Kinderstart

My baby will be headed to Kindergarden in September 2013!

This is her first monthly kinderstart session, she was so excited!

MiniMed Paradigm Veo and CGM

So last night my husband and I attended our first session on insulin pumps.  A rep, who's also a nurse, and a pumper, was there for the night to introduce the pump and answer any questions.

It's the fist time that we've put any serious thought into switching to a pump.  I have very limited experince with them, and my husband has none.  We are currently weighing the pros and cons, but have started the paperwork to see what our insurances will cover.

Any advice from anyone?

Elf on the Shelf

So my girls are 6 and 4.  They are busy little girls.  They play hard.  They fight hard. They cry hard.  Did I mention they fight?  I'm sure they are typically little girls, I remember fighting with my older sister, and I see other siblings fight.  They can be so loving with each other, it's like their best friends one minute, then worst enemies the next, then back to best friends!

The months of October and November were difficult.  It felt like things we said as parents went in one ear and out the other.  I never wanted to be one of those parents that yelled at their children, but man, I could turn blue in the face and it wouldn't matter.

Then a friend of mine introduced us to the idea of Elf on the Shelf.  I was sold.  What harm could it do?  Sure it might even help the girls listen, and if nothing else, it would be something fun to do with them.

So, December 1 I strategically placed the Elf package in the living room and let them find it.  They were pretty excited as we had been telling them that we would get an elf the beginning of the month and had already explained the concept to them.  The other reason they were excited was because they were hoping they would have good reports sent back to the North Pole each night as they had already been told they were on Santa's Naughty List ( thank you Magic Santa video!  We were hoping this would entice their listening!  And believe it or not it did work.......for a few days!)

Introducing Buddy

Buddy first found hanging from the kitchen cabinets

Buddy propelling down the family room blinds

Buddy stayed hanging around the blinds while we went were away for our Diabetes clinic day .  The girls were told that Buddy didn't move because he had nothing to report back to the North Pole.

Buddy making snowflakes with doll scissors

Buddy and Barbie having a marshmallow and weiner roast

Buddy hiding in the red christmas vase

Buddy eating cookies.....and he tinted all the milk green!

Buddy toilet-papered our christmas tree

So the girls were totally not impressed with the last one....ewwww!!! That's toilet paper!!! 

I wonder what Buddy will do next?  If you have any great ideas, let me know!







Clinic Day

Our town has one hospital that is staffed with family physicians.  They are quite capable and very friendly, however, we wanted Amy to be seen by an Endo at a children's hospital.  We wanted her to been seen by people who treat diabetes everyday.  To put this in perspective, Amy is one of six kids in our town with diabetes.

We are lucky enough to have two excellent insurances that covers travel and expenses to go to these appointments.  I'm also lucky that I'm able to bank time at my work as it usually requires me taking two-three days off to go to these appointments.

Overall her check up was good.  Her A1C is down by .6 from August.  It's still not where we would like it to be, but hopefully next month we will see a further reduction.  Our other change includes testing before the bus in the afternoon and only have her snack if her BG is <7.0.  She is still higher than we would like before supper and hopefully this will help.

She enjoyed our trip, we stayed in a hotel with a waterside and pool.  My husband got to go this time too.  They spent about two hours in the pool each night.  We gave extra juice and snacks before bed, but we still managed to go low.  I checked her before I went to bed, and gave her some milk to bump her up, then at 2am I awoke to a very sweaty little girl.  She was 2.9.  I gave her a Jr Juice, then went for a snack.  We were leaving the next day and somehow had managed to run out of something with protein. I went to the front desk and explained what was going on.  They were excellent!  They opened up the continental breakfast area and turned on the juice machine.  We got more AJ and some whole wheat PB and toast.  So here Amy was propped up on the bed eating toast and watching cartoons in the middle of the night.  And thankfully she went right back to sleep when she was done.

Note to self, ensure even more snacks when a pool is involved!

For the love of Zofran

Zofran, also known generically as Ondansetron, is a D-Mom's best friend!  Amy is just recovering from her third gastro since diagnosis.  The first time we were just two weeks in and I didn't have a clue what to do.  The only sick day management education that I was given involved extra insulin for high sugars.  Amy had ketones and low sugar and wouldn't keep anything down.  It was a weekend, my husband was away and I was lost.  We ended up in emerge with the doctor telling me she had a urine infection.  I argued it was a stomach bug.  They gave her some fluids and sent us home.  It took her a full week to recover.

The next time, I was a little better prepared.  I knew to give small amounts of carbs every hour, how often to check her BG and for ketones, and had a nice sick day kit made up.  However she was still barfing profusely and couldn't keep gravol down.  This time, I had a CDE and Endo on-call.  Their suggestion.....Zofran.  I got a prescription from our local family physician, gave her a dose, and she honestly never barfed again after that.

This time.....Amy woke at 12:30am and luckily made it to the bathroom.  I'm a very light sleeper and heard her get out of bed, but I thought she just needed to pee.  She called out to me.  We tested, and got her settled again.  Did I mention my husband was away again!  And I couldn't fall back to sleep.  She woke again at 2:30, threw up in the bucket I left next to her bed.  I searched for the Zofran and couldn't find any.  We tested, got her settled away again, and I stayed awake, waiting until morning to get some meds for her. She has not vomited again, since I started giving her this med.

I'm happy to say, 36 hours later, she hasn't vomited once, her appetite is back, and she's up running around and playing again.  I love Zofran!


On another note, today is December 1, and we have just received our new Elf on a Shelf.  This is our families first time with the elf and the girls are so excited!  His name is Buddy!  If you have any great ideas on what we can do with Buddy the next few weeks let me know!

Enjoy your weekend