BEEP BEEP BEEP!!
Insistent noise, drowned out only slightly by the sound of two toddlers dunking basketballs on each other in the living room.
“Do you have any juice?”
My friend reaches into her fridge and pulls out a 1/4 full carton of lemonade. “Would this work?”
She and I know one another, but we’re fledgling friends. Still in that learning phase. And my mouth is tugging down at a funny angle, like after you have Novocain but before you’re able to fully move your mouth again. My lips are completely numb, the numbness spreading down into the back of my throat. Peripheral vision starts caving in. My eyes are having trouble focusing.
But I look normal. Almost. It’s hard to see the gears in my mind grinding to a halt for half a second before I’m able to answer a question. I know I’m repeating myself, though, and I can tell by the way my neighbor’s eyebrows go up when I ask the same question twice in a row. “Hang on, I’ll be right back in.” I run/trip out to the driveway where my son’s stroller is parked, grabbing the container of glucose tabs.
I open the tabs in the kitchen, announcing their presence in a cloud of sugary dust, stacking six or seven on the countertop so I can make sure I eat enough — double arrows down with a 56 mg/dL in the pigeon head is not a good look.
“I’m having a pretty nasty low blood sugar right now, okay?” Okay. Like I’m asking for clearance to land. “I’m sorry if I seem out of it. I feel pretty out of it. I’ll be normal in a couple of minutes.”
Our conversation is blurry but I know she’s watching me out of one corner of her eye while keeping tabs on the toddlers. I think we talk about how many glucose tabs it takes to bring a blood sugar back up, and I make up some number that sounds official, even though the answer in that moment is “ALL OF THEM and also do you have a pile of Swedish fish I can dive into with my face.”
Minutes stretch into fake hours, but they remain minutes for everyone but me. The kitchen floor looks wavy, I can’t feel my mouth, and I’m staring at my sneakers wondering when they also ended up covered in glucose tab dust. I feel stupid. So low and so confused but I don’t look all that different when I’m low so maybe I just appear stupid? What the eff. I know the sugar will hit my system in a few minutes but it’s never fast enough never fast enough never fast enough.
Eventually, it’s over. I’m better. Fine. Blood sugar more in the 130’s instead of the 50’s. I look exactly the same on the outside. Except now my brain is tuned in. The terror is tabled. I’m fully with it. Like nothing happened, except what happened.
This is so so so so precisely what happens every. single. time.
Time slows down & speeds up all at once & all you want is for it to be over. Or to turn time back about 15 minutes and make it never happen at all. Or at least to have one of those flashy things from Men In Black so you can make the witnesses forget they saw it happen. *sigh*
Such is the life of T1Ds everywhere.
OH man, great description. I am sorry this happened. and happens to all of us. Boo.
And to be in a social situation DOES NOT help. Really all you want is to be home by yourself with the contents of your refrigerator/pantry. Ugh.
With “all the contents” of aforementioned food holder things. 😉
Can so relate to the “like it never happened” comment… we have to shut out those awful moments so many times!
I appreciate learning from you what the experience is like for my daughter, as she doesn’t yet have the best words to describe it. So then, when you are on the high side, what is that experience like? I see her get very angry at everyone and everything, unable to learn or concentrate (she is homeschooled and we are able to set aside school until she is in a better range), and even get violent with throwing things or breaking things. Are those common?
I’ll let someone else comment on their highs but I homeschooled my oldest when she was diagnosed, 2nd grade and it was really tough. She would get a bad stomachache after lunch every day. I usually had to let her take a nap and do school after that. Or just do the most important stuff in the morning. It took a while to get her insulin doses worked out (what fun – R & N!). I don’t remember her throwing stuff though. I get “growly/hangry” when I get low (diagnosed 4 years after my daughter).
Hi Jennifer, it is totally normal to get angry when you are high. I know I do sometimes and it’s usually because I am frustrated at how bad I am feeling. I definitely cannot concentrate, I’ve tried to take tests when high and it is extremely difficult. It is kind of like your mind is going through molasses and you feel a little nauseous, have a little headache, and know you aren’t going to feel better until the insulin hits, understandably leading getting angry sometimes because there isn’t anything to do but wait it out.
