Thankfully work has calmed down since my last post.  I’m clocking about 40 hours a week again and I’m able to spend more time at home, but I’m also craving horrible, terrible, non-diabetic foods.

For the most part I’ve been able to keep my bread and candy cravings under control, but the other day I walked past the employee lounge and saw the most delicious looking loaves of bread I’d ever seen.  I knew I should have just kept walking.  I wasn’t even really hungry, but they smelled so good.  So I grabbed one, sliced it in half and toasted it with some cheese.  It was delicious, and I truly enjoyed every bite, but of course my BS spiked afterwards, stayed high through dinner.  For the rest of the day I felt guilty and crappy.

The next day a co-worker brought in a giant tub of Jelly Beans.  The old me would have been all over that, keeping a steady flow of jelly beans at my desk throughout the day.  This time however, I restrained… a bit.  I noticed my blood sugar was trending down and registering at about 107.  I could have had a clementine, or a couple strawberries and been fine.  In fact I keep a little insulated lunch bag at my desk filled with goodies in case my sugar does start dropping, but no, I grabbed a handful of Jelly beans and watched at my BS shot up.

The other night my husband and I decided to see a movie we’ve been wanting to see for a while, The Grand Budapest Hotel.  It was fantastic.  Very entertaining and we both really enjoyed it.  What wasn’t fantastic though was how much popcorn I consumed.  The last time we went to a movie I didn’t know how many carbs were in  popcorn so I just didn’t give myself insulin for it.  Stupid, I know, but this was also before I decided to take back control of my diabetes and work towards bringing down my a1c.  At that point, I didn’t really care.  This time I gave myself insulin for 30g of carbs and vowed to not overdo it.  That went out the window when I realized I had consumed almost the entire Small popcorn all by myself.  Not only that, but my insulin pump ran out of insulin during the middle of the movie.  As soon as I got home I changed my pump, but the damage was done.  For the rest of the night I was restless, got up to pee about 4 or 5 times and woke up feeling crappy…again.

So yesterday I decided to only eat healthy foods, count every single carb and learn from my small setback.  Sean and I both had the day off so we slept in, made a delicious and healthy breakfast of scrambled eggs with green pepper and onion.  We relaxed at the beach for a few hours, made chicken sandwiches and brought fruit and water.  No candy for me.  Dinner was one of my now favorite meals, grilled eggplant with provolone.  We had a really great day off together.  It felt like a mini vacation, and I feel wonderful.

I had my May doctors appointment this week and I feel fantastic! I figured that not having a sensor all month would reflect a higher a1c, but surprisingly I went from a 10.3 to a 10 despite not having sensors, getting food poisoning and working approximately 50 hours in 4 days last week.

I gotta say that this has been a very challenging month. I would have liked to have used my sensor (especially during one of the busiest tournaments at my work) but Dexcom made that impossible. I called them over a month ago to get more sensors with only 2 left (which lasts roughly 2 weeks). After calling once a week and finally getting one of their lovely territory managers involved I received a 3 month supply on Wednesday.

Being sick for a whole day when I was in Vegas really took it’s toll on me and it took a while to recover from that. So working as much as I did last week didn’t really help that. I found myself in a constant bad mood, always tired, and I just felt really crummy. Unfortunately I took out my frustration with Dexcom, work and my diabetes on the people closest to me. Mainly my wonderful, patient, sweet and loving husband. I work in the customer service industry and last week I just had no patience. It’s a good thing my supervisor gave me 2 days off back to back at the beginning of this week. I really needed the time to relax and just hit my reset button. I needed to get back to feeling like myself again.

When I went to my appointment on Monday, I was afraid to check my a1c. I said I would do it at my last appointment though, so I knew I just had to get it over with. I had lost a couple pounds since April (113 in April and 111 in May) so I just knew my a1c would be higher.

Dr. Peters and I were completely shocked when we saw that it went down to 10. It might not be as big a difference as it was the last time I checked it, but we are taking baby steps and making progress. She says I’m a very unusual patient and that she loves having me as a project. I love having a doctor who cares about lowering my a1c as much as I do.

My job for this next month is to eat more carbs. I need to eat about 30g per meal and 100g per day. I can eat more fruits and veggies (I don’t have to eat more refined carbs like bread and pasta- which is good because I always feel sick after I eat those foods) I just have to make sure to calculate for all carbs that I do eat. Now that I can use my sensor again I’m going to make sure to check it closely after I eat and adjust accordingly. Right now though, my main focus is spending time with my mom. I haven’t seen her in months and she lives so far away and she’s coming to visit for 6 weeks!! If I don’t post for a while it’s because my mom and I are going to be going on shopping sprees and getting our nails done!

It’s been too long since I enjoyed Los Angeles.  I live here and work here, but I needed to get out and appreciate it’s beauty.  Since I wasn’t able to hike or run in Vegas I was eager to get back into motion in LA.  Luckily I had the next day off after I got back from my girls weekend so I slept in, ate a delicious breakfast of eggs, salsa, shredded cheese and avocado with Sean and got ready for an adventure to Temescal Canyon in Pacific Palisades.

I met up with a few friends at Pacific Palisades High School.  My blood sugar was 237.  With my glucose in hand I made my way up the Canyon.  It was hot,and humid, but the hike up was breathtaking.  I felt so great hiking up the Canyon.  I made sure to stay at a conversation pace and chatted with my friends.  Even though I was minutes away from Downtown Santa Monica it seemed like I was hundreds of miles outside of Los Angeles.  The only thing that made me nervous about the hike, besides rattle snakes, was the fact that I did not have my CGM.  I’m so used to just looking at my sensor and seeing where my blood sugar has been and where it is going.  Not having access to  this information that quickly is frustrating.  I made sure that I hiked with my blood glucose monitor and checked my blood right before and right after my work out.  I probably should have checked again once I reached the top, but I was way too distracted by the amazing views.

