For the past five years or so, Chris and I have been going up to Bar Harbor, Maine to spend a few days walking around in the woods. (Let me clarify. “Walking around in the woods” means going on hikes, spending hours on end outside, and then retiring to the comfort of a bed & breakfast because I do not…
Seven weeks is a long time. It’s a lot of garbage days (I hate, hate taking out the garbage, especially since we have a crew of vindictive raccoons who have made it their agenda to bust into the garbage cans of everyone on our street, spreading trash all over the place and laughing maniacally whilst wearing hats). Seven weeks is…
“Mawm, I can I help you put on your pump right now?” It’s always an issue of immediacy. If Birdy sees me taking off an old pump site and preparing a new infusion set for insertion, she’s immediately taken with the urge to press all the buttons and cue up the dosing. “Sure, you can help with some of the…
This morning, in the shower, I heard the Dexcom start to wail. Actually, I heard Birdy mimicking the Dexcom low alarm from the bathroom floor, where she was hanging out and coloring with crayons while I took a shower (Chris was away and in a meeting all day, so I was solo-parenting). “Beeeep, beeeeeep,” she sang in a tuneless sort…
“So when do we go to the confwence, Mawm?” “In two weeks. And did you know there is going to be a big fancy dress-up ball? Like a big party for princes and princesses?” “Yeah?” “Yeah. And you get to dress up as a princess, if you’d like. Would you like to dress up as a princess that night?” “I…
My Little Orange Bracelet.
Diabetes and Emotions, Diabetes and Family, Diabetes Online Community, Diabetic Mommy, Real Life DiabetesAt the Friends for Life conference, people who are living with type 1 diabetes wear bright green bracelets. Green bracelet’ers are the people who know what my diabetes life is like, from the injections to the blood checks, from the guilt to the successes. They get it. But the orange bracelets go on the wrists of the loved ones of…
Our cat, Prussia (known formally as Prussia the Cat, or PTC) had been ailing for a few months. And over the last week, her decline was fast. “She looks really skinny. And her breathing is labored. Also, I think she peed on the floor over there. She’s definitely getting much sicker. We should bring her to the vet.” But Prussia…
Diaries of a Diabetic Girl.
Diabetes and Emotions, Diabetes and Family, Diabetes Complications, Diabetes Memories, Diabetic Mommy, Real Life DiabetesThe last time I cracked the binding on these journals was back in 2009, when I was cleaning out the apartment I was living in at the time. I happened upon them again last night, while searching for something in the attic. (I never found what I was looking for up there, but I did come down with a bunch…
You Want to Try Again?
Diabetes Community, Diabetes Complications, Diabetic Mommy, Real Life Diabetes“You want to try again?” “Yep.” http://youtu.be/KxRadetesYU (Thanks for your comments and emails yesterday. The support found in these kinds of patient communities help so many of us to keep trying … again and again and again. Thanks for what you’ve done for me, and what you do for so many. Now go outside and roll down a hill,…
“I really like Ironman. And Superman. And Spiderman.” She paused. “But not the Hulk, because he smashes things. Why he smashes things?” “He gets angry and that anger makes him turn into the giant green guy, and he smashes.” My daughter, thanks to her father’s affinity for all-things superhero, has developed a taste for the slate of superheroes and super…
“I’m going to draw a picture of Grandpa.” “Okay, so where do you start?” She put her finger to her lips, pondering. “How about … a head! With two eyes! And a nose with nostrils. And some cheeks.” Birdy pressed her pen against the paper, painstakingly drawing a circle for the head, and then two eyes, and a nose. Her…
Oh, you. Birdzone, you are sixteen months old. And that’s, like, a big deal because you’ve now been “out” for double the amount of time you were “in.” That’s some nice, neat math that I can handle. (Unlike the calculations of how many diapers your dad and I have changed in the last sixteen months. That’s a staggeringly gross number.)…