the tape staying down. Plus, it is sort of cool to be able to clip it in the direction needed and not worry about which way you’re inserting the set.

Preparing for Pregnancy : How Did You Do It?

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Photo credit: Theresa Kaye Photography

One question that I noticed was being asked a lot when I attended the DiabetesSister’s conference in Raleigh this month was “How did you do it? What did you do to control your diabetes and get prepared for pregnancy? How did you get your A1c below 7 for pregnancy?” While I’m not here to give medical advice in any way, shape, or form, I will go over just a few things that helped a lot.

First, I know that many women have been able to have very healthy, successful pregnancies years ago without the use of the technology that we have now, but for me, I’m very tech-oriented and use whatever diabetes devices I have to the best of my ability… especially when I was preparing for pregnancy and all during my pregnancy. Most pumps and CGM’s (Continuous Glucose Monitors) come with software that you can upload and get a good general feel for how the past few days, weeks, or even months have gone and you can either fax or email your doctor your results.

I knew that in order to have a safe “oven”, I needed to keep my A1c below 7% per my endocrinologist’s advice. Of course, some of you may already do this, but considering I was a diabetic who hovered in the 8-10 A1c range, this was a huge step for me.  The biggest thing I ever did to help make this happen was I not only uploaded and studied all of my pump charts and logbooks on a regular basis (okay, once every 2 weeks)… I also obtained a Dexcom CGM. Some of you use a Medtronic  CGM that’s built into your pump.. that’s okay too. If you don’t have a CGM, I would strongly suggest looking into getting one. I know it’s not a very easily obtained piece of d-equipment, but it did make all the difference in the world for me.

There is a setting in the CGM that will alert you if you go high or low. I started out from my high threshold of 200 mg/dl and every few weeks, I lowered it by 20… so two weeks later, I lowered it to 180, then 160 and so forth. Even though I knew it would bug the absolute mess out of me, I eventually kept the high at 140 mg/dl and my low around 70 or 80 I think. I wasn’t worried about the low too much because the Dexcom defaults to alert you at 55mg/dl no matter what anyway. But by setting my high threshold at 140, I would know each and every time I hit that level and I would know to either keep an eye on it or go ahead and do something about it. I didn’t use it to think “Oh gosh, I’m high”… but more of a heads up that, “hey, you might want to watch this”. Why did I choose 140? The old “egg” (Seven Plus) system would only let you choose the high increments at 20 mg/dl steps, so I couldn’t set a 130 as I would have liked and 120 was just ridiculous, so 140 it was.

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Photo Credit: Theresa Kaye Photography

Over the next few months, I kept a very close watch on every single thing. I knew how exercise, certain types of foods, even the difference between water and a Diet Coke affected me. I literally became obsessed. I was a master of “dual wave” boluses for certain types of foods and Super Boluses for large-carb meals. I watched my numbers so closely that I had my basal rates down to the 0.025u increments, something that I never had to do before. I only ever adjusted to the 0.5u. Shortly after doing all of this, I reached and maintained that “under 7%” goal, and we were given the “green light” for pregnancy.

If I could give any advice (not medical… just “d”sister-to-”d”sister), I would tell you to honestly learn your body. Each and every one of us is made differently and what works for me may not work for you. It’s a process that takes time and patience, but it a rewarding process. I will say that I owe a big part of my preparing for and having a healthy pregnancy was having a CGM and insulin pump that I could work with and fine-tune, so use whatever d-equipment you may have to your advantage. Also, letting go of seeing your numbers as “grades” and seeing them as guides to help make a huge difference.

t:restart

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I swear, I’m going to just update a banner that will show which pump I’m on as soon as you hit my blog page. As much as I switch back and forth, I’m sure it would be a helpful guide.  Granted, I know all pumps work differently, so what I’m trying to accomplish may not be worth it after all.

Today, since I noticed I needed to do a site change anyway, I pulled the t:slim out. I know it doesn’t have the one feature that I so need, but it does have the IOB right there on the screen and, most importantly to me right now, is that it has the IOB in the reports screen.

