Long Stressful Drive Back from Orlando

Posted by Chris on Oct 5, 2009 in High Blood Sugar, Insulin Pump Problems, Stress | 1 comment

Yesterday involved a long, stressful drive back home from Orlando. After spending a great weekend up there, Amanda and I were headed home on the Florida Turnpike in seperate cars. We were flying down the highway and making great time. We were on pace for about 2 1/2 hours which is great time for where we live. My sugar was about 220 at this time. It was above 200 all day while at Sea World. I couldn’t seem to get the numbers down, I don’t know why.

So, we were just north of the Ft. Pierce exit on the Turnpike when I heard a little noise, almost like I hit a bump in the road. About 2 miles later the loudest noise of my live occurred. It sounded like someone let go a shotgun right next to my head. I knew it exactly what it was when it happened though, and the first thing I thought was $#!t. My spare tire is already on the back right side of my car because I had a flat several weeks ago. And no, my spare is not a donut tire, it was a real tire so that is why I was able to drive on it for so long.

I called Amanda and told her to get behind my car and she said that it didn’t look like my tire was flat, but then she said that she thought that she just saw the tire spark. She saw it again, so I said ok we need to get off at this next exit. We pull off into the nearest gas station (with a Dunkin Donuts) so I could get a coffee if needed. I looked at the tire and there was a huge hole in it, but it wasn’t flat. The wires were sticking out of the tire, so that explains the sparks. I called AAA right away and they were going to send a truck out to me and tow it to a tire service and I would have to get it the next morning. I definitely did not want to do that, but what the hell else was I going to do on a Sunday night at 8 p.m.

I called a 24 hour tire service to come out and fix the tire and they wanted to charge me over $300, uhh yea right! After 30 minutes of waiting for the AAA truck, it was the wrong kind of truck. They didn’t get the correct information from dispatch and they needed a flatbed truck. It was going to be another 30 minutes, which I didn’t want to wait. I asked the driver what his honest opinion was, if he felt I could drive it about one mile to the Super Wal-Mart and he felt that I could. I drove it down there about 10-15 MPH and took all of my belongings and then drove home with Amanda. I wanted to stay in a hotel and just get the car fixed first thing in the morning, but it didn’t make sense to spend the $70, even though it probably would have worked out better that way.

Finally, this afternoon after a half day of work, we drove back up to the Ft. Pierce area and went back to the Super-Walmart. Luckily my car was s till there and intact and I was able to drive it over to the tire service center and get 2 new tires and put the spare back into the truck. I drove the car back home and the tires felt fine. The car was riding smooth again, so I was happy.

Meanwhile, the whole time this was going on my sugar was just skyrocketing because all of the stress. It went up to about 375 because I was freaking out. I was so hungry and there was a Sonic right there, but I knew I couldn’t eat because I could tell my sugars were in just one of those moods that they were not going to come down, especially with more food going in. I woke up this morning with a 245 blood sugar. Things were fine with the blood sugars all day today after that, a few lows, but no highs.

So that was the wonderful life of a diabetic this weekend and the stressful drive back from Orlando. It was a long, exhausting, stressful night. But I made it through it, and have another diabetes related story to share with people that want to know about diabetes.