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Scary Low Blood Sugar at the Driving Range

Chris Stocker 3 Comments

Low Blood Sugar at Golf CourseToday was such a beautiful day and I was sitting at home just doing laundry and cleaning up all day, so I decided to take some time to go to the driving range.  I haven’t been able to golf for a few weeks and I have a golf tournament the second weekend of April, so I need to get back into golf shape.  Overall, not too bad.

Anyway, before I went there I had some chicken and pasta for lunch. I didn’t test my blood sugar before I went out to the driving range, not a good idea.  Once I got there, it was really hot out there, so I began to sweat right away and I could feel the blood sugar dropping.  I didn’t bring any candy or Gatorade with me, because I figured it would only take me about 15-20 minutes to go throw the bucket of balls.

I hit the first 10-15 balls normally, and then I felt it getting really low, so I didn’t want to exert too much energy, so I did a quick hit drill where I just lined the balls up and continued in a swinging motion.  This helped me get through the bucket balls a lot faster.  Now I had to drive home.  Luckily I live on the golf course and I didn’t decide to walk there like I initially was going to do. As soon as I got home, I drank some orange juice and ate a few cookies and then it was all good.

The blood sugar dropped quickly because I didn’t think it was that bad, and I just spent the money to buy driving range golf balls, so I didn’t want to just not hit them.  I know exactly what you’re thinking, because I thought the same thing, is a $4.00 bucket of driving range golf balls worth passing out from a low blood sugar?  Absolutely not!

I survived it, and sometimes I test my limits, but I know that I shouldn’t.

I am typing this at almost midnight Saturday night, and it is a lot more relaxing writing blog posts on a Saturday night then going out I think.

Tomorrow I’m going to tell you about a diet idea that one of my co-workers came up with because he was concerned about my eating habits and my diabetes.

Re-Design In Process

Chris Stocker

I am in the process of re-designing the site.

Hang with me.  If you see things that are messed up and don’t look right, please let me know so I can make sure that I get it all working properly.

I wanted to make the design a lot more simple and easy.

Have a good one.

I Am Motivated by a Bravo TV Start

Chris Stocker

Amanda likes to watch this Bethenny Ever After, or whatever it is called on Bravo, so as the good boyfriend I am, I watch it with her.  I don’t like these shows at all, but I still watch them, mainly to make fun of these people.  Especially these Housewives shows because these women are living in a fantasy world and I would love to just smack them into reality.  Anyway, the reason that I am mentioning this is because this Bethenny lady motivates the hell out of me!  She has so much passion and enthusiasm for her product lines and her personal brand.  She was  talking about having someone write a blog for her about food.  I don’t know what it was, but she  really motivated me and that is why I am writing this blog post right now.

On to other things, I had my follow up visit for my knee today.  I had my MRI last week and the doctor took a look at the MRI results today and I do NOT need any surgery.  Thank goodness!  I do have a partial meniscus tear, but not serious enough to have surgery.  The doctor felt that I should just rehab it for about a week and do some light lifting with the legs.  I am allowed to start golfing right away and I can even play in the co-ed softball league again.  But, I’m not sure if I should play this week in the softball league or take another week off.

Last bit of news, I rescheduled my endo appointment for April because I have a few days off during that time period and it’s always best to have appointments on my days off.

So, have a great week everybody.

Medco Pharmacy and Tier 3 Drugs

Chris Stocker 5 Comments

On January 1, 2011, my insurance, United Healthcare, who uses Medco as their mail order pharmacy, made the decision that the type of insulin that I use, Novolog is a tier 3 drug.  What does that mean?  That means that instead of last year when I paid $25 for a 3 month supply, I now pay $150 for a 3 month supply.  I noticed that Humalog, which I used to use before I went on an insulin pump, is still a tier 1 drug and still costs only $25 for a 90 day supply.  When I asked why Novolog was bumped up to a tier 3, they said they didn’t know, which I didn’t expect that exact person to know, but somebody had to know and there had to be some sort of documentation out there on why this was bumped to a tier 3.

I still have not been able to find any information, so I am just curious as to why one is considered one thing and the other is not.  I don’t think there is some sort of huge conspiracy here, I just want to know.  Is there a possibility that it could be that more people use Novolog, so that way they charge more for it?  Or they don’t have a good relationship with that manufacturer and they don’t get as good of a deal on it?

Does anybody have any information on this?

