Shoot Up or Put Up

I went to London for work yesterday. Not a major event really, I go a few times a month and it’s only a couple of hours by train. For some reason though the world was against me yesterday.

- 0630: Leave the house.

- 0635: Return to the house having remembered that I haven’t picked up my meter.

- 0705: Get to the station and ladder my tights getting out of the car.

- 0715: Get on the train and spill my hot coffee on my leg, luckily though I haven’t changed the laddered tights yet, so at least that’s something.

- 0800: Go to the bathroom to change my tights. Somehow during this escapade I manage to pull my infusion set out.

- Because I’m a bit of an idiot and am allergic to carrying lots of junk around I don’t carry a spare infusion set when I’m only out for the day – bad diabetic!

- Because I’m not a complete idiot, I do carry a syringe so that I can get insulin out of the pump should I accidentally remove an infusion set on a train.

- 0805: Stop muttering about the infusion set nightmare and get on with dealing with it.

- 0806: Realise I’ve forgotten what it’s like to use a syringe in public – the man opposite me looks at me a bit strangely as I disassemble my pump and use the syringe to draw insulin out of the reservoir.

- 0807: Wimp out of starting a diabetes education session with the man opposite as my brain is occupied with calculating how much to inject to compensate for the basal I’m going to miss, conscious that I have an important meeting at 1100 that I don’t want to hypo in.

-  0808: Realise that my diary is back-to-back with meetings pretty much all day which will make injecting every couple of hours a bit of a nightmare. Decide to keep an eye on CGMS, aim to inject every 2 hours and deal with problems as they arise.

- 0820: Realise that for all the time I’ve been dealing with the infusion set issue and wondering how I’m going to keep myself alive for the next 12 hours the woman across the aisle has been doing her make up. Why can’t my life be that simple?

- 1127: CGMS alarms to tell me I’m high. Normally I’d press a button for a quick bolus of insulin and no one would notice, but my only way of getting insulin is to take my pump apart and use a syringe. I decide that my kidneys won’t fry from sitting in excessive glucose for the 30mins it’ll take to finish this meeting.

- 1200: Most important meeting of the day is over and CGMS shows 14.6. I resist the instinct to just press a button on my pump and get the syringe out again for a splash of insulin to correct the high and some more basal to cover the next few hours.

- 1405: Why can I smell insulin? So that I can keep track of how much insulin I’ve injected, I’ve been bolusing the same amount on the pump every time I inject. This info is incredibly helpful but as the infusion set isn’t actually in my skin all this insulin is running down my leg and my tights smell of insulin. Nice!

The day continues – check CGMS; thank the god of diabetes tech for CGMS which makes this whole palaver slightly easier; inject; do my job; repeat.

- 2000: Arrive home and insert new infusion set, I feel whole again! Blood sugar is 13.8 which isn’t at all bad after a busy day of managing with only fast acting insulin and a syringe.

- 2245: Jump out of bed to put a couple of new syringes in my handbag for any future emergencies.

- 0257: Remember that I know someone in the London office who also has a pump and who could probably have given me an infusion set. Idiot!

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