Photo credit: Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc

Photo credit: Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc

See, the past few weeks, I have been having unexplainable lows. And lots of them… especially at night. Being a visual person, It’s hard for me to sit down and think for each bolus how long they are in my system. The one thing that I love about Tandem’s software above all the rest is that it has the ability to show IOB if you want/need it to so that quickly you can see if your it’s your boluses driving you low or if you could be having more of a basal issue.

Photo credit: Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc

Photo credit: Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc

In the report, you see those blue shaded slopes? That’s the Insulin on Board from time of bolus until it’s worked out of your system. IN those areas where the blue slope starts higher than the bolus bar, those are when the boluses have been stacked, thereby increasing your IOB. Pretty smart, huh?

I really hope Tandem releases the “fix” for the reverse-correction soon. It would be nice to have even better visual reports without me lying about data (putting a 69mg/dl into my pump’s calculator verses the true reading if below 90 to get it to reverse-correct the “low”). I’m going to see after a week’s time how those little slopes are looking. I need to see if what’s happening is my fault or if there are truly adjustments that need to be made.

Dream Job

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Someone asked me today what would be my dream job.

Aside from being a stay-at-home-mom, I would love to help other people with diabetes. I don’t exactly have a certain dream way of doing this, but I would want to be involved in a company or office that has a passion and goal of doing whatever it takes to help people with diabetes live better, fuller, less-complicated-with-d-stuff lives. To share insight on how it is to live with this disease day in and day out and to help in some way just to make it better for them.

My dream since being a child was to be in the medical field because I thought that was the only way to truly help. Now that I’m older and have a little (well, very little) experience in the outreach world, I want to do more. And I realize that it doesn’t have to be from within a doctor’s office, but can be in any capacity honestly.

What is my dream job? Reaching and helping others with Diabetes. To help and encourage them in any manner possible. It’s just narrowing the scope to a specific thing that I’m having trouble with. I know some things that I’m good at, and other’s I’m not. I don’t want to be able to do everything, but I want to be able to do something (or a few things) and do it (them) very well.

Off-ish-ially Confused

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I have written about being back on my Ping pump.. and I do feel at “home” on it. Honestly, other than for envy’s sake, I don’t know why I switched. It wasn’t needed.

One thing though is that I knew the Verio meter read higher, but I forced myself to use it and just let my body become accustom to the “new” levels. Now that I’m back on the Ping, I want to use the system as a whole, and that means using the Ping meter remote. What bothers me now is the difference in readings. They aren’t really off, just off-ish.  I trust both meters, but I honestly don’t know which one to trust more. I’m confused. And I know you are not supposed to compare meters, but I can’t help it. And knowing that the Ping meter-remote is consistently lower… on average of 20mg/dl (which is like, a difference of 0.3 in A1c terms)… just irritates me to no end. I want them to read the same so that I’ll use the Ping meter and not wonder if I’m really higher than what it says.

I know I need to do what I’m comfortable with, but I ask you…. what would/did you do? I want to do the best for my health and with so much emphasis placed on A1c’s and BG averages (duh… it’s Diabetes!), I don’t want to use equipment that will cause a huge difference in A1c. Yeah.. I’m probably really over thinking this and need to quit.. but I can’t make my mind stop the questions.

Springing Along

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So, to make a very very long story short, I contacted a diabetes supply company back in January to see if I could obtain samples of different infusion sets and a couple of weeks ago, they came in. (Yep… if you did the math… that’s FIVE months. But they were given to me at no cost, so I won’t complain.)

I asked specifically about the Orbit set and the Spring Universal set. I’ve since tried the Orbit, and aside from not having an inserter, they are okay. Honestly, I don’t see why a set needs to rotate unless you have it in an area where you’re going to be moving the pump around  a lot, or say, on your arm. I personally found them difficult to disconnect as well, so I probably won’t go back to that set.

The next set was the Spring Universal. This little thing looks intriguing to say the least. The set is similar to the Animas Inset in that it’s an all-in-one site (but the tubing is not attached, which I honestly prefer) that you just place, press a button, and it’s in. Now going forward, I think it’s fair to say that I am very partial to my Insets. They’re simple, compact, and no-fuss sets and come in colors too. The Spring? Comes in the color option of white… as all the rest do.

