Bree forgot her cell phone this morning. With her trainy the way it is, I don't like her to be without her phone, so I ran out the door with it, but she had already left, how I didn't see her go, i don't know, but just then it hit me that my senses weren't at peak function. I began to see the purple and white stars that signal a low blood sugar, my legs and stomach began to itch and my breath started coming along in chunky, laboured spasms.My mind began to wander and think in half sentences, so i ran into the house depending on my default co-pilot-mind, an accessory diabetics learn to build for themselves after enough of these experiences if they want to survive as long as they possibly can. Much like when your car battery is perishing on the road, and you've got a couple miles to go yet, you turn off the lights if you can and the radio, and focus all available power towards the act of carrying on til you reach the safety of your own driveway. So, I got to the kitchen, brain half shut-down, test-pattern in place in my head, emergency broadcast signal tingling in my ears.I open my test kit, gather a drop of blood and shove it into the glucometer to see what I'm dealing with.I get a 78. I drink half a bottle of regular Sprite and have a couple slices of grapefruit.I know the count will drop slightly further before pulling out of the nose dive, so i sit and stare out the window and listen to the radio, barely noticing either as the plummet makes my stomkach itch worse and I shake and cannot complete a sentence at all in my mind and I'm fully aware that I can't. Like the witch Medea in Homer's Odyssey, she turns some men into pigs, and lets them keep their rationale, so they know they're pigs, well Medea-induced or not, I know I'm a stammering idiot running on empty.My stomach starts to harden a little, the front of my brain gets hot and hurts...feels like it's turning to molten lead.The sugars working, I wait for the shakes, some of the symptoms are the same, for low and high sugars, that's why we have those nifty lil gucometers to tell us just how we should be panicking at any given time of distress. These shakes are worse, they're harder, you shake til your sternum and back muscles are weeping with the effort. I test again... 145.Yay! Good sign! I get up and try to throw the shakes by playing a little Mario Kart, letting my focus not be on my straining body, but on controlljng the little digital car.The car, like my blood sugar swings violently all over the track until i decide it's not a good idea just yet.I get angry, and I know it's another symptom, but the anger still seems justified, i get this way, when i'm doing what I'm supposed to, trying to control this wicked disease, is when this type of attack happens most frequently.Have you ever swam in deep water, that had a precipiece below, that you ould walk out just so far on..? Then one more step and you'd sink like a stone, gone from an uncomfortable, neck-deep environment of awareness, to a fathomless all-enveloping crisis situation? Staying in desperate control of your blood sugar, is like trying to function all day long, walking on that precipice, looking down through the water constantly, waiting to slip, waiting for something bigger than you to creep up through the depths and take a bite out of you, and all because you've done something wrong somewhere.The whole disease centers around guilt, because you have the reigns, it's up to you to stay totally on the track,at all costs, everyone can make you feel guilty, but they don't have to do the balancing act nor the suffering.If your count stays high a couple days, you suffer too, the heavy head, the blurry eyes,the fat hands and body ache, but it's because you want to stop gazing into the water, and tread without fear for a few ****ing minutes,************...okay, swearing, check the sugar again.... yep, 94...pilot to co-pilot, hit reserve fuel tanks, we're spiralling again.., reverie-abort.... I hit the fridge again, drink nearly the rest of two-litres of Sprite and finish the grapefruit,and take note that candy canes are much too tightly wrapped to be dealt with to be of any service. I have to loosen all the caps on the juice and the soda for moments like this, when they may be too hard to remove during a low.Like an abandoned cat with a can of tuna, I go completely opposable thumbless in moments like these.Sink or swim,sink or swim.Finally the hard shakes let me know I've reached the shore, and can haul myself onto the sand for a few moments, cuddle in a towel before I have to stick myself with more medicine, and walk back out to the precipice and begin dangling there again, toes out for the sharks.The amazing thing is holding the reigns, you eat and you inject, you do it all to yourself. You're the only one in the space capsule, alone in the nebulae. Where's Ray Bradbury when you need him, to narrate this **** aloud, and teach you how to deal with the empty beauty of space and time?Especially when it's trying to kill you?
It's hard on the people around you as well, that's why i continually try to write what it's like, so maybe they know that my stealth-mode isn't meant to piss them off, when I cannot complete a sentence, or look them in the eye, or hear them... or start to cry because the water's getting higher , or I'm drifting out towards a super-nova that they cannot see.When I turn into a babbling Helen Keller and grope madly for assistance.It's hard on them too, they can't even see the encroaching waters, or zombie hoard, or whatever their parallel would be.Honestly, I hope they never do.

