Update

I am woefully behind on updating here.  Things have just been spiraling out of control here, and February hasn't been a very good month for me.  Putting it in perspective, though, we are alive, and just got to spend a week with my parents.

It's just been a few weeks where everything seems to go wrong.  And they're little things.  But it's like the straw that broke the camel's back.

I got a letter saying I have no prescription drug coverage.  Which I knew was incorrect, but knew was going to be a pain to fix.  It turns out that the problem was the nurse who tried to e-prescribe the scripts, but she was not forthcoming about her mistake, and last I heard from her, there was nothing they could do and it was a problem on my end.  Obviously not true at this point.

I am completely fed up with the doctors and nurses in this diabetes program I'm in.  I thought it would be a good idea.  But the doctor doesn't listen, the care isn't coordinated, things are constantly slipping through the cracks, my lab paperwork is never right, etc.

My debit card expires at the end of the month.  The new one came in the mail, but when I call to activate it, all I get is a message saying that it can't be activated.

I came home from work on Monday and stepped in cat puke.  And I've cleaned up more today.

I'm taking another class for work two nights a week.  I went in to register for the exam through a testing service, and on my profile, the test I needed wasn't an option.  I had to jump through hoops to find out that when I requested permission to take the test back in November, it was never communicated to the testing service.

What makes my blood boil is all of these things should have been routine ... things that should just happen, and make life easier.  But it just seems like, for me lately, nothing ever works right.  And I honestly don't have the time and strength to fight all these battles.  It has left me really bitter, and emotionally drained.

Anyhow, that's enough for now.  I'll be back with some happier posts soon.

Diabetes

My post about the new job reminded me that I rarely post about myself anymore. A big part of the reason for this blog is because I'm not keeping a real baby book, so I'm trying to record things here for the girls to read. But I am realizing that it will also be important to them what ELSE was going on in our lives, besides them (you know, in the 2 or 3 minutes every day that we're not focusing on them).

I developed gestational diabetes around week 17 or so of pregnancy. After trying some oral medication with no real results, I was hospitalized for a weekend in November of 2008 to start insulin therapy. On insulin, my blood sugar was very well controlled. I also had a consultation with a diabetes specialist/dietician, and my maternal fetal medicine nurses required me to check my blood sugar 4 times a day and fax the results to them every Monday morning. (If it wasn't there by 10am, they'd start hunting me down.) It was actually harder for me to check my blood sugar (finger prick) than to give myself the insulin injections every day. I had very specific carbohydrate targets for each meal, and I could stick to them, because I knew it we had a specific goal. I also stopped working in late November, so I didn't have much to do except eat, check blood sugar, eat again, check blood sugar again. Once the girls were born, my blood sugar would go back to normal.

Except it didn't.

It's been over a year now. I'm still carrying way too much extra weight, which is probably my biggest issue. I don't exercise enough, because I can only find time once the girls go to sleep, and I'm exhausted by then. If I do make it to the gym, I have to worry whether someone is going to wake up before I can take a shower. If it's just one, Greg can handle it (we take turns going to the gym and doing the massive nightly clean up at home), but if 2 of them start crying, it's a lot to handle. We have made a lot of dietary changes in the last few years, but it doesn't seem to be enough. My fasting blood sugar first thing in the morning is ridiculously high, despite medication.

We are still trying to fine tune my medication. Some of it makes me miserably sick, some of it drops my blood sugar way too fast. Right now, I take the one that drops my blood sugar really fast in the morning, so my blood sugar actually drops before I get hungry for lunch... so I eat lunch earlier. And get hungrier in the late afternoon. It's a cycle I can't seem to get out of. And then I take the one that makes me sick (if I take too much of it) at night.

Diabetes is a serious disease. It scares me. I'm trying to live my life, and set a good example for the girls, and do everything I can to be around for as long as I can for them, and for Greg. My food excuses are that I don't always know when I'll get to eat again, I'm always hungry, and I don't know how long I will have to inhale some food before someone throws a tantrum. For the most part, we don't eat *bad* stuff. Just too much.

I read something the other day about someone who had been living with diabetes for 10 years and needed a kidney transplant. What?!? No.

I really need to make some more changes. Lose this weight.

I was doing weight watchers earlier this year, with meetings at work. But I wasn't really getting anything from the meetings - it was all stuff I learned while doing WW online a few years ago, except now I'm surrounded by a room full of people talking about food for an hour. I went to a few meetings, lost a little bit. Then gained a little back. And quit going. I wasn't tracking what I ate. I wasn't measuring.

I need to get it together.