The learning never ends

Have you ever had one of those months?

You know the ones...the months where you think you have some free time and all of a sudden something totally off the wall comes in and fills that space?

I've had one of those months.

The day before I went on my trip to Nebraska I went to the doctor. I haven't been to a doctor in years (insert many types of lectures here) so I met Dr. for the first time that day. He and I had a really nice chat. He told me to lose weight and then asked me to please give blood. Lots of it. He also scheduled me for a mammogram. Which I blogged about already and it went real well.

OK - so I get back from my roadtrip with my mother and sister and baby Stella and there is a post-it on the fridge.

Call the Dr ASAP

uh-oh

Next day. I call. I ask for the lab results and am told that I must see the doctor in person...can I come in today. (Is it really that urgent?)

The Dr. walks in and he says "you have out of control diabetes and we're going to get you started on insulin today."

WHOA

Huh?

Seriously, it was just like that.

Then he pops out of the room and comes back with a large handle bag -- large like the Large Big Brown Bag from Bloomingdales - yea that size.

Although mine was one advertising VIAGRA! of all things.

I was given a lot of booklets, two glucose meters (one for home and one for my purse,) and these very interesting insulin pens. He explained how to give myself an injection and then said OK, do it.

So I did it.

Then he gave me a ton of verbal instructions and sent me home. See you in a week he said.

I asked him what I was supposed to do about my diet and he said that he knew I would be looking it all up on the internet anyway, so I could just research it there. What he gave me was the basic food pyramid and a diet of 1800 calories.

This is where the learning was really beginning.

I fumbled and fuddled around the first week pretty much eating what was in the fridge and taking my Blood Sugar levels to see what happened with that meal. When I went to my first Drs appt after being an official diabetic for a week the Dr. told me I was doing real well. He told me he was proud of me. He was pleasantly surprised that I had tested my blood sugar as instructed and had given myself insulin as instructed.

(this is where I have to say -- Why wouldn't someone follow instructions on such a serious disease? I can understand denial but when I was told "out of control diabetes" I listened. And then Googled everything I could, just like he said I would lol)

He upped my long lasting insulin in the evenings and told me to come back in two weeks.

The next two weeks I had a lot of trouble sleeping. My feet were absolutely killing me. They hurt, itched, ached, shot pains up my legs and pretty much made for horrible sleep. Then last week the horrible pain stopped. I can sleep now. I've had some weird issues with my feet for a few years now - as I've read, it is probably a diabetic issue. I think they are actually getting better though. I'm going to talk with the Dr. more about my feet at the next appt. I've got a list going into each appointment.

The other night I was having some problems so I asked a friend to just talk to me. She suggested a support group. You could have knocked me upside the head. I go to the Liver Transplant support group and encourage others going through the process to get involved in it - why it never occurred to me to join a support group is beyond me. I haven't found a physical group here in my town yet but I did find an online community last night, Diabetesforums.com.

The things that group were talking about just blew my mind. Not all carbs are created equal. Sugar is OK in some things. Some foods are just poison to a diabetics system. Goodness.

I ordered a few books today. I'll talk about those when they arrive.

This is going to be a whole new chapter.

The learning never ends.
Kristin