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The insertion was fine and didn’t give me a problem at all. But attaching the tubing connector to the site was a bit of a hassle, not to mention taking it off. It just didn’t want to sit right at all when connecting it, and one side or the other seemed to stay “caught” when I tried to remove it.

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Sorry, these images were from a video I tried to do… and failed. 

After a few tries, I was getting to just how to grab the set connector to remove it. Apparently there’s a technique to it. But what was getting worse was the tape. The more I moved, the loser it got…. and I USED IV PREP! I rarely use anything but alcohol to clean the area and IV prep is for the sites that are hard to stick. Well, this thing was as if I just placed a piece of paper there. It was NOT sticky at all. I managed to keep it in long enough to soak some cement SkinTac around the edge and secure it more with Infusion Set IV3000.

I will have to say though, since all of that mess, I have been able to use with no problem (attaching/reattaching) and moving it around (you can position the tubing any way you need it to at any time) is easy to do. I am debating on maybe getting a box of these to try out though… with the pre-knowledge that SkinTac is a must. Reason being is that these are cheaper for me insurance wise, and I wouldn’t have to lose my insertion device that I’ve come to love. (HOW I manually inserted these things for so many years is shocking to me. *read: I’ve become a wuss*)

So how about you? Have you used the Spring Universal set? What were your thoughts on it? If you’re still using it, do you have any tips you could share? Thanks!

Back Home

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If you take a look in your address bar, you’ll see that my blog is back at Sugabetic.me. There has been a lot of work getting things back over here and redesigning the blog, but hopefully you’ll like it. There’s a few more things I want to try to change up (like how the HECK to get the social icons to the right and NOT the left!), but for the most part, I’m done hopping domains. So (once again… and if you’ve been with me for the long haul, I do sincerely appreciate your sticking with me!), please update your blogrolls, RSS feeders, and whatever else you may use to receive and read my posts.

So, welcome (back) home. Where you don’t have diabetes, you just got a little ‘suga’. ;-)

He’s My Heart

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My kid is becoming a half kid / half toddler in that he’s not a “kid” like a 4-10 year old, but he’s not a baby/toddler in that he’s becoming so much more independent than ever… and we’re 2 months away from his 2nd birthday. He’ll be 2 going on 20.

His personality is starting to show through so much, and I’m starting to see a little boy instead of a baby. He loves his music and dances to the beat. He’s picky about what he wants to eat and lets you know it too. He’s full-on melt-down mode when he doesn’t get his way. He can tell us “Poo-poo” before he has actually done anything, yet is scared to death of his kingly toddler “throne” when we place him there to try to do his business there instead of in his diaper.

He knows how to adamantly shout the word “NO” and shake his head to get his point across that he doesn’t want to do something or get something or eat something. He also knows the word “GO” very well and uses it to it’s full capacity when he wants to go outside. We have all sorts of words and even some phrases (“here you go” is becoming a common one lately) being added into his vocabulary now, but most of them are condensed down to a one syllable – sometimes two syllable – word… with the exception of his baby cousin’s name, which has 3, and is the first and only word of that length he’s been able to say… and it still amazes me. I mean, we can’t get out the full word for “cup”, but we can get out a 7-letter, 3 syllable word. I’m learning quickly, that not everything makes sense in the world of toddlerhood and development.

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He loves to play in the floor with me… or, more recently, to kick me out of my recliner so he can play in it. We play and roll and tickle and laugh. But it’s in that moment when he pauses and takes his two hands so soft and sweet and places them on both sides of my face and looks in my eyes that all the world stops and my heart wants to burst with the amount of joy and love I have for him. Of course, then he squishes my cheeks and lips together into mush and continues to giggle, and that moment has passed. But I remember it and hold it close.

He’s growing so fast. I’m afraid to blink because if I do, he really will be turning 20 and he’ll be off in college (hopefully) being his own person. So, while he lets me, I’ll continue to squeeze him tight and kiss him a bazillion times and be the tickle monster so I can soak up his laughter.

He’s my heart, and I love him so very very much.

