Most of us have heard plenty about the dreaded "F-word." A lot of people use it in one way or another. Some people use it rather sparingly only to express anger about something. Others use it or a form of it as an adjective, adverb, conjunction, interjection, noun, preposition, pronoun, and verb. Generally speaking, such a word is not used on Eric's Planet, though occasionally it has been known to slip out.
In my case, there's another word that gets a lot of mileage around here. Diabetes. "Oh no, not THAT word again!" [sound of three people slapping themselves upside their heads] "Is that all he ever talks about?!?!?" Yep, that's all I ever talk about.
"What do you want for dinner?" "Diabetes."
"Where do you want to go for your birthday?" "Wherever I can talk about diabetes."
"What do you want for Christmas?" "Information about diabetes and more test strips."
Yeah, those conversations took place. [laughs so hard his ears pop] The truth is that I talk about diabetes because I'm not only fighting it—and will for the rest of my life unless they find a cure—but talking about it might have the horrible consequence of educating people. Believe me, based off some of the stuff I've heard, there are a lot of people who do not understand what I need to do every. Day. Of. My. Life.
I'm not the only one. There are millions of us. We've been known to go to your house in the middle of the night and leave sugar under your pillow while you sleep.
All right, enough of the silly; let's get down to business. This particular post was inspired by what I'll call a hiccup in my blood sugar level last week. As I've told many people, a "normal" blood sugar reading is 80-120 mg/dl, that is, 80 to 120 milligrams of glucose per deciliter of blood. (I aim for 100 because it's right in the middle of the range.) Blood sugar levels can and do vary throughout the day even in healthy people, and there are many factors involved. I won't get into that here.
In my case, even with using insulin, my blood sugar levels were all over the place. At one point, my glucometer was not able to give me a reading, though it did give me a reason: my glucose level was over 600. That's a LOT higher than the 80-120 range I mentioned earlier. Other readings were in the 250-400 range, which is too high.
The area where I live is in the midst of a heat wave. Insulin is affected by heat. We diabetics know that insulin should be kept as cool as possible. A vial should be stored in the fridge until it's opened; then can be stored at room temperature after opening. Room temperature means, say 70°F. I abide by that and have been fine. Leaving it out in a closed up car on a hot day where it just might boil is neither a good, nor a smart idea. Out in the crazy heat, the effectiveness of the insulin can be compromised. I suspect that this may be what happened here. I opened a new vial and apparently that did the trick because I've been OK ever since.
At this writing, I see my 59th birthday just a few weeks away. Assuming that I reach the age of life expectancy for men here in the United States, that means I get to deal with this for about another 15 years. I've been at this insulin-shooting game since 2006. If I can continue keeping serious complications at bay, then I should be OK. As of now, I have none of the typical issues that many diabetics deal with. My vision is good; kidney function, great. Neuropathy? Don't know what it is. Heart is good, blood vessels leading to and from my brain, all clear. Etc., so on and so forth.
Being OK for the most part is a good thing, but I'd better not drop the ball. That could send many years of hard work straight to the cemetery.
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