The hike down was obviously much easier than the hike up.  It went by quickly because we were all chatting the entire way down.  I loved breathing in the fresh air and surrounding myself with trees and sky and dirt. If I had time I would hike Temescal Canyon everyday.  The rest of the week I knew I would be spending my entire day at work so I wanted to make sure I spent as much time outside as I could.  Once I got to my car my blood sugar was 56.  I ate a few glucose tablets, waited until my sugar started going up and went home.

It’s really easy to get wrapped up in the day-to-day routine of work and sleep, work and sleep, work and sleep.  The days are getting longer so I’m staying at work later and finding less and less time to get outside and get moving.

This weekend went by way too quickly. The first day we got to Vegas was the first OAR show. We planned on seeing them each night they were at the Brooklyn Bowl. I had a few drinks, but nothing insane. In about six hours I drank 2 beers and a vodka soda with a glass of water after the beer and before the vodka. The next morning I felt like I had been hit by a train. My BS was thankfully 84 when I woke up, and that made me happy, but I couldn’t keep anything down all day.

It might have started as a hangover, but by the end of the day I was wondering if I had gotten food poisoning. At breakfast someone said to eat greasy food, that that will kill a hangover. So I ordered greasy, cheesy eggs with hash browns and wheat toast. I had about 3 bites of egg, one look at the hash browns and 2 bites of toast. My head wouldn’t stop spinning. We were all feeling pretty sick and after breakfast went up to the room to lie down again. Within an hour, I puked up my sad attempt at breakfast. A few hours later, I tried eating couple pineapple chunks which probably wasn’t the best thing for me to eat, but for some reason was the only thing I could stomach. An hour later, sure enough I threw up again. Every time I checked my blood it was between 180 and 250. So I knew my insulin pump was good. Still not where I wanted it to be, but at least I wasn’t looking at readings of 450+ or 80 and below. After a nap we tried eating lunch. I picked a safe chicken sandwich and picked at 1/4 of it. This time I lasted about 3 hours before running to the toilet bowl. I took a couple ibuprofen and got dressed for the show because after throwing up I had convinced myself that I felt like a new woman. Everyone else had been cured of their hangovers and drinking beer and wine. Even smelling alcohol made me feel queasy so I drank club soda and picked at fresh veggies. Thank God we had a table the second night, because I couldn’t stand for very long. After about an hour I decided to go back to the room and lie down. Not something I had originally planned on doing, but I’m so glad I did. Of course I threw up immedialty, fell fast asleep and rested for about 10 hours.

Saturday was wonderful. I felt fantastic ad had a ton of energy. We walked up and down the strip, saw some really interesting people, shopped at the Miracle Mile, gambled, learned how to play Craps, and ate (and digested) food. I didn’t drink anything for the rest of the weekend except for a glass of Pino Grigio at dinner. I ordered the most delicious Salmon again I wanted something light and fresh.

The final OAR concert was amazing. I might have missed the second show, but I more than made up for it with their last show. The final Encore was Crazy Game of Poker and I just about died with excitement.

So even though I got horribly sick the second day and lost $100, I had a wonderful weekend, made new friends and got some great pictures.
     

I was afraid that not posting my food choices online with pictures and carb values would make it easy to fall back into my terrible eating habits. However, since I’ve started eating better, I’ve been feeling so much better. And of course, exercise has been keeping my sugars pretty level. I didn’t really make anything new or exciting after my week of delicious, fresh diabetes friendly meals. The first night was a mish-mosh of leftovers and I quickly discovered that eggplant doesn’t keep very long. That was pretty dissapointing because it was so yummy the first time I made it. I want to keep trying new recipes though and I’ll definitely post my experiences with them!

Yesterday I spent the morning hiking to a local waterfall near my cousins house in Thousand Oaks, California. It’s was a wonderful way to get outside and spend the day with my family. We climbed some natural stairs, jumped over rocks, got yanked around by her puppies, sprinted through the trails and posed for pictures in front of the waterfall. I had so much fun and got an awesome workout. After we got back to my cousins house, we all changed into our bathing suits and jumped in the ice cold pool. It felt amazing. After our excursion, my sugars were pretty steady. I made sure to keep an eye on my sensor while we were walking and I had a half a peanut butter sandwich (one slice of potato bread-20 carbs, tablespoon of penut butter-7 carbs and no jelly) for once we got to the waterfalls. I also hiked with water and a new tube of glucose tablets.

About an hour after we got back though I saw that my BS was falling below 100. So I grabbed a small Hawaiian roll and melted some cheddar cheese on it and hoped that snack would be just what I needed to bring up my blood sugar. It did go up, but then it wouldn’t stop going up. My sugar ended up rising to about 250 and then hovered around 270 until dinner.

I also tried something I havent done since I started taking back control of my diabetes. I drank a beer. After a long, hot day hiking in the sun I decided to drink a Bud Light Lime with my dinner. I wasn’t sure how it would affect my bloodsugars and I was already around 270 before I ate, but I made sure to calculate my carbs (I ate teriaki steak and brocolli for dinner- no carbs) and I paid close attention to how I felt and what my BS was after my dinner. I’m pleased to say that my sugar stayed about the same all night even with the beer, and when I woke up this morning it was 142. I’m not going to start drinking beer every night for dinner and last night I only had one bottle, but at least I know that if I’m careful, eat pretty low carb for my meal, and make sure to count all the carbs I’m consuming, I should be ok for an occasional bottle every now and again.