Diabetic idiot

By | 11 April, 2011

On occasional bright, sunny days when the birds are singing, the flowers are blooming and all is well in the world, I’ll eat a meal, do a blood test and see that I’m a 6. On those days I am a diabetic genius.

Then there are the other days when I miscount the carbs, forget to bolus or get a bit over enthusiastic with the insulin. On those days I’m just a normal diabetic.

And then there are days like today. I sat down to change my infusion set. I filled up a new reservoir, inserted a new set into my leg and primed the insulin through the tube. Then I connected the tube to the set in my leg and removed the old set. Except I didn’t remove the old set. I connected the tube to the old set and removed the shiny new set I’d just put in. On days like this I am a diabetic idiot, completely beyond help!

Category: Living with diabetes Mildly amusing

About Alison

Diagnosed with Type One in 1983 at the age of four, Alison's been at this for a while now. She uses Humalog in a combined insulin pump and continuous glucose monitoring system and any blood glucose meter as long as it takes five seconds or less.

11 thoughts on “Diabetic idiot

  1. Tim

    He he! I nearly do exactly this every time; sometimes I have to look very closely and make sure I remove the scabby, dirty, old set and leave the nice, clean set.

    I’ve also hit upon a new way of rotating my sets – I start at my belly button and rotate round clockwise a few inches each set – so I just have to remove the set that’s anti-clockwise from the most clockwise set. Easy!

    Reply
  2. lizz

    Lol! For that reason with my Cosmo I used to remove the old set while priming the new.

    What I have done is if I’m not concentrating (well, you know what happens, your son comes in and asks if you’ve seen his belt, the one he definitely out on the chair before leaving this morning…) is shoot the new needle in BEFORE priming. Also very irritating!

    Reply
  3. Alison Post author

    I’ve always left my old set in until I’ve got the new one in, so that if I suddenly had to stop mid set change I’d still have a working set in my leg that I could use. Theoretically sound, but like you say, this stuff becomes routine and life carrys on around you and before you know it you’ve done it all without thinking and messed it up!

    Reply
  4. Megs

    Ahh yes the Diabetic Idiots Club (D.I.C). I too am a fully paid up member . Why is it always a new infusion set that you yank out as the tubing gets caught around a door or drawer handle, its just never the old one.

    Reply
  5. Annette A

    Oh yes, I’ve done this one too. Put in the new cannula, taken the tubing off the old one, put a new tube on the pump and primed it. Plugged the tube into the new cannula and primed it also (the set I use comes in 2 bits, tube and cannula, so you can change the cannula without the tube, but they have to be primed seperately.). Then realised that actually I plugged it back into the old one, and hence have ‘primed’ the unit of insulin into me. So then I have to go find something to eat so I dont go low. And remember to move the tube over and prime the new set and remove the old set.

    Reply
  6. lizz

    Tim, Alison! I think you’d better ‘hide’ these entries so no-one but us can see them, in case the NHS police come storming through our doors and declares us too incompetent to be trusted with such complicated manoeuvers…!

    Reply
  7. Angie

    I tend to leave my old set in for a couple of hours, so this isn’t one I’ve personally done. I have, however, lost count of the number of times I’ve pressed the buttons on the set whanger in thing (TM) only to discover that I forgot to take the plastic off the sticky bit… I’ve also somehow managed on at least two occasions to get the tubing stuck *under* the sticky bit of the infusion site.

    And that’s not even counting things I’ve done on MDI, like dial up a dose for breakfast, realise I’m out of insulin, change the cartridge, and then go on my merry way without actually bolusing for the carbs I’ve just eaten.

    Why I’m not dead yet is a mystery… 😉

    Reply
  8. Lesley

    Like others, I usually leave the old cannula in for a couple of hours or so, so this wouldn’t happen.

    However, I often manage to prick my finger before I’ve put a test strip in my meter, and then I risk getting blood all over the place, or drying up, before I’m ready to actually do a test.

    Glad I’m not the only “idiot”!

    Reply
  9. Spike Jones

    My usual trick is to forget what I’m doing mid prime, having primed the tube & then wonder why I’m peeing like Niagara a couple of hours later… The only reason I haven’t done as others have described is because I always remove the old cannula before inserting the new. Of course, that means if I mess up the new, I’m really messed :-/

    Reply

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