Different Kind of Doctor’s Appointment

Chris Stocker 1 Comment

This week has been filled with different kinds of doctor appointments other than diabetes.  I did something to my knee in a co-ed softball league a couple of weeks ago.  The same knee that I tore my ACL on 9 years ago.  Seems like I may have partially re-torn it, or tweaked it a little bit.  But I had an appointment with an orthopedic doctor and it’s weird going to doctor’s visits that have nothing to do with diabetes.  I was impressed however, that when the doctor saw me, right away he said, “Ah, Minimed insulin pump.”  Made me feel good about this guy that he knew what an insulin pump was, and also the brand.

I had to get an MRI on the knee yesterday, but there were some issues so I had to reschedule it for this Saturday.  I haven’t had an MRI in a long time, but I hate them.  The worst part about this injury is that it pretty much has me doing no exercise at all.  I can ride a bike, but at a slow minimal speed.  I can’t play softball, I can’t golf, I can’t walk far distances or run.  I can swim, but I haven’t had a chance to get into that workout schedule.  I’m up when my girlfriend leaves for work, so I am really going to try and start going to the pool at that time and getting a few laps in for some exercise.

Well, until I hear more from the doc about the knee, I will just be worrying and hoping that I don’t need any sort of surgery.

Have a good day ya’ll

Blind Bolusing : Don’t Try This at Home

Chris Stocker

Wow, what a spectacular Sunday Morning.  I am not able to sleep past 9 a.m. ever.  My body has just become so trained, that I can’t sleep in past then.  When I was just a few years younger, I was still able to sleep in late on the weekends, and then re-adjust my sleeping schedule back for the work week, not anymore.  I feel like I am just wasting the day away.  Plus, I live on a golf course now, so I don’t get to enjoy this view during the week because of how late I get home every night.  Sitting out here writing a blog is one of the most amazing things that I get to do on the weekends.  Enough of this side story, let’s get into what I really want to blog about today.

Since I moved, almost a month ago, I still don’t have all my things unpacked and situated.  Which means that I don’t know where all of my meters are.  I have my main one that I keep in my work bag, which comes home with me and that is the one that I try to use 99% of the time.  However, that was left in the car overnight, so last night I had no meter to test.  At about 11 p.m. I had to use the bathroom, then again at 12:30, and then again around 1:30.  Hmm, sounds like my blood sugar is high to me. Since I couldn’t test, I took about 10 units of insulin (to you that may be a lot, but to me it’s not, my sensitivity level is 1 unit of inuslin per 11 “points” my bg is).  After this, I continued to still wake up every hour or so to use the bathroom, so I took 10 more units again.  I do not recommend doing this at all!.  Finally, around 5-6 am this morning I took 10 more units.  That was a total of 30 units over a 6-7 hour period.  When I woke up this morning, my bg was 275.  So even after all of that extra insulin, my bg was still high!

That means that today, I will find all of my meters and make sure that there is one right next to my bed so I don’t ever have to deal with a situation like this ever again.  I know the consequences of this.  What if my sugar wasn’t really high and I just had to use the bathroom, and I took 30 units over 6 hours and my bg crashed horrifically?

This will be the last time I do that.  Time to go look at Sunday morning ads.

Have a great Sunday everybody.

I am a Diabetes Hoarder

Chris Stocker

Currently I am watching this Hoarding: Buried Alive show, and I am seeing myself in this a lot, in many different ways.  One, I hate to throw things away and get rid of things, I like to hang onto things.  The other part is that the hoarders are constantly making excuses.  I am a diabetes Hoarder.  I hoard bad blood sugars and bad habits.

Unless I make drastic changes, then I am going to continue to collect these bad things and all the bad things that go along with all the bad diabetes related things, which I don’t think I need to tell you all what those things are.

I have been getting so much support from all of you in the diabetes community and I thank you all so much, because it means a lot.  It shows me that I can do these things because you are all doing it.  It’s almost a jealousy thing, I’m jealous when I see you all showing your Dexcom numbers and when it’s 180 you are like, OMG I can’t believe I went up that high.

I have been eating a lot better so far this week, I know it’s only Wednesday, but still.  For dessert tonight I am having some strawberries and kiwi.  As opposed to ice cream with a lot of sprinkles and syrup and whipped cream.

Well, I’m off to eat this and then relax and go to bed.  Have a great night everybody.