Erica
I got diagnosed with Type 1 when I was 20, so I never threw things or got violent. However, I do get angry when my blood sugar goes over 300. I feel bad, have a headache, have a stomach ache, and strangely enough I feel nasally congested. My vision also blurs and I am unable to focus and find myself snapping at kids and husband. I can tell I am snapping, but it is like I am observing from outside myself, and I can’t stop myself.
All of those can happen with highs. Also I just feel lousy all over, and my body feels like I’ve syrup (molasses) in my veins. It’s hard to move or do anything.
While you can recover from lows in 15-20+ minutes, the same isn’t true for highs. If I’m over 300 it can take at least an hour after extra insulin before I see the numbers dip downwards. So be careful with corrections.
Had a long and unwelcome bout of 50s earlier today. Not only was the time while I was low agonizingly slow, the recovery seeemed interminable. Even now, a couple of hours later, my head feels hollow and I still want to eat ALL THE THINGS. I’m glad to say not all lows are like this but this is one for the books. Thanks for posting this and helping me remember I am not alone in the misery……
Yes, I’m here now and been there all to often, heck, once is to many times. I’m a bit unstable on my feet, so I don’t dare look down without holding on to something. I wish I didn’t relate so dang good to your lows, but damn I do.
this is so true- I get it… always feel like I have to explain why I am stumbling over my words…urgh
I can TOTALLY relate! I am always embarrassed and feel stupid unless it my close family. “Pile of sweedish fish I can dive into with my face” EXACTLY!
Thank you for sharing.
I really hate feeling stupid…
Kerri- been there!
Its also tough when someone then does not trust you.
Or thinks you might have a drug problem, or had too much to drink.
Or thereafter feels the need to be sure they have 3 boxes of cookies any time you are together. And ice cream. Just in case….
You just want to say- I am more than this. But this is my reality…..every day. Any day.
I know Dexcom is way better in many ways, but Medtronic’s predictive suspension has put and end to such lows for me (I still miss my Dexcom, though)…
So looking forward to that feature when Tandem releases it (Targeted for Summer 2018).
https://www.tandemdiabetes.com/about-us/pipeline
Thank you! As a parent of a recently diagnosed T1D 9 yo, it’s nice to hear what it’s like for her in such descriptive words!
Hate when this happens, especially with a new friend. It’s happened to me several times, thanks for writing about it!
Thank you Kerry for explaining this from your point of view. It’s hard as a mom of a 6yo T1D to know exactly what this feels like. I can usually see it on my daughters face, she looks spacey all of a sudden and she starts staring at something behind me or up on the ceiling.
Thank you all for sharing and being so honest about your syntoms it’s been the only way I’ve been able to understand what my my daughter( diagnose T1 3 years ago) is going through and it just brakes my heart to see you all suffer and not be able to help.
I don’t normally get this way. I don’t show signs until I’m in the 30s and I feel a little numb n the face. I have been in the low 20s and I was just shaky and sweating. Afterward I am just exhausted
Thank you for being so transparent and descriptive. I am a mom of a 17 year old with T1D; diagnosed 2 years ago. My sweet girl doesn’t accurately (or as eloquently as you) describe lows and so it is very helpful for me to read your words. I know what her face looks like when she is low, but I don’t know the panic in her brain and heart. This world is a tough one – we all need each other. Thank you for your blog. Here’s to dusty glucose tabs! I hope that your BG is steady eddy today.
I can completely relate. My husband found me on the floor in front of the fridge the other night where I crawled from our bedroom, downing a bottle of orange juice because I couldn’t find my glucose tabs which had fallen behind my dresser and I couldn’t make it to the living room where there was more when I was in the low 50s. I didn’t want to wake him. I’ve only been on insulin since last summer and am type 2 not 1 but insulin dependent. I am still getting used to the ups and downs from just always being up (above 300). I find I overdo the glucose tabs or juice or candy sometimes and put myself up to high. I hate the feeling of feeling slow and confused and the numbness in my lips and shaking usually alerts me to being low. I don’t have a CGM but do have a Freestyle Libre so I still have to scan to know. Sometimes I scan excessively cause I can drop sometimes without even noticing.
Swedish fish! HAHAH yes!!! allofthem