Home

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You know that feeling when you come home? Even though your time away may have been exciting, that feeling when you walk through your door and familiarity surrounds you and the comfort of the atmosphere relaxes you?

That’s how I feel this morning. My Ping pump arrived (after being held at the local PO sorting facility for two days rendering me completely on-edge!) and I hooked up immediately. Well… almost… I had to go get batteries…. you know, those things you don’t need when you use the t:slim? So, as soon as I got those, I cracked open a new vial of Novolog and got everything set up.

Yay Blue Fridays!

Yay Blue Fridays!

Clipping my Ping to my pants was like welcoming home an old friend. The relief was immediate. It was as if all the worries I had with my other pumps just melted away. Granted, even the Ping isn’t perfect, but I think it just goes back to the fact that it was the one piece of equipment I used while I was pregnant and I trusted not only my life, but my growing baby’s life to it too. It’s not so much that I’m attached to this one particular pump… just the Ping model and functions. (Okay, you’re free to call me utterly crazy now.)

Honestly, I don’t know why I deny to myself that this is the pump for me…. or why I’m so obsessed with having to know each and every pump available. Some people have quirks like jewelry or pens or (if you’re my husband) computer mice. Mine is pumps. No this pump is not perfect. It’s loud, the scrolling is irritating and the meter-remote communication is lacking but, overall, I like it the best, and I need to remember that next time pump-envy comes around.

My t:slim is now sleeping, and my Omnipod stuff is packed in my closet. My thought process is that if I remove the temptation, I won’t bother with it… as often. Switching off pumps every few weeks can’t be healthy, not to mention it totally screws up logging. They all do the same job, just a little differently, and I have to realize that.

So, happy Blue Friday everyone! Hope you have a great weekend.

Waiting

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Since reaching out to Tandem to see if I could return the t:slim and being denied (not surprising  but hey, thought it would be worth a shot), I have been trying to find out when the “fix” would be available to us for the reverse-correction issue. At first, I was told within the next few months… but was promised within a year.

But we all know how that goes. We were promised t:connect for how long? And that was one of the factors that took me so long to reach out to them to ask if I could return it.. I had been waiting for t:connect to come out. Still, I probably would have been denied then too.

When it was explained to me how they want it to work, the reverse-correction won’t be a set feature that you turn on or off in a profile (like the rest of the pumps do), but rather will most likely be similar to the high correction confirmation screen:

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Instead of “Your BG is Above Target. Add Correction Bolus?”, it will more than likely read, “Your BG is Below Target. Reduce Bolus?”, with the current BG and the amount of reduction suggested…. or at least that’s how it plays out in my head from what was being explained. If they pushed that feature out, I’d probably be okay with using the pump. Right now, since I’m using it for my alternate sites, I’m on edge about how it delivers and calculates. Granted, having touch screen bolusing and a calculator built right in is always a plus, but it doesn’t help me much if I’m 86 and it won’t subtract out to bring me up to 120 (my target).

One thing the rep suggested to do for now is if I’m close to the 70 mg/dl cut off say in the 70′s or 80′s range (but not so much in the 90′s or higher), just to record a 69 mg/dl into the pump and it will reverse correct. I told him I was concerned about having incorrect info in the t:connect system, but his argument with it is that being as how I check my bg as often as I do, having a few “off” numbers in there for that reason won’t skew the results that much. So while I’m wearing the slim waiting on my Ping to arrive from my friend, I’ll keep that in mind.

And then… I’ll just wait on them to fix it. I’m a data freak and I don’t like skewing with results, not even a smidge. Doing that feels like I’m violating some endo-law that will render me punished in some way (reduction in test strips? Having a vampire get a blood sample instead of the phlebotomist? Having my FastClix taken away and replaced by the “guillotine”? I dunno). So, it will be in it’s little box in my drawer… taken out for charging periodically.

Also, as a side note, I tried to return the Omnipod sytsem I have just because I don’t want or need 3 working systems at my disposal. I am 6 days over the return period, and Insulet will not make an exception. So, I’ll be using the pods for my stomach / arms and Ping (or when they fix it, the t:slim) for my butt/legs. It’s like, above the waist is Pod safe and below the waste is tubing/longer cannula only.