School Without Mom

It finally happened. Zach had his first whole day of school without me there. Up until now, I have been coming to school to have lunch with Zach to make sure he ate his food and got the proper amount of insulin. I know how fortunate I am to be able to do this. He was very nervous as I told him this morning that I would not be coming to school. His older sister is sick today and I knew how hard it would be for me to take her in there with me. Her sniffling, sneezing, and coughing are the reasons she is not there. Needless to say, our school is awesome. I cannot begin to tell you how much they are appreciated. The kindness they have shown us is tremendous. It has been an incredibly hard year. We are just over 5 months since Dday. It is a constant learning curve which I am not sure is ever mastered. I want to shout out to my school for doing such an amazing job with my little man today. He came home and I asked him, "how was school?" His response, "AWESOME!" Those words are hard to come by some days. Thank you!

Watching and Waiting

So here it is. My therapy of sorts. I should be working on my online classes. I have a final in a day, but I am still awake and intensely watching the MySentry from Medtronic. Hoping, wishing, praying for the number to move down from 248. Hasn't budged from his last correction of .275. This type of correction and his basal rate which was just increased this week should send him low.......To no avail. nothing...no movement. Arg! My name is Melodee. I am a newly diagnosed mom of Zach. My son is 7. My sweet boy, Zach... Oh my goodness! How much I love him! My Zach was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes on July 6th. July 6th, 2012 is a day I will never forget. I am reminded of it as every month thereafter slips by. (Not the I forget any other day.) Today is 12/5/2012. One more day, 5 months. Type 1 diabetes does not run in our family. I can honestly say I didn't know anything about it until "almost" 5 months ago. So when my son was extremely thirsty and suddenly wetting the bed, I was concerned. But I thought, it is 100+ degrees outside. He just has a bladder infection, or something. My husband, Wes, was home from work that fateful day. I don't remember why, but the girls were spending the night with my parents. Wes would normally not be home, but hurt his finger at work and took the day "off" to recouperate over the weekend. I had made Zach an appointment with his pediatrician the day before. He was getting worse. He threw up in the car on the way home and had a huge headache. Not normal for Zach. It was time to go the Dr. We get to the pediatrician and it is startling how much weight my boy has lost. I don't know why I didn't see it. I knew he was skinny, but how did I not "see"? The Dr. says we need to check his blood to make sure he is not anemic and a blood sugar check. I am thinking to myself, please God let it be nothing, please God let him be ok. The nurse who seems like she would rather not be there, comes in and pricks his perfect little finger and walks away. My baby gets his bandaid and all done. Wait, not so fast. The nurse comes back for another stab. I knew this could not be good. They never come back to do it again, unless there is something wrong. I can feel the huge lump in my throat, my heart starts skipping beats. About 5 minutes pass, our pediatrician walks in. I cannot remember the exact words she says, but she tells us our son has diabetes with tears in her eyes. I will never forget the look she gave me. While I had NO IDEA the implications of this diagnosis, the look told it all. We were told to go home and get some things and head straight to Children's Hospital in Aurora, CO. I know I asked, how much time do we have. We were told to not take too long and be there in about an hour. Zach was hungry so we went home and made him a cheese sandwich and headed out. Looking back, that was a mistake. I am sure his blood sugar skyrocketed some more. Children's Hospital was supposed to be expecting us. When we got to the ER. We waited for almost an hour before Zach was even checked in. I was doing my best to be patient, but I just wanted to know if my baby was ok. We get into this small room finally. The Dr is urgently on the phone with the Barbara Davis Center. It seems they cannot take his blood fast enough. After all, it is Friday afternoon and almost 2PM. I cannot see the urgency. We waited for an hour just to get back in this small room, why are we hurrying him out now? My poor little Zach is scared. He doesn't want anyone poking him and take his blood. After all, he is only 6. He should be playing outside, swimming with his sisters. Here we are stuck in this hospital ER room. I didn't know about ketones or high blood sugars then. They check for the magic numbers and we are told to go to the Barbara Davis center right now. They are EXPECTING us. The Barbara Davis Center is right across the street from Children's Hospital. We walk together as a family. My wonderful husband, my son, and I. My sweet little boy, his life about to change. Ours forever as well. We walk into the Barbara Davis Center. A beautiful building. The receptionist greets us warmly. We have been expecting you. We are whisked away for more tests I think. My mind is a blur now. We haven't eaten a thing. We are starving. Zach is starving. My husband grabs us some pizza. While he is out getting the pizza, Zach gets his first shot. Huh, wth just happened. Nobody said anything about shots. After we eat, and the kind nurse talks to us about diabetes (I think.) Like I said, I don't remember the conversation much until. My sweet husband, just bursts. He can't take it anymore. He almost yells, "How do you even know he has this?" I look at him surprised and think to myself, "How do you know?" He goes on, all we did was a simple blood test and you sent us here and there. She tries to reply as kindly as possible and go over what has been done so far and basically just says, we just do. We just do, huh. We are whisked away, with another family with a little boy the same age. He is 6 and just diagnosed that day as well. I think, hmmm coincidence? I don't remember any kids having diabetes when I was a kid. I mean I didn't know a one. Why are our kids getting this terrible disease? That is a topic for another day. So, we are in the room and they bring us a BIG bag with supplies and a meter. We go through setting up the meter and are urgently taking notes on the times of day to check our son. Upon waking, before lunch, between lunch and dinner, and bedtime. Ha! Seems funny now, that is not the norm even now. Zach gets his blood sugar checked at least 10 times a day. They should have told us then to check during the night at least. I am terrified to think of this now. What could have happened? Thank God it didn't. Back to the story. After the meter talk, it is onto how to give a shot. A what? My husband and I look at one another worried. Our son is still in the room in wonder of what is transpiring before his eyes. Much to his amusement, we practice on each other first. I do not like giving my husband a shot. I have never given anyone a shot before. I don't want to do it. I have passed out twice in my life, both in a medical setting. This is not good! I pass with flying colors as does my husband. I honestly don't remember much of the rest of the 2 hours. I remember the Dr. talking about A1C. She said he was 10.5. I have no idea what that means. She says it means he has diabetes. It is time to leave. We are sent home with not a clue of what just happened, what diabetes really is. We are in survival mode for the weekend. Our lives have changed forever. I didn't know it back then. I still feel as though I am in survival mode. His blood sugar is now 199. Glad he has moved down a bit and not 266, but maybe time for another correction. The honeymoon is ending. The end of his beautiful body producing his own insulin. Heart wrenching for any parent. I would gladly take this away from him and so much more. I still bargain with God almost every day for this one wish. I know it will not come true, but oh how I wish. One day, there will be a cure. For now, I worry for him. Watching and waiting. He is now 196. Hmmm.