...this disease, Diabetes, is very awful..and to think that kids have to deal with this also!? I wish they would find a cure! Pen, I dont know the words to say here exactly, but I'm so sad you have to go through this. Dont mistake that for pity, your a friend and its my nature to be "caring". The way you've described this disease is AMAZING, you really could help alot of people/familes to understand it..if only they could read this post....

*hugs*

Kids and animals too, I cannot imagine not being able to at least articulate the needs that go along with the distress. Thank you!!! That's all I really wanted to do, was communicate...a man ran into a store I was working at one night, desperately looking for sugar for his little boy in the car, just being able to help and calm them both was such a blessing for me,it IS really horrible, specially with the other two conditions i have blended in, I feel like a major nutcase sometimes , so these moments of clarity mean a lot,lol. I know how caring you are Lil, I've been personally blessed by your friendship, you amaze me. Don't ever stop!! You're truly a genuine rarity!! *HUGS!!*

You are an amazing person, getting through that must be tough on you...i'm not a medical expert but i recently read that exercise can help a bit. Out Mac.

Thank you Mac, it does help! That's one reason i get the good old music out. Thanks for reading and for the advice, both are muchky appreciated!

Pen I am sorry to hear that you also have to go through that. I watch my Grandmother at times when she starts the nose dive and if it hadn't been for her stash of Lays potato chips and O.J in the car who knows what would have happened.
I must say even though this is not a funny matter I had to chuckle at the whole abandoned cat with a can of tuna part. You really do have a way with the words.
Keep that sugar level up my friend.

Pos, I always told myself that I'd never get a disease that I couldn't pronounce or laugh at,well, I've got three now, I can't pronounce one of them and sometimes the laughter sounds like madness, but I still got my chuckle going on. I'm glad she had the OJ and chips!! Staschs are such a great idea, coz you just never really know whats gonna happen.Keeps your toe shoes on!God bless her and you, thanks for reading and commenting, makes my day!

man, that sux. Be careful, Pennster. My cuz just had his foot removed.

If i ever loose a foot , it's because it'll be stuck up someone's tight arse hole. But thanks for the concern.

I hate when I get shoe polish up the arse.

lmao, thats our Pen..... hehe

quote:

Originally posted by pen dragon:
If i ever loose a foot , it's because it'll be stuck up someone's tight arse hole. But thanks for the concern.

Correctamundo Lillibean *hugs*

quote:

Originally posted by pen dragon:
I always told myself that I'd never get a disease that I couldn't pronounce or laugh at,well, I've got three now, I can't pronounce one of them and sometimes the laughter sounds like madness, but I still got my chuckle going on.

I read this, & said in my head that this is definitely you. Despite all the things you've been through in your life, you've managed to see the light in everyone & everything & see positivity in many situations, & for that reason, you are an amazing human being!

Thanks for always listening and siting up with me when sometimes it wasn't all so easy. (idiot arses!!!!!!) You're an amzing young adult with great standards and ideals, and I truly believe in you, Karin. Any effort you make in life will change things big and small. Thank you for what you said, and being who you are. You're a genuine slice of hope.(With awesome taste in music and blessed with photog and writing skillses!!) Proud to know you!!

quote:

Originally posted by pen dragon:


Thanks for always listening and siting up with me when sometimes it wasn't all so easy. (idiot arses!!!!!!) You're an amazing young adult with great standards and ideals, and I truly believe in you, Karin. Any effort you make in life will change things big and small. Thank you for what you said, and being who you are. You're a genuine slice of hope.(With awesome taste in music and blessed with photog and writing skillses!!) Proud to know you!!

thanks. you're way too kind though, lol. i miss talking to you on AIM!