Weight Loss Reality Check

Chris Stocker 5 Comments

I finally re-scheduled my endo appointment for the middle of March and of course, once again, I am nowhere near the weight loss goal that we had set at my last visit.  And to make things worse right now, I re-injured my knee and can’t really do any physical activity because I am afraid that I am going to tear my ACL again.  I will be making an appointment with an orthopedic doctor and hopefully there isn’t anything wrong and I will be able to get back to exercising like I was before.  I can’t jog, and I can’t even go for a nightly walk anymore because it hurts too much to even walk a long distance, hell, a short distance at that.  My only option right now is to just do sit ups and push ups at home and at least get some sort of exercise in.  I might try to ride the bike a little bit, but pretty sure that is going to cause pain as well.  My brother mentioned this to me, and I think he is 100% correct, my body is not used to dealing with this amount of weight, and I am at the highest weight level of my life, and my bad knee just can’t handle the weight and it’s due to happen some time soon until the weight is gone.

At times I really feel like an addict, like a fat addict.  I always tell myself, “I can easily lose 15-20 pounds when I want to, I just have to get serious about it, so I’ll just eat this fast food and work it off when I decide to start”.  These are the sort of things that I hear on Intervention or these other addiction shows.  It is sad, but yet, I don’t do anything about it.  Go ahead and search my blog, I have probably written nearly 50 posts about how I’m going to lose weight, but yet I still weight more than I ever did, and I don’t fit into half of the clothes that I own.

All that, and I haven’t even mentioned the affect it is having on my diabetes. Over the last year, I have probably had the worst blood sugars that I have had since I’ve been diabetic.  I know this, yet I haven’t done much to change it.  The last month, however has been a lot better, been able to keep them under 200’s a lot more frequently then before.  I read blogs and tweets about people being upset or cursing out diabetes when they see 180 on their meter or CGM.  I’m like…. WTF, when I see 180, I am happy, I’m happy that it is below 200.  What does this mean?  Does this mean that I have accepted high blood sugars, or that I am settling myself to levels that are not healthy and I should not be accepting of those numbers?

I’m not sure, all I know, is that this is a reality check.  Cleaning out a closet of clothes in which 80% of the pants and shorts that are in there do not fit anymore is embarrassing.  I will not be beat by all of this.  I will succeed, and I will prevail.

What Is Your Most Creative Fundraiser Idea?

Chris Stocker 1 Comment

It’s about that time of the year again to start preparing for the local JDRF walk.  I was really excited about this years walk because my mom and dad were thinking about flying down to Florida around that time and they were going to do the walk with me, so that would have been fun.  Unfortunately, the scheduling didn’t work out and they have to come down the following weekend.  I need to go online and create my team and start preparing the e-mails and letters and all the other fun things to try and spread the awareness and collect donations.  Sometimes it can be tough to ask for donations because it seems that there is so many other things going on.  Most people are still recovering from spending a lot of money on girl scout cookies.  At the same time there are other non-profits asking for money, so it’s usually tough to get a good amount of donations.

So, here is the question that I’d like to ask today.  What are some of the best, coolest, and most fun ways that you have ran a fundraiser and collected money to give to your favorite.

Please spread this around, because I’d love to hear all of your creative ideas!

Have a good day.

Forgot to Reschedule Endo Appointment, Oops

Chris Stocker

It’s been a while since my last A1C and my last endo visit.  I had an appointment scheduled in January, but it was cancelled because the doctor could not make the appointment.  My main doctor is on maternity leave, so the doctor taking her place has her own office and there was a scheduling conflict, so she had to cancel mine.  I just realized today that I never re-scheduled a new appointment, so I need to call tomorrow to make sure that I get a new appointment soon.

I was supposed to lose at least 5 pounds by next visit, and I guess you can say, luckily I got sick these last few days because I lost a few pounds, and now I am trying to keep them off.  Amanda and I are still settling into our new place and are cooking a little more often, but still not as frequently as we would like to.  Still wasting a lot of money and a lot of calories on take-out.

I am having some serious internet issues with Comcast right now, so I never know when I am going to actually have internet.  It works for a day, then doesn’t work for a few days, then works, etc.  Just one big viscous cycle, that I don’t like.  Anyway, my blog reader is up to close to 1,000 with a backlog of blogs, crazy huh?  I am determined to catch up on every single one of them, but it will definitely take some time, but I can get it done.

Well, time to get started on those blogs.