Learnings of a diabetic mum

Eva and I are now three months into life and motherhood, and so far so good. Eva has learned to smile, recognise people, chatter away and be generally adorable. Mummy has also learned a lot… 

• Abandon any hope of pre-bolusing for meals. Just because the baby is asleep when the plate hits the table, doesn’t guarantee you’re going to get to eat the food.
• When breastfeeding during a heatwave replace the majority of insulin with ice cream.
• Don’t attempt to do any fancy adjustments to basal rates to compensate for breastfeeding – it is impossible to predict whether the baby will feed for 5 mins or 45 mins. Just reduce basals by 20% across the board and eat more to deal with any lows.
• No baby bag is complete without at least 2 cartons of apple juice and a pack of fruit pastilles for any post breastfeeding lows whilst out and about.
• Likewise no house is complete without strategically placed apple juice cartons at every spot where you might feed the baby.
• Baby junk outweighs diabetes junk by a good few kilos. But carting it all around means you barely notice the diabetes junk any more
• Meters that beep when you apply blood are not helpful in the middle of the night when they wake the baby you’ve just spent an hour getting off to sleep.
• I was wrong when I thought waking up to treat a hypo ;