“Do You Ever Get Sick of It?”

“My daughter’s friend has diabetes, and she had to have needles all the time. What a pain that would be! Do you have to do that?”

“Not anymore now that I have the pump,” I replied as I pulled it out of my pocket and began gesturing wildly. “So, the pump does two things. It gives insulin continuously in small increments to keep me steady in the background. Then I enter insulin doses myself to cover the foods that I eat. So yeah, the pump is really convenient when I’m out and about or at work,” I concluded in response to her remark.

“Do you have to do that thing where you prick your finger all the time as well? My daughter’s friend said she had to do it 10 times a day! You would think there would be some kind of technology that could do that for you by now!”

“Yeah. I’m wearing this at the moment” I said, picking up the FreeStyle Libre reader that was sitting on top of my iPhone. “So, I wear this sensor on my arm,” turning sideways and showing it to them. “And then I just swipe the reader over it and it tells me my blood sugar. So that’s a pretty good reading,” I said, holding it up and showing them my unicorn and graph.

“I’ll have to tell her about it.”

“Yeah, it’s really good for figuring out trends and things. But it’s expensive so I don’t wear it all the time. And the numbers do my head in sometimes.”

“Can you have a lot of this stuff?” She asked me, gesturing at the hot cross buns and chocolates on the table.

“Yeah, of course I can. I need insulin for most food that I eat, so that my body is able to convert it into energy. I would look at this,” I said, picking up a marvellous creations wrapper from the plate of Cadbury Favoutites on the table, “and say its about 8 grams of carbs. I know that I need 1 unit of insulin to cover every 8 grams of carbohydrate, so I would give a unit with my pump.”

Do you ever get…sick of it? I know that you would probably be used to it by now…

“I wouldn’t say I get sick of it. Most of it is second nature to me. If anything, it just feels really, really monotonous. Getting up and doing the same thing over and over again every day. Looking at the same items and devices all the time. I get bored of it.”

3 Comments

  1. When I hear the question, i always think, well there is someone who is still fighting or angry. Once I got over the anger, I stopped being sick of it. Then I was just sick, because I ignored it. but that is different.

  2. Ivan

    I am just sick and tired of no type1 cure being released. lots of expensive gadgets, new insulins and toys to manage your diabetes but very little real type1 cure